A modest jazz critic and retired English teacher, Randy L. Smith is hard pressed to account for his musical tastes. As a teenager in the early 70s, while almost everyone else in the rural hinterlands of eastern Washington State listened to Johnny Cash, he became unaccountably fascinated by jazz. In high school, he bought a gleaming silver Getzen Capri trumpet from Don Lanphere of Belmont Music in Wenatchee, not knowing that Don had recorded with Fats Navarro in 1948. Jazz is truly where you find it! As a student at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, his love of jazz continued unabated and his knowledge expanded. That passion glows undimmed to this day in his adopted hometown of Kobe, Japan where live and recorded music occupy much of his time. Along the way, he has contributed articles and interviews to Jazz Journal, Cadence, and to other publications in Japan and the Pacific Northwest. In his interviews, he strives to be a good listener and to let the musicians tell their stories. He is still attempting to master that delicate craft, while the Getzen remains securely in a closet.