Hentoff dead

Columnist, jazz critic, author was 91

NAT HENTOFF, an unwavering defender of the First Amendment and unparalleled jazz critic, died Saturday to the sounds of Billie Holiday at his Manhattan apartment. He was 91.

The longtime Village Voice columnist and contributor passed away of natural causes while surrounded by family, said his son Nick.

Civil libertarian Hentoff (photo right) wrote more than 35 books on topics from education and free speech to jazz and country music. There were also a pair of memoirs, “Speaking Freely” and “Boston Boy: Growing Up with Jazz and Other Rebellious Passions.”

“Nat Hentoff was a gas to read and a joy to edit,” tweeted fan and former colleague Jack Shafer, now of Politico. “A 1st Amendment radical, a sharp music critic, and an inquisitive reporter. And a good egg.”

The Boston native received an American Bar Association Silver Gavel Award in 1985 for his coverage of the law, and an honorary law degree from his alma mater Northeastern University in 1985.

The author and agitator also became the first non-musician cited by the National Endowment of the Arts as a Jazz Master.

He profiled Bob Dylan in 1964 for The New Yorker, accompanying the singer-songwriter to a Manhattan recording session. Hentoff would write liner notes for albums by Dylan, Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles.

His love of jazz led to friendships with luminaries like Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, while his work as a freelance writer led to a connection with Malcolm X.

He spent a half-century with the Voice, and contributed to a disparate array of publications: the Washington Times, The New York Times, Playboy, Esquire and Down Beat magazine.

He also wrote a weekly column until this past September for WorldNetDaily.com.

The iconoclastic Hentoff was liberal yet pro-life, a tireless defender of the Constitution, a critic of both President Nixon and President Clinton.

He came to New York out of college, landing a job as a disc jockey before becoming an editor at Down Beat and joining the Voice in 1958.

“I came here because I wanted a place where I could write freely on anything I cared about,” Hentoff wrote when leaving the weekly in January 2009.