FINELY-CRAFTED DANCE MUSIC: THE EASY WINNERS and FRIENDS (NICK ROBINSON, ZAC SALEM, ROBERT ARMSTRONG, IRENE HERMANN, MATT TOLENTINO, MARTY EGGERS, VIRGINIA TICHENOR) at the 2022 WEST COAST RAGTIME FESTIVAL

The EASY WINNERS are singularly delightful.

If I may, I will quote myself:

“There are so many names for the music The Easy Winners create (is it string-band music, ragtime, roots music, Americana, or venerable popular song?) that I have given up the quest to name it.  But it’s light-hearted, sweet, sometimes hilarious, sentimental in the best ways, old-fashioned without being stuffy.

To me, this music is completely charming — what I envision people who lived some distance from cities playing and singing at home (ideally on the porch in summer), old songs, pop songs, swinging without trying hard to, joining their individual string sounds and vocal harmonies to entertain family, friends, neighbors.  They feel a million miles away from music funneled through the iPhone into earbuds or blasting from someone’s car speaker: they remind me of a time when people made music on their own and they were expert at it even when Ralph Peer didn’t offer them a record contract: a landscape full of wonderful sounds, people creating beautiful melodies for their own pleasure.”

The Easy Winners are Nick Robinson, mandolin, guitar, vocals); Zac Salem (mandolin, guitar, vocal); Robert Armstrong (guitar, Hawaiian steel guitar, banjo-guitar, ukulele, musical saw, vocals); Irene Hermann (mandolin) — and for this set, so nicely video-recorded by Rob Thomas, they added kindred spirits Matt Tolentino (accordion); Marty Eggers (string bass); Virginia Tichenor (drums).

A friend sent me their eleven-song playlist, their set for dancers, at the 2022 West Coast Ragtime Festival, and it’s a delicious interlude, showing not only their joyous precision, but also their wide repertoire. They begin with the venerable NOLA strain, CREOLE BELLES, then WHISPERING, EL CHOCLO (Tango), SWIPSEY CAKEWALK, HELIOTROPE BOUQUET, FRANKIE AND JOHNNY, TOBASCO, STARDUST, THE ENTERTAINER, SAN and HINDUSTAN, and end with BUCKSNORT STOMP, aptly named.

I dream of hearing this in rotation over the sound system at Starbucks — but for now, make sure your friends and perhaps neighbors hear it too. Good for what ails you.

They refresh the ear . . . and we certainly need that.

May your happiness increase!

THE CAPTAIN STRIDES BY (Part One): JOHN ROYEN’S NEW ORLEANS RHYTHM and SOLO at the SAN DIEGO JAZZ FEST: DAN LEVINSON, KATIE CAVERA, MARTY EGGERS, HAL SMITH (November 29 / 31, 2019)

An authenticated signature.

Festivals and jazz parties make it possible for me to greet old friends again and bask in their music, but a great thrill is being able to meet and hear someone I’ve admired for  years on record — people who come to mind are Bent Persson, Jim Dapogny, Ray Skjelbred, Carl Sonny Leyland, Rebecca Kilgore, Hal Smith (it’s a long list) and now the wonderful pianist John Royen, whom I met for the first time at this year’s San Diego Jazz Fest.

At work / at play, 2014, with Marty Eggers and Katie Cavera.  Photo by Alex Matthews.

For John’s New Orleans Rhythm, the first set, he was joined by Dan Levinson, clarinet and tenor; Marty Eggers, string bass; Katie Cavera, guitar; Hal Smith, drums. I hear someone’s therapy dog, or an audience member was whimpering with delight.

SOME OF THESE DAYS:

WABASH BLUES:

WOLVERINE BLUES:

That was Friday.  We didn’t see John, and Conal Fowkes took his place at a set; we heard that John had decided (not really) on an internal home improvement, and had had a defibrillator installed at a nearby hospital.  This surprised me, because his beat has always been terribly regular.

But he reappeared magically on Sunday, looking like himself.  Virginia Tichenor graciously ceded some of her solo piano time so that he could play.  And play he did.

His solo playing was both assertive and delicate, spicy yet respectful of the originals.  John’s relations with the audience are so charming . . . and his playing, while not always fast or loud, is lively — lit brightly from within.

The Lion’s HERE COMES THE BAND:

ATLANTA BLUES, or MAKE ME A PALLET ON THE FLOOR:

and John’s delightful improvisations on MY INSPIRATION:

There will be a Part Two: John with Joe Goldberg, Marty Eggers, Riley Baker, and a brief visit from John Otto.  An honor to encounter the Captain, who creates such good music.

May your happiness increase!

WE SAVOR THE RITUALS (WITH A SMALL UPDATE): THANKSGIVING at THE SAN DIEGO JAZZ FEST (Nov. 21-25, 2018)

Even in the midst of darkness there are always reasons to be thankful.  Here is a detail from the classic Norman Rockwell portrait of a late-November American celebration, make of it and its assumptions (culinary, sociological, political) what you will.

But this post is about another ritual of communal gratitude, another place to give thanks: the thirty-ninth San Diego Jazz Fest, held this year from November 21 through the 25th. My update (as of late November 11) is to offer the flyer below, and to point out something I didn’t know when I’d written this blogpost — that the Saturday night Swing Extravaganza will also feature the wonderful band Michael Gamble and the Rhythm Serenaders with the wonderful singer Laura Windley. Add that piece of news into your computations.

I’m sitting here with the band schedule in front of me, and can narrate my own pleasure-map of delights for the weekend.  How about dance lessons, opportunities for “jammers” to play with others of their ilk, a Saturday night swing extravaganza?  Ongoing solo piano recitals featuring Kris Tokarski, Vinnie Armstrong, Stephanie Trick, Carl Sonny Leyland, Conal Fowkes, Paolo Alderighi, Paul Asaro, Marty Eggers, Virginia Tichenor?  Then sets by the Dawn Lambeth Trio featuring Marc Caparone, High Sierra, Grand Dominion, the Chicago Cellar Boys, the On the Levee Jazz Band, the Original Cornell Syncopators, the Heliotrope Ragtime Orchestra, Katie Cavera, Clint Baker, Hal Smith, Yerba Buena Stompers, Titanic, Colin Hancock, Charlie Halloran, Ben Polcer, Joe Goldberg, John Gill, Kevin Dorn, Andy Schumm, John Otto, Leon Oakley, Tom Bartlett, and more.

And more.  At any given moment at the fest, let us say on a Saturday, the music goes from breakfast to wooziness — 9 AM to near midnight — in six separate locations.  Using my right index finger (the highly-skilled instrument for such computations) I counted sixty-six sets of music on Saturday, sets either 45 minutes or an hour.

At other festivals, that would make for transportation difficulties (a euphemism for “How am I going to get to that other building before the band starts?) but since all the action is contained in one building, even people with limited mobility make it in before the music starts.

Did I mention that everyone I’ve ever dealt with at San Diego has been terribly nice, including such luminaries of cheer and comfort as Paul Daspit and Gretchen Haugen?  This is no small thing.

And for those of you who think you will be deprived of Thanksgiving edibles (which means “too much food”) as depicted by Mr. Rockwell above, take heart. There is a splendiferous buffet served on Thursday from 2 to 6 — you can reserve a place there, with a discount for those who do so before November 15: details here.  If you’re vegetarian or vegan, you’ll still totter out of there, quite stuffed.

I am a late adopter who hasn’t made all 38 festivals (to explain why would tax all your five wits) but when I did make my way to the Fest, of course it was video camera at the ready.  And here are three sets that pleased me greatly.  I have shot several hundred videos, and that’s no stage joke, but I don’t feel right about using videos of X if X isn’t at this year’s festival.  But the three sets below feature people who are alive and well for this year.  First, here are the Cornell Syncopators featuring Katie Cavera in 2017.  Then, here are the Yerba Buena Stompers in 2016, and here are Marc Caparone and Conal Fowkes paying tribute to Louism also in 2017.

Going back to 2009, I remember when I first started this blog, I used Rae Ann Berry’s videos as glimpses of the Promised Land.  Here, for example, is John Gill paying tribute, beautifully, to Mister Crosby, in 2009:

Why am I concluding this post with PENNIES FROM HEAVEN and John’s beautiful rendition?  It seems an obvious message as far as the San Diego Jazz Fest is concerned, this year or in years to come. Good things are coming, the lyrics say, but you can’t hide under a tree. If you bestir yourself on Monday, November 26, you’ll have to wait a whole year for this opportunity to be grateful amidst friends and lovely heated music.  Take a look here and you will be glad you did.  See you there.

May your happiness increase!

ON THE ROAD TO SEDALIA, MISSOURI (May 30 – June 2, 2018)

The Sages urge us to live in the moment, but I need something to look forward to — even if it’s nothing larger than that second cup of coffee.

But this post is about something far more expansive: the 37th Scott Joplin International Ragtime Festival that will take place in Sedalia, Missouri from May 30 – June 2, 2018.

The performers at the 2017 Festival, a welcoming bunch.

You can see the enticing list of the people who will be playing, singing, talking, and (if I guess correctly) being lively and funny at the 2018 Festival here.  I don’t know every one on the list, because I have never been immersed in ragtime, but those I do know are very exciting artists and good friends: Brian Holland, Danny Coots, Marc Caparone, Steve Pikal, Evan Arntzen (that’s the Holland-Coots Jazz Quintet), Carl Sonny Leyland, Jeff Barnhart, Marty Eggers, Virginia Tichenor, and Dalton Ridenhour.  There are just as many luminaries I haven’t mentioned here, and I hope they don’t take offense: look at the list to see what heroes and friends of yours will be there also.

The map suggests that the festival is neatly laid out, and it should be a pleasure to be trotting around in the late-Spring sun:

I expect to be dazzled by people I’ve never heard before (although I am no longer obsessed with Seeing and Hearing Everything — that’s for people with more energy) but here are two favorite groups / performers.  One is the Holland-Coots Jazz Quintet, the five brilliant planets that came together for a hot constellation last summer in Nashville.  I wrote about my visit here and about the CD that resulted here.

Incidentally, I don’t promote the CDs below as substitutes for the experience you will have in Sedalia — rather, as a way of making the time between now and May 30 seem easier to endure.

Here you can learn more and buy copies.

And if the thought of reading more words makes the room spin, try this:

As Eubie Blake would shout exultantly at the end of a performance, “That’s RAGTIME!”  And who would disagree?

The other group also has Brian Holland and Danny Coots at its center, but with the addition of the best chemical catalyst I know — the wonderful one-man orchestra, gutty and tender and rocking, Carl Sonny Leyland.  Here are more details.  And a few words from me.

OLD FASHIONED refers to two pleasures: music-making the way it used to be, and the cocktail . . . sometimes consumed in tandem.  Recordings of two pianos plus “traps” go back to 1941 or perhaps earlier — I am thinking of a Victor set called EIGHT TO THE BAR, featuring Albert Ammons, Pete Johnson, and Jimmy Hoskins, which was about twenty-five minutes of locomotion, no matter what the tempo.  Having the train come roaring down the track is a pure adrenaline jolt, but eighty minutes of high-intensity, high-speed music could soon pall.  So the three wise men have opted for sweet variety — slow drags and old pop tunes treated with affection, originals in different moods.  Thus the CD rocks its way to the end before you know it.  And the sound is lovely — it’s possible that Carl’s singing voice has never been captured so well on disc.

May your happiness increase!

FOUR DAYS at the SAN DIEGO JAZZ FEST (November 24-27, 2016)

THINGS I LEARNED (OR RE-LEARNED) AT THE 2016 SAN DIEGO JAZZ FEST:

1. Never set up a travel schedule that gets you home (after a long weekend of life-changing music) at 5:20 AM Monday.  Not “sleeping” on a plane is worth a higher fare.

2. Music is best experienced in the company of friends — those on the bandstand, those in the audience.  The former, a partial list: Marc Caparone, Dawn Lambeth, Ray Skjelbred, Conal Fowkes, Kris Tokarski, Clint Baker, John Gill, Duke Heitger, Jeff Hamilton, Kevin Dorn, Orange Kellin, Leon Oakley, Dan Barrett, Tom Bartlett, Stephanie Trick, Paolo Alderighi, Katie Cavera, Josh Duffee, Andy Schumm, John Otto, Dave Stuckey, Dan Barrett, Larry Scala, David Boeddinghaus, Nobu Ozaki, Virginia Tichenor, Marty Eggers, Mike Davis.

Off the stand: John Ochs, Pamela Ochs, Donna Feoranzo, Allene Harding, Rae Ann Berry, Barbara L. Sully, Judith Navoy, Mary (“The Ambassador of Fun”) and her twin, Chris and Chris, Paul Daspit, Jim and Mary McNaughton, Gretchen Haugen, Patti Durham, Angelica, Carol Andersen, Bess Wade, Cat and Scotty Doggett, Ed Adams.

Much-missed and I await their return: Hal Smith, Janie McCue Lynch, Donna Courtney, Mary Cross.

I know those lists are incomplete, and I apologize to any reader I’ve accidentally omitted.

3. This festival is delightfully overwhelming.  At any given time, music was happening in seven rooms simultaneously.  There was a Wednesday night session, a Thursday night session, full days on Friday and Saturday (with approximately seventy offerings of music, most an hour long) and a full afternoon on Monday.  By six PM on Monday, I was full and sloshing.

4. I am a man of narrow, precisely defined “tastes.”  I didn’t grow up sitting in Turk Murphy’s lap — now there’s a picture! — I began my listening education with Forties and Fifties Louis, so I need lyricism and melody the way plants need sun and air.

Many of the bands so dear to my California friends strike me as perhaps over-exuberant.  And when a fellow listener, politely curious, asked me “When did you get into trad?” I had to consider that question for a moment before saying, “I didn’t start listening to ‘trad’ . . . ”  As I get older, I find my compass needle points much more to subtle, quiet, sweet, witty, delicate — rather than the Dixie-Apocalypse.  Each to his or her own, though.

5. Videos: I videoed approximately eighteen sets, and came home with perhaps ten times that number of individual videos.  They won’t all surface; the musicians have to approve.  And I probably didn’t video your favorite band, The New Orleans Pop Tarts.  Rather than mumble about the unfairness of it all, come to next year’s Fest and live in reality rather than virtually!  Or buy an RV and a good camera so that you can become an official NOPT groupie-roadie-archivist.

6.  For the first time in my life I helped sponsor a group.  It was extremely rewarding to think that I had helped some music to be heard in public that otherwise would not have.  I’ve offered to do it again for 2017.  And, not incidentally, sponsors get to sit in the very front row, a great boon for people like me who want to capture the music to share with you.  Videographers like myself want to be made welcome.

7.  Moral tradeoffs are always possible and sometimes happily inevitable.  At the San Diego Jazz Fest, one can share a large platter of tempura-batter-fried pickle slices and fresh jalapenos . . . because one is doing so much walking that the second activity outweighs the first.  Or one tells oneself this.

8.  On a darker note, odd public behavior is more pungently evident. People who call themselves jazz fans talk through a whole set about the new puppy (and I like puppies).  Years ago I would have blamed this on television and the way viewers have been able to forget the difference between private and public behavior.  Now I simply call it self-absorption, and look for a window that I can open.

Others stand up in front of a band to take iPhone photos of the musicians, pushing their phones into the faces of people who are playing and singing. Photographers have treasured costly cameras that beep, whir, and snap — we ignore these aberrations at many events (I think some photographers are secretly excited by such things) but at musical performances these noises are distracting.

I won’t say anything about those folks who fire off flash explosions in well-lit rooms.

I cannot be the only person who thinks of creatively improvised music as holy, a phenomenon not to be soiled by oblivious behavior.  As a friend of mine says, “You’re not the only person on the planet.”

9. The previous paragraph cannot overshadow the generosity of the people who put on the Fest and the extreme generosity of those who create the music.  Bless them.  And the nice young sound people who worked hard to make music sound as it should!

It’s appropriate that the Fest takes place at Thanksgiving: I feel so much gratitude as I write these words, upload videos, and look at my notes of the performances I attended.

More — including videos! — to come.  Start planning to come to the 2017 Fest, to bring your friends, to sponsor a band.  Any or all of these activities are so much more life-enhancing than Black Friday.

May your happiness increase!

MUSIC IN ABUNDANCE, FOR WHICH I AM THANKFUL: THE SAN DIEGO JAZZ FEST (November 23-27, 2016)

One way to celebrate Thanksgiving — eating a communal meal:

(In honor of my vegan / vegetarian friends, among them Lisa, Susan, Hedda, Sam, Melissa, and others yet unmet, a photograph free from animals and relatives with knives.)

But there are other ways to celebrate gratitude — although we know such celebrations should be every day.

I am not light on my feet, and my usual dance partner is a camera tripod, so I might simply be observing this . . . but please note that it is just one part of the very pleasing San Diego Jazz Fest — which has been my Thanksgiving celebration for the last five or six years.

Here’s one of the great pleasures of last year’s Fest — thanks to Hal Smith!  Dawn Lambeth (more about her below) introduces Ray Skjelbred and Marc Caparone for a tribute to Jim Goodwin, Bing Crosby, and Louis Armstrong:

It would be unkind to relegate Dawn to the role of M.C., so here she is — one of the most subtly swinging singers I’ll ever hear:

Ray, Marc, Dawn, Carl Sonny Leyland, the Yerba Buena Stompers, David Boeddinghaus, Paolo Alderighi, Stephanie Trick, Grand Dominion, High Sierra, Kris Tokarski, Lakeshore Syncopators, Chloe Feoranzo, Hal Smith, Virginia Tichenor, Katie Cavera, John Gill, Marty Eggers, and more.  But you don’t have to imagine who might be playing and singing: you can visit here — with colored markers — to begin arranging a weekend of Thanksgiving pleasures, including parasol parades, brass bands, rockabilly, zydeco, and other dishes.

More about the bands here, and the crucial page — how to buy tickets! — here.  The whole website lives here on Facebook.

You’ll be grateful, I promise you.  So much more refreshing than carb-induced slumber, sports on television, and a week of turkey sandwiches, getting less appealing by the day.

May your happiness increase!

 

GOING MY WAY? (to the JAZZ BASH BY THE BAY, March 6-7-8, 2015?)

I hope that posts such as these aren’t too frustrating for those JAZZ LIVES readers who are far away from the particular Mecca of Hot.  If you’re in Illinois or Newcastle, you are hereby let off the hook.  But for those readers who can, or could, or might . . . read on.

The 2015 Jazz Bash by the Bay is happening soon — an opening concert / dance on Thursday, March 5, then full-steam ahead for Friday through Sunday. I have delightful memories of being there from 2011 on — a very friendly and hospitable festival, the staff and volunteers exceedingly nice, the rooms in which one hears and sees music very comfortable.  And the music itself, although the players and singers shift slightly from year to year, is always both superb and varied.  Your favorite bands — including High Sierra, the Carl Sonny Leyland Trio, Ivory & Gold, Ellis Island Boys, Crescent Katz, Cocuzzi/Vache All Stars, Le Jazz Hot, Royal Society Jazz Orchestra.  Soloists: Dan Barrett, Eddie Erickson, Rebecca Kilgore, Ehud Asherie, Stephanie Trick, David Boeddinghaus, Banu Gibson, Dawn Lambeth, Yve Evans, Jeff Barnhart, Jason Wanner, Marc Caparone, Bob Draga, John Reynolds, Jeff Hamilton, Paul Mehling, Clint Baker, John Cocuzzi, Allan Vache, Danny Coots, Virginia Tichenor, Marty Eggers, and many more.  Everything from hot jazz to swinging rhythmic ballads to ragtime, stride, and boogie-woogie, with offferings of zydeco and gypsy swing.

It’s a lovely place to visit, also — my meteorological memories of Monterey in March (say that once at a conversational tempo) are lovely: sunny and warm.

Here are the band schedules.  I spent a happy fifteen minutes this morning with a green highlighter, noting sets I absolutely wanted to be at — and there were no idle hours.

And just for our collective happiness, here are my videos of a March 2011 performance featuring Clint Baker, Marc Caparone, Howard Miyata, Mike Baird, Dawn Lambeth, Katie Cavera, Jeff Hamilton, and Marty Eggers — mixing sweet, swing, and hot.

I am eagerly looking forward to it.  And I hope to see you there, too.  No fooling. And if you’re hungry for more music, you can search this site for “bash” or “Monterey” and find videos from 2011-14 . . . better yet, you can make plans to attend.

May your happiness increase!

A THANKSGIVING CORNUCOPIA OF JAZZ: SAN DIEGO JAZZ FEST (November 26-30, 2014)

You can always have turkey if that’s your pleasure, and I hope you will have many occasions to get together with your family, but the San Diego Jazz Fest — the generous creation of America’s Finest City Dixieland Jazz Society comes once a year.  This November will be the thirty-fifth such explosion of music, and it is not to be missed. The SDJF website can be found here, and the amount of good music offered during this long weekend is more than amazing.

Some of the wonderful musicians and bands who will be there are —

Connie Jones-Tim Laughlin New Orleans All Stars, Jim Buchmann, Stephanie Trick, Paolo Alderighi, Marc Caparone, Carl Sonny Leylnd, Marty Eggers, Virginia Tichenor, High Sierra Jazz Band, Josh Duffee’s Graystone Monarchs, the Fat Babies, Yerba Buena Stompers, Dave Bennett, Cornet Chop Suey, Katie Cavera, Titanic Jazz Band, Grand Dominion, Ellis Island Boys, Duke Heitger,Leon Oakley,Kevin Dorn, Conal Fowkes, Orange Kellin, Euphoria Brass Band, Andy Schumm, Chris Dawson, Jonathan Doyle, John Royen, High Society Jazz Band, Sweethearts of Swing, Night Blooming Jazzmen, Clint Baker, Hal Smith, Tom Bartlett, Chris Dawson, Mission Bay High School Preservationists, Sue Palmer and Motel Swing, the Memphis Speed Kings, Red Skunk Gipzee Swing, Corey’s Rolling Figs, Jazz Souffle, South Street Market Jazz Band Reunion, Uptown Lowdown Jazz Band,  Dixie Express Jazz Band, Dick Williams’ Jazzsea Jam, Hal and Georgia Myers’ Dance Classes, Heliotrope Ragtime Orchestra, Chloe Feoranzo, Uptown Rhythm Makers, San Fernando Valley Banjo Band, San Diego Banjo Band, Paragon Quartet, South Bay Jazz Ramblers.

If you can’t find some favorites, some people or groups you love to hear in that list, I would worry for your sake. Anhedonia is a terrible burden.

Paul Daspit, who runs the giant rollicking enterprise, clearly loves the music, and he is a good sort who wants to make sure everyone — musicians, guests, volunteers — is happy and fulfilled.  Full to the brim of fine hot music.

You can buy tickets online here and I urge you to do so soon.

The San Diego Jazz Fest is something to be thankful for.  Truly.

May your happiness increase!

FINE TIMES AT CLINE, 2013 AND COMING SOON (July 12, 2014)

One can get tired of the settings in which most jazz is found: small rooms, dark and dense with chatter; larger windowless ballrooms. Even someone who spends as much time indoors as I do enjoys hearing the music in a beautiful setting out of doors — where the only sound competing with the hot music for our attention is birdsong.

We had a wonderful time at the 2013 Cline Wine and Dixieland Festival: music hot and sweet in the open air, delicious wine and good food, and delight everywhere.  I can’t offer JAZZ LIVES readers a plate of oysters or pour anyone a glass, but I can share three videos I recorded on that fine summer day.

Ray Skjelbred in a pastoral solo recital:

The Black Diamond Blue Five (Clint Baker, Leon Oakley, Robert Young, Marty Eggers, and Bill Reinhart):

Scott Anthony’s Golden Gate Rhythm Machine (Bob Schulz, Jim Maihack, Clint Baker, Robert Young, Bob Hirsch, Bill Maginnis):

This year, Cline Cellars offers another delicious experience, on Saturday, July 12, 2014, from 11 AM to 6:15 PM, at Cline Cellars, 24737 Hwy 121, Sonoma, California, four miles north of the Sears Point (Infineon) Raceway.  Bands invited to perform — at this writing — are Black Diamond Blue Five, Devil Mountain Jazz Band, Golden Gate Rhythm Machine with Pat Yankee, Jambalaya Big Swing Band, Natural Gas Jazz Band, Ray Skjelbred and his Cubs, Royal Society Jazz Orchestra, and there will be piano mini-concerts by Ray Skjelbred, Bob Hirsch, Marty Eggers, Virginia Tichenor, Tom Barnebey.

Admission: $30 advance (before July 10), $35 at the gate. Wine, beer, food available. Or, bring your own picnic. Call 707-940-4025 for reservations, information.  Click here to buy reservations online. For those who don’t feel like walking long distances, there is a shuttle bus to the festival from the Jacuzzi Winery parking lot across the street. Wine enthusiasts who like to buy wine at Cline Cellars can receive a 15% discount on bottle or case sales on the festival date: show your festival badge. And other creature comforts: there are always several sites for music going on at once; shady or in the sun, with comfortable places to sit. We’ll be there.

May your happiness increase!

ON THE ROAD TO MONTEREY (March 2014)

I am not readjusting Kipling’s famous lines for the twenty-first century, simply reminding everyone that the Jazz Bash by the Bay (a/k/a Dixieland Monterey) is almost here.  Think of this blogpost as a public service announcement, more exciting but just as necessary as those reminders to change the battery in your smoke detector.

Here is the schedule of sets for Friday / Saturday / Sunday (that’s March 7-8-9) . . . very good news indeed, with music from Rebecca Kilgore, Marc Caparone, Carl Sonny Leyland, Jeff Barnhart, Dan Barrett, High Sierra, Dawn Lambeth, Jeff Hamilton, Marty Eggers, Paolo Alderighi, Stephanie Trick, Bob Draga, Gordon Au, his brothers and uncle How, the Ellis Island Boys, Katie Cavera, Le Jazz Hot, Paul Mehling, Sam Rocha, Bob Schulz, Ray Skjelbred, Jason Wanner, Bob Draga, Danny Coots, Yve Evans, Frederick Hodges, Sue Kroninger, Virginia Tichenor, Steve Apple, Chris Calabrese, Don Neely, Eddie Erickson, Ed Metz, Phil Flanigan . . . . and I know I am leaving out a multitude here. But the music starts on Thursday night, so be sure to get there early!

Here is information on ticket pricing, ordering, and all that intriguing data.

I think JAZZ LIVES readers who live in California know all about the Jazz Bash by the Bay, for it has been generously offering hot music of all kinds for three decades.  If the festival is new to you, and you can consider being there, you should: it has been a consistent pleasure for me since the first deliriously good one I attended in March 2010. I won’t belabor the subject, but if you search this blog for “Monterey” you will find enough wonderful improvisatory evidence; if you go to YouTube and type in “Dixieland Monterey” or “Jazz Bash by the Bay” the same thing will happen.  A powerful series of advertisements for those who can carpe the diem while the diem is still hot, or something like that.

May your happiness increase!

IT HAPPENS IN MONTEREY (March 7-9, 2014)

These two worthies found love at the Jazz Bash by the Bay:

I am not proposing that everyone who goes to this year’s festival (March 7-9) will come away with the Love of His / Her Life — maybe you are all already spoken for.

But the music will be wonderful. And I write this as someone who’s been there since 2010.

For me, the Jazz Bash by the Bay was a transformative experience.

I had not been to California since having been conceived there . . . . insert your own witticism here. And when I had the notion in March 2010 of going to see and hear the people I so admired in their video appearances, I expected to have a good time in a new jazz setting, perhaps make a few new friends.

It was a life-altering experience: I came back to New York and said to the Beloved, “I’ve never had such a good time in my life. Do you think we could spend the summer in California?”

Fast forward to 2014, where I am writing this from Novato, with serious plans to make the Golden State my retirement home.

So if the Jazz Bash by the Bay can make one couple find love; if it can make a native New Yorker say, “I’ll move to California,” I think its powers are . . . powerful.  But enough personal narratives.  What’s in store for you?

As always, a wide variety of well-played music.

You can visit the site to find out if Your Favorite Band is going to be there, but here are some kinds of music that will be played: blazing stride piano in solo and duo, boogie-woogie, sweet singing in so many forms, rocking small-band swing, New Orleans ensemble polyphony, trad, Dixieland, blues, zydeco, gypsy swing, classic songs from the Great American Songbook, Jazz Age hot dance music, ragtime piano, stomp, swing, music to dance to, San Francisco jazz, washboard rhythm, music to hold hands to.

And the stars?  Well . . . Ray Skjelbred, High Sierra, Carl Sonny Leyland, Bob Draga, Rebecca Kilgore Trio, Dan Barrett, Ivory and Gold, Ellis Island Boys, Marc Caparone, Le Jazz Hot, Jeff Hamilton, Dawn Lambeth, Virginia Tichenor, Marty Eggers, Yve Evans, Katie Cavera, Paul Mehling, Clint Baker, Stephanie Trick, Paolo Alderighi, Frederick Hodges, Jim Buchmann, Eddie Erickson, Jason Wanner, John Cocuzzi, Howard Miyata, Big Mama Sue, Ed Metz, the Au Brothers, Bob Schulz, Pieter Meijers, Brady McKay, Tom Rigney, Royal Society Jazz Orchestra . . . and more, and more.

Important links.

The BAND LINEUP.

The all-important too-Much-Of-A-Good-Thing-Is-Wonderful SCHEDULE, which calls for careful planning (“If I go to see X, then I have to miss part of Y, but it puts me in a good place to be right up front for Z.  Anyone have a Tylenol?”) — with four or five sessions going on at the same time.

And most important — with a Sidney Catlett drum roll or a Vic Berton tympani flourish — the GET TICKETS NOW page.

I try to hold down the didactic tendencies that four decades of standing in front of sleepy (good-natured) young men and women have solidified, but I hope readers will permit me this basic logic exercise.  Festivals where people buy tickets last forever.  Festivals where people don’t vanish.  And then there is a wailing and a gnashing of teeth — very hard on the neighbors and harder on the dental work.  I think of the California festivals that have moved into The Great Memory even in my short acquaintanceship with this state.

(Or, as William Carlos Williams — or was it Philip Larkin? — wrote: “Want it to stay?  Do not delay.”)

So I hope to see throngs of friends and even strangers at the Jazz Bash by the Bay.  Anything that makes live jazz in profusion go on is a good thing.

P.S.  Need more evidence?  Go to YouTube and type in “Dixieland Monterey,” or “Jazz Bash by the Bay,” or the name of your favorite artist.  I, Rae Ann Berry, and Tom Warner, among others, have created many videos — enough to while away the hours in the most energized ways.  Proof!

May your happiness increase!

RIPENESS IS ALL: JAZZ ON THE VINE AT CLINE CELLARS (July 13, 2013)

Might I remind my Northern California friends of something good (“algo bueno,” as Dizzy Gillespie would have said) on Saturday, July 13, 2013?

Some details.  You might want to take notes here.  Five venues, music going on simultaneously — the BARREL ROOM, the MISSION, the GREAT LAWN, the TASTING ROOM DECK, and the PIANO CORNER.  The bands are listed above; the piano sessions feature Ray Skjelbred, Bob Hirsch, Virginia Tichenor, and the Ragtime Skedaddlers.  Music from 11:00 AM to 6:30 PM, which is jazz enough for anyone.  In beautiful Sonoma, too!

And — the way things go at beautiful establishments like Cline Cellars — I have reason to expect there will be wonderful beverages in glasses and delicious things to eat . . . . for you to purchase.  My previous dealings with Cline have all been more than pleasant, even though this is the first Day of the Dixieland I have been to.  So I am looking forward to great combinations, say MABEL’S DREAM with a glass of zinfandel . . . anything is possible!

I also hear tell that you can bring your own picnic, but be sure to bring more than you need, so that you can offer your jazz heroes and heroines a piece of fried chicken, a hard-boiled or deviled egg: playing jazz is hungry work.  They’ll love you for it.

Details and tickets here.

May your happiness increase! 

DOIN’ THE SONOMA STOMP: JAZZ and WINE in EQUAL MEASURE at CLINE CELLARS (July 13, 2013)

For those who love jazz but never make it to clubs (dark, noisy, too late) and festivals (too much of an investment) here’s a simpler kind of gratification: a one-day jazz party in a beautiful Sonoma, California vineyard on Saturday, July 13.  

I don’t know the personnel of every band, but I am making some educated guesses that Clint Baker, Scott Anthony, Ray Skjelbred, Marty Eggers, Don Neely, Andrew Storer, Steve Apple, Virginia Tichenor, Leon Oakley, Robert Young, Frederic Hodges, and Pat Yankee will be there.  (Feel free to add your name in a comment if I have unintentionally left you out.)

I also know that there will be beautiful vistas for the eye (vineyards tend to be spectacular) and intriguing things to eat and drink, or the reverse.    

It should be a simply swell affair.

May your happiness increase!

FEEL LIKE A (JAZZ) BASH? (MARCH 1-2-3, 2013, MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA)

The music doesn’t start for another ten days, give or take — but we’re excited about the 2013 Jazz Bash by the Bay (or you can call it Dixieland Monterey . . . call it what you will as long as you support it by your presence!).

The Beloved and I will be there for as much of it as possible.  The music begins on Thursday night (Feb. 28, if my dates are right) with a special benefit concert by “We3” — Jeff Barnhart, Danny Coots, and Bob Draga — and runs like an express train until Sunday, March 3, late in the afternoon.

Here‘s the schedule.  And although my counting skills are imperfect, I see 149 or so sets in that weekend — because of simultaneous action in a variety of rooms.  What this means to me: Marc Caparone, Dawn Lambeth, Jeff Barnhart, Anne Barhart, Bryan Shaw, Howard Miyata, John Reynolds, Clint Baker, Ralf Reynolds, Katie Cavera, Carl Sonny Leyland, Banu Gibson, John Sheridan, John Cocuzzi, Allan Vache, Ed Metz, Paul Keller, Sue Kroninger, Eddie Erickson, Chris Calabrese, Jim Fryer, Danny Coots, Jeff Hamilton, Virginia Tichenor, Marty Eggers, Gordon Au, Justin Au, Brandon Au, David Boeddinghaus, Jason Wanner, Ray Templin . . . and you can add your own favorites, heroes, heroines, and heartthrobs.

Here‘s ticket information.  Few people I know are moved to take positive action because of fear and dread, but the evidence speaks for itself: many jazz festivals have vanished or morphed unrecognizably before vanishing: join us at the Jazz Bash by the Bay!

And for those readers who say, “I’m not convinced.  I need evidence before I get in the car, find someone to walk the dog, and unstrap my wallet,” will this do?  Recorded on March 2, 2012 — something to provoke SMILES:

May your happiness increase. 

THE JAZZ BASH BY THE BAY IS COMING! (March 1-3, 2013)

I’m happy, excited, bewildered, and reaching for the oaktag and the colored Sharpies.  No arts and crafts project is on the horizon, but Dixieland Monterey’s JAZZ BASH BY THE BAY has just published its 2013 schedule.  This moment is always a combination of elation and puzzlement.  “Are all my favorite bands playing or am I dreaming?” to quote a late-Thirties record.  Yes, there’s John Sheridan and Jeff Barnhart, Carl Sonny Leyland and the Au Brothers, High Sierra, The Reynolds Brothers, David Boeddinghaus, Banu Gibson, Katie Cavera, Marc Caparone, Eddie Erickson, Sue Kroninger, Danny Coots, Howard Miyata, Pieter Meijers, Allan Vache, Bob Draga, Ivory and Gold, Jim Fryer, Titan Hot Seven, John Cocuzzi, Virginia Tichenor, Marty Eggers, Ivory and Gold, Frederick Hodges, We 3, Jerry Krahn, Ed Metz, Paul Keller, and more . . .

That’s wonderful.  Then the headache starts to creep up my neck.  “All right.  I have to see X but Y is playing at the same time, and Z starts a half-hour later.  Where shall I go?”

We should all have such problems.  Plot out your perfect weekend — including dance lessons and a Thursday-night concert by We 3 (Barnhart, Coots, Draga) to kick things off properly.

Here is the schedule.

Try it for yourself.  You have seven weeks to calculate the possibilities that will bring the most joy.  But you can do it!

And I’ll see you in the Portola Room, or the De Anza, or the Bonsai . . . look for me and say hello!

May your happiness increase. 

ON THE WAY / TO MONTEREY / JAZZ BY THE BAY

Many JAZZ LIVES readers aren’t close enough to California to hear the siren song of Hot Jazz that will be emanating from the 2012 Jazz Bash by the Bay in Monterey.

And carry-on rules are stringent, so I can’t establish a raffle for the most enthusiastic / lightest reader to be smuggled aboard my JetBlue flight.  Anyway, the Beloved has first dibs — although being a woman of discernment and breeding, she would require a seat.

But it’s not too late to remind, to urge you all to put aside the possibly mundane plans for the coming weekend and choose a Jazz Holiday.  Ask yourself, “Would Turk Murphy spend his weekend taking the car in for an oil change?”  Would Big Sid Catlett take Fluffy to the groomer’s instead of playing the drums?”  “What would Lee Wiley do?”  “Would George Lewis spend his time putting up the new curtains for spring?”  If none of these names resonate with you as a personal role model, please feel free to fill in the blank until you come up with the proper answer: “Given the chance, ______________ would be heading for Monterey.”

Having arrived at this revelation, come join me and hear the Reynolds Brothers with Marc Caparone, Dawn Lambeth, and Katie Cavera; the Bob Schulz Frisco Jazz Band with Doug Finke, Kim Cusack, Jim Maihack, Scott Anthony, Ray Skjelbred, and Hal Smith; Bob Draga; Eddie Erickson; the Vache-Cocuzzi Swing All-Stars with John Sheridan; Carl Sonny Leyland; the Titan Hot Seven; High Sierra with Bryan Shaw, Pieter Meijers, Howard Miyata; Jeff and Anne Barnhart; Jerry Krahn; Sue Kroninger; Chris Calabrese; Jason Wanner; Marty Eggers, Virginia Tichenor; Royal Society Jazz Orchestra; Yve Evans; Gonzalo Bergara; a host of youth bands.  And more.  Here’s the link to the schedule.  Feast your eyes, as they used to say.

I don’t want to be grim, but festivals are quietly closing up all around us — not only in California.  Better to create a pleasant surprise for this next weekend than to regret indefinitely into the future.  And that’s no stage joke.

See you there!

HOT JAZZ IN THE WINE COUNTRY: TED SHAFER’S JELLY ROLL JAZZ BAND (Jan. 8, 2012)

There might be better ways to spend a Sunday afternoon than in the company of a hot band playing King Oliver and Jelly Roll Morton, but so far science has not found it.  Think of the raised dopamine levels!

Rae Ann Berry, the guiding light for traditional jazz in the San Francisco Bay Area, brought me to the monthly meeting of the Napa Valley Dixieland Jazz Society — where the guest band was Ted Shafer’s Jelly Roll Jazz Band.

You can find out more about the NVDJS here.  Their regular sessions take place at the Embassy Suites, 1075 California Blvd., in Napa, on the second Sunday of the month from 1-5 PM.

The band was Ted and Ken Keeler, banjo; Leon Oakley and Rick Holzgrafe on cornet and trumpet; Glenn Calkins, trombone; Pete Main, clarinet; Virgina Tichenor, piano; Jim O’Briant, tuba; Burt Thompson, drums.

And here’s some of the music they played:

SNAKE RAG:

CAMP MEETING BLUES:

TIGER RAG:

MILENBURG JOYS:

WORKING MAN’S BLUES:

To learn more about what’s happening in the Bay Area jazz scene, visit Rae Ann’s site for an up-to-date listing, here — and check out her YouTube videos — well over two thousand at last count — www.youtube.com/sfraeann

ONCE AGAIN, IT HAPPENS IN MONTEREY — the 2012 JAZZ BASH BY THE BAY is COMING!

I’m a late-adopter but a deep convert to California jazz.  My first exposure to it in the flesh took place a year ago at the Jazz Bash by the Bay in Monterey, and — since tempus fugit at an alarming rate, the 2012 edition will be here in two months.  Here’s a link to the site:

Sue Kroninger, who not only runs the show but also sings and plays the washboard, tells me, “The theme of the year is variety, diversity, mix and match.  We’ve got a whole bunch of exciting and unexpected pairings from within the core bands and it is my fondest wish that guests will have a tough time deciding among all the choices.”

I know this is true from my one experience last year: I had a long session with the schedule and a highlighter, thinking, “I want to go here, but if I do that, I can’t go there.”  We should all have such problems.

Between 11:30 AM Friday, March 2, and late afternoon Sunday, March 4, you’ll have more than one hundred and sixty sets to choose from, from solo piano to the Royal Society Jazz Orchestra, and dance lessons from Dave & Linda Dance Company.

Some of the other players and bands are John Sheridan, Katie Cavera, Eddie Erickson, Bob Draga, Hal Smith, Bill Allred, Doug Finke, Bob Schulz and his Frisco Jazz Band, Take Two, Old Friends, Reynolds Brothers, High Sierra, Marc Caparone, Hal Smith, Carl Sonny Leyland, Josh Colazzo,  Mary Eggers, Virginia Tichenor, Titan Hot Seven, John Cocuzzi, Allan Vache, Ed Metz, Side Street Strutters, The Barehanded Wolfchokers, Yve Evans, Gonzalo Bergara, Jeff Barnhart, Anne Barnhart, Jerry Krahn, Tom Hook, Bill Dendle, Shelley Burns, Westy Westenhofer, Jason Wanner, Howard Miyata, Bryan Shaw, Mark Allen Jones, Frederick Hodges, Crown Syncopators Ragtime Trio, Chris Calabrese, Dave Gannett, the Rhythm Hounds, Grant Somerville, Reedley River Rats, Crazy Eights, Bob Phillips, George Young, Saxaphobia, Danny Coots (Musician of the Year at the festival, with good reason), sets of gospel music for Sunday, tributes to Bix, Nat Cole, Fats Waller, Harold Arlen, the washboard, Scobey and Clancy . . . duo-piano sets, lots of solo and group ragtime, and many surprises, as people sit in and have a good time, on and off the bandstand.  Most sets run an hour, giving us leisurely mini-concerts.

To purchase tickets, visit here.

Children under 12 are admitted free with an adult, as are high school students with an ID.  Discounted tickets are also available for college students, so if you have a music major in the house or just someone glued to his or her iPod oriPhone, the discounted tickets make a meaningful gift — perhaps the beginnings of a conversion experience.

Dear grandparents who lament that the young people “aren’t coming to hear our kind of music”: now’s the time to take steps to reverse the trend!  Jazz, like charity, begins at home.

Here’s some vivid evidence from 2011.  First, A KISS TO BUILD A DREAM ON, featuring Marc Caparone, Bryan Shaw, Howard Miyata with High Sierra:

And another kind of romantic serenade, SENTIMENTAL GENTLEMAN FROM GEORGIA by the Reynolds Brothers:

And 2012 promises even more!  So — to refer back to a song performed by Clarence Williams around 1933 — I hope you’ll come over and say “Hello”!  I’ll be juggling a video camera and a notebook. And I’ll be happy as the day is long.

JAMMIN’ AT NICK’S: Jan. 11, 2010

On January 10, 2010, the energetic Rae Ann Berry captured these performances by the San Francisco Traditional Jazz Foundation Staff and Directors Band — jamming at Nick’s at Rockaway Beach in Pacifica, California.  It wasn’t the Nick’s of “sizzling steaks” and fabled memory, where Eddie Condon and his friends played before Eddie decided to open his own club in 1946, but the ambiance was the same.  In fact, both selections — SUNDAY and AM I BLUE? — are played at those nice medium tempos that musicians of a certain age and musical education associate with Condon.  And the solos — compact and eloquent — would have pleased him greatly. 

The players are Bob Schulz, cornet; Bill Carter, clarinet; Marty Eggers, piano; Bill Reinhart, bass; Scott Anthony, guitar; and Virginia Tichenor, drums.  It’s possible, if you get into the right mindset, to imagine — in your mind’s ear — that this is a session for Commodore or Decca, with Bob’s serious, flexible lead (Marsala, Max, or Muggsy), Bill’s curlicues (reminiscent of Pee Wee, Cless, or Marsala) and a strong rhythm section driven by Scott’s swinging guitar and Marty’s Stacyish piano.  And — with apologies to the dozen fine trombonists I know — the simple two-man frontline is eager, dancing, and light on its feet.

Ignore the dancers; ignore the conversation: the music’s delightful.  No one was embarking on a studious repertory recreation: they just got in the spirit and stayed there.  All hail!  (And Rae Ann has posted another substantial handful of performances by this band with guest singer Pat Yankee, doing old favorites and Hot Five tunes.  Rewarding stuff!)

BARRELHOUSE GOES TO CHURCH

Pianist Virginia Tichenor (casually fierce) and plectral shaman Craig Ventresco offer meditations on Joe Oliver’s RIVERSIDE BLUES (composed by Thomas A. Dorsey) — which contains blues and hymns superimposed. (MABEL’S DREAM has a similarly-shaped Trio section, in mood if not in chords — perhaps both of those multi-strain compositions owe much to brass-band march music.) 

 

 Silverware and dishes crash; someone in the audience unwisely attempts to whistle the melody.  But none of this deters Virginia and Craig from their intense, holy, funky pursuits.  Frank Melrose approves.  Thanks once more to SFRae Ann and her magic camera!