Last Tuseday, midway through his October 2009 New York City tour, Duke Heitger was scheduled to bring his trumpet to Roth’s Westside Steakhouse to play duets with pianist Ehud Asherie. One of Ehud’s friends, the Italian clarinetist Attillo Troiano, was there and joined the fun. (You might not have heard of him, but you will — he’s 27, comes from Matera, Italy, and is also a wonderful tenor saxophonist.)
Lorna Sass, photographer and blogger extraordinaire (www.lornasassatlarge.wordpress.com) was also there and shared a few of her portrait studies of this trio.
Duke, working hard, to great effect.
A young master — you’re going to hear from him!
The best part of this final portrait is the one we might at first overlook or even think a failure of Lorna’s camera — the blur of Ehud’s left hand. But those of us who have watched Ehud know that this portrait is true to life, that his fingers do fly over the keys!
I imagine my faithful readership saying, “Great portraits! Too bad we couldn’t hear what the trio sounded like.”
Your wish, as they say in the movies, is my command. Here are Duke, Ehud, and Attillo romping through a set-closing SHEIK OF ARABY:
It takes presence of mind and a clear head to play ballads in a noisy restaurant, which is what this trio did — so here are two such moving examples: APRIL IN PARIS and YOU GO TO MY HEAD.
Notice that the trio plays APRIL IN PARIS without any of the Fifties Basie cliches — just as a lovely melody! And they honor YOU GO TO MY HEAD in much the same way:
Great pleasure and emotional depth — worthy of being captured twice!
JAZZ LIVES 
It’s too bad that the musicians have a menu board as a background instead of some nice velvet draped behind them. It could be known as the Drapes of Roth.
good one, Bill!