Longtime Chronicle and Examiner jazz critic Phil Elwood, who died Jan. 10, was remembered today in a packed memorial at Yoshi's in Oakland.

"Phil was the quintessential jazz critic," said performer Jon Hendricks, who met Mr. Elwood at clubs and festivals. "Most jazz critics love the music, but Phil knew the music as well as loved it."

Chuy Varela, from KCSM, served as a well deserved Masters of Ceremonies. A special all-star tribute band led by saxophonist Mel Martin, featuring vocalist Kim Nalley, trumpeter Allen Smith, pianist Dave Mathews, bassist Robb Fischer, percussionist John Santos, and drummer Eddie Marshall provided music, along with performances by Mike Lipskin (solo piano)and Richard Hadlock's trad-jazz band. Solos were also provided by Denise Perrier and Michele Rosewoman.

A plaque was installed in his honor at his customary table at Yoshi's where you often found him sipping Chardonay and listening to Jazz.

I didn't know Phil as well as most who attended, but like so many people in the Bay Area, he became an influence to me. I was fortunate to attend two of his jazz appreciation classes while at the Berkeley Jazz School.

Class with Phil was always facinating. I think that Chronicle jazz writer Jesse Hamlin, said it best; "I remember him coming into his Monday night jazz history class at Laney College in the mid-'70s," "with a funky old record player and a old briefcase stuffed with scratchy albums, most without their jackets. He'd just start riffing and reminiscing and playing records, never referring to notes, for 90 minutes at a stretch. That music was in his veins."

His appreciation for music went well beyond jazz. For he felt, as he so often paraphrased Duke Ellington, "that there are only two kinds of music, good and bad."

"Phil Elwood was born March 19, 1926, and raised in Berkeley. He first saw Count Basie in 1939 from a ballroom balcony in Oakland, which sparked his lifelong interest in jazz."

"He used to ride his bicycle around to Oakland thrift stores and spend his paper route money buying old jazz 78s by King Oliver, Jelly Roll Morton and others. Those discs were the beginnings of a legendary jazz record collection, which he stored in a serpentine basement in his North Berkeley home."

He was also one of the first people to broadcast jazz on the FM dial. His weekly radio program, "Jazz Archive," began in 1952, when very few people even owned FM radios. His show continued on Berkeley's KPFA until 1996.

Phil was a "life-long friend of jazz and an irreplaceable treasure for the Bay Area music community."

Exerpts are from an article entitled "Phil Elwood: 1926 to 2006," written by Joel Selvin, Senior Chronicle Music Critic.

As an added note, Joshua Kosman had an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, Tuesday that talks about the Sunday celebration at the Great American Music Hall, entitled; "Late music critic, radio broadcaster Phil Elwood gets an exuberant tribute."