Song of the Day: Billy Bang Quartet, Live at the Knitting Factory, 2000

The second great musician to die recently is Billy Bang. The wonderful jazz violinist became something of a sensation in the early 2000s with the release of his phenomenal Vietnam: The Aftermath, his attempt to deal with his experiences in the Vietnam War through his music.

I also met Bang once at a wedding, although I never saw him play live. He was very nice to me in our brief conversation. It's one of only 2 conversations I've had with relatively big-time jazz musicians. The other was, oddly enough, another violinist, Eyvind Kang.