A movie about a guitarist ... by a guitarist

One of the coolest things about Steve Vai is that he is committed to his love of the instrument and music. Many artists have enjoyed artistic freedom, controlling their output and being able to maintain their visions thanks to his Favored Nations label.
Several years ago, Vai greenlighted a movie bio-pic about the legendary Hank Garland, called Crazy. I hadn't heard of this movie before coming across it on Netflix, and enjoyed it immensely.

Granted, it's a fictionalization, and gives short shrift to Garland's terrific jazz playing, but the first 30 minutes are a delight for fans of jazz guitar, western swing, or rockabilly playing. The opening shots of a room filled with Gibson and Gretsch archtops are a players' dream sequence.

For those unfamiliar with Garland, check out his recordings with Gary Burton. Burton says he went to Nashville to record with Boots Randolph, a local Evansville, Ind., hero when Burton was growing up, hired to play on Garland's jazz album.

The result is magic -- some of the best, hard swinging small combo music you'll hear. Garland reminds me of Barney Kessel at times, playing with that easy swing not matter the tempo, with a touch of blues every now and then.

His chord knowledge is just astounding, though. He jumps into quick chord stabs in the middle of a melodic run, then slips back into the run. Other times, he uses chains of chords to embellish a melody.

Check out Crazy if you like movies about musicians and great music. Watch for real-life guitarist Tony MacAlpine's screen debut as Wes Montgomery!

Oh, and producer Vai slips in for a moment Hank Williams.

Music service ... or disservice?

I subscribe to several music services, including Napster and eMusic, for accessing music for my listening enjoyment, for work and for teaching. All of these sites offer their helpful "picks" or recommendations, but there's a huge difference between the recommendations made by the sites.
Compare Napster's top picks to eMusic's:
Napster:
Lyla by Avishai Cohen
The Architect of Modern Bossa Nova (Antonio Carlos Jobim)
The Best of Dizzy Gillespie
Ultimate Big Band Collection: Glenn Miller
Body and Soul, by Louis Armstrong

eMusic:
Pathways, by the Dave Holland Octet
Kind of Blue, by you know who
Lush Life, by John Coltrane
Half the Perfect Word, by Madeleine Peyroux

This a list of really great and important work done half-a-century ago ... and three new releases. Making Kind of Blue
one of your picks on these sights is analagous to "phoning it in": you've obviously not heard anything new so you're falling back for the obvious.

In fairness, both sites are pushing Esperanza Spalding on the eve of her new release, which is great. Scroll down a little bit to find my opinions of Ms. Spalding.

But as wonderful as she is, she is but one of hundreds of hugely talented people recording and touring today. Most of whom are getting the short end of the stick because record companies -- and their apparent proxies, the music services -- are beholden to their back catalogs of classic recordings.

If jazz is in trouble, it's because these companies have decided the marketplace only has the capacity to grow by one or two new names each year (this year's additions are Michael Buble and Spalding). There's more money to be mined in what was recorded 50 years ago, so why bother?

It's got to be extremely difficult for musicians to get their names known and to build any kind of music sales -- it's not right to make them compete with Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie.

An extra treat at the Somerville Jazz Festival

Made it to Somerville in time to catch all of Louis Hayes' set -- the set list included some Monk, some Coltrane, some Adderley ... Hubbard and Shorter tunes. Terrific!
I took a Bloggie, hoping to capture at least one performance but forgot to change the settings -- after getting about 2 minutes of the opening tune, the memory card was full and the camera jammed up ... but I did get this video of the mayor of Somerville, Brian Gallagher, declaring Sept. 12 as "Louis Hayes Day" in Somerville.




Here's Louis showing off his proclamation:



Wouldn't it have been great to have captured a bit of the performance -- especially since Hayes brought Javon Jackson out! What a great treat!

A Central Jersey jazz weekend

This weekend offers local jazz fans a feast and a festival ... Princeton's Jazz Feast on Saturday, and Sunday's Somerville Jazz Festival. Both have great lineups -- can you make both?

Princeton's feast opens with the Princeton University Jazz Ensemble -- a top notch group -- and follows with the New Legacy Jazz Band. Bucky Pizzarelli returns at 2:30 to help accompany Nicki Parrott -- that will be a great treat.

The afternoon is rounded out with The Fins and Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks will wrap things up.

Sunday's fun begins at 1 p.m. and has a fabulous lineup: The Curtis Brothers, "Sweet Papa" Lou Donaldson, Melissa Walker and the great Louis Hayes to close it. Last year, the festival ended with Jimmy Heath -- do I see a pattern here? If so, it's a good one!

Both events are downtown and outside, so plan on getting in early for the best spots.

Thursday in Princeton

Came across Adam Parker-Lavine and friends playing at Princeton's Farmers Market today:





Sorry for the lo-fi audio, but it's always nice to hear live music enhancing a gathering.

Jazz in Jersey City Friday

If you've a taste for jazz delivered fresh, head to Casa Dante in Jersey City, Friday. Laura Hull will be joining Vic Juris and Steve LaSpina for a set starting at 7:30 p.m.
If you've not heard Ms. Hull, be sure to visit her website; ditto for Mr. Juris, one of the best guitarists in the area. They should make a great combination.Ms. Hull is not only one of New Jersey's busiest performers, she's also the current president of the New Jersey Jazz Society.
Casa Dante is at 737 Newark Ave.

New Brunswick project taking off

New Brunswick is an often-overlooked oasis of terrific jazz, much of it safely cocooned within Rutgers' scattered venues.

Recently, a group of in-town jazzbos launched the New Brunswick Jazz Project, aimed at increasing the visibility and awareness of jazz in the Queen City. Headed by Rutgers prof – and Posi-Tone Records artist -- Ralph Bowen, the group has emerged as a solid source of jazz performers around town. I had a chance to review Bowen's Due Reverence for AllAboutJazz.com recently – you can read the review here.

The group has been organizing events in recent weeks, and Thursday, saxophonist Todd Bashore and his quartet will perform at Makeda at 338 George St. The show starts at 7:30 p.m., runs to 11 p.m., and there's no cover charge. The quartet includes pianist Orrin Evans, Yasushi Nakamura on bass, and Chris Brown on drums.

This show is a bit of a tune-up date for the group, which will be recording in August, ahead of Bashore's departure to hook up with the Max Weinberg Big Band for an upcoming tour.

Summertime, and the re-issues are jumpin' ...

It's the middle of the summer, apparently not the best time to release a new CD. For those willing to try, beware of the competition!
According to AllAboutJazz.com's CD release schedule, this month has been rife with re-issues. From John Coltrane to Charles Mingus, Louis Armstrong to Bill Evans, it's been a crowded field of big names. Revamped, re-issued, reworked or re-mastered, it's a tough crowd to go against.
Next month perks up, though, with releases from Dave Liebman, Esperanza Spalding, Brian Bromberg, Vijay Iyer, Kenny Werner and Jeff Berlin.

Brains, beauty ... and a bass

If you've not listened to Esperanza Spalding, you're missing out on a rare treat.
Spalding is a 25-year-old dynamo, maybe the best thing to happen to jazz in a decade or two because she has the star quality missing from so many young players. Eldar and Julian Lage are exciting players, but Spalding is not only a capable player -- she's also a singer capable of making a song her own.

Check out this video of her performing Stevie Wonder's "Overjoyed":



We can thank Pat Metheny for this treat: the story goes Esperanza was ready to quit Berklee after spending two semesters lugging her bass around, and switch to a political science major. But Metheny told her not to, pointing out she has the undefinable quality that can make an artist rise above others.

Need more proof? Here she is Jimmy Kimmel's show:





How can jazz be dying when it draws someone so full of life?

Fairy tales can come true ... it can happen to you

Choosing to be a musician is a commitment for the long-term, especially if one aspires to be a jazz musician. For every Jamie Callum or Eldar, there are thousands of determined players woodshedding every day and dreaming of having a hit record.
They may have even already recorded the tracks that will break through – and don’t know it. That’s what happened to New Jersey pianist Joel Zelnik.
Zelnik is a regular performer in New York and Northern New Jersey clubs, where he and his wife Francine Evans draw crowds with their tributes to Frank Sinatra, Big Band girl singers and other shows.
His career began in the late 1960s, when he formed the J. Zelnik Trio. The group’s swinging performances earned them lots of fans, including Dr. Billy Taylor, who would feature tracks from an LP recorded by the trio in 1970, Move, regularly on his radio shows.
Turns out, Move is a big hit in Japan … in 2010.
The album wasn’t a big seller initially, in fact, when the son of the trio’s drummer David Rosenburg, who died some years after the recording was made, wanted to hear his late-father’s work a few years ago, the only copy anyone seemed to know about was on Zelnik’s shelf.
Zelnik made a copy of the recording and sent it to Jay Rosenburg (son of David). Jay enjoyed it so much, he began a one-man crusade to spread the music of the J. Zelnik Trio.
Thanks to the Internet, Japanese businessman Keisuke Taniguchi became a fan, investing time and money in producing a CD to release in Japan.
Search online for the J. Zelnik Trio and a handful of Japanese sources pop up – using Google’s translator, a few things were clear: the album is legendary among jazz fans there (and they are a dedicated and informed bunch); it features such tunes as “Tune Up,” “A Minor Thought” and “Will You be Mine”;… and it’s selling out.
It’s such a hit, the Japanese Think! Label has already arranged to release a follow-up, Joel Zelnik Trio Live At Steinway Piano Gallery.
Both recordings are available stateside from Dusty Groove’s American site, dustygroove.com.

Summary judgment: Royce Campbell

I just received a new CD from guitarist Royce Campbell, the third he's kindly sent me to review. While I owe him a longer writeup on his "Movie Songs Project" with Phil Woods, I wanted to share his name and my thoughts on his music sooner than I'll be able to do otherwise.
Campbell's latest release is "Solo Trane" (on Moon Cycle Records), a collection of John Coltrane tunes arranged for the guitar. Most musicians have enough trouble getting comfortable with Coltrane's often-complex harmonic ideas to skip trying to craft intelligent or creative arrangements -- it's all about the speed of soloing for too many Coltrane-wannabes. I've only had a chance to hear about half of the release, but it's clear Campbell is firing on all cylinders on these cuts. His treatment of "Naima" is magnificent; quietly passionate while still exploring all of the harmonic potentials of the song.
"Trane Track" gets a fun, strummed treatment to bounce melody and solo lines from ... I'm anxious to hear it again.
"The Movie Songs Project" (on Philology Jazz), a collection of movie soundtracks with bassist Bob Bowen, drummer Ron Free -- and a freelancing Phil Woods -- will satisfy bebop fans of such soundtrack faves as "Manha De Carnival" or "Laura." This group plays with classic cool, easily swinging while soloists tear through. Woods plays with a quiet intensity -- you can always count on quality improvisation with him, but he seems to be enjoying this outing a lot. I never thought of "Baby Elephant Walk" as much more than a novelty tune, but in the hands of capable musicians ...
The first listen I had of Campbell was his "Art of Chord Solo Guitar," which I wrote about for AllAboutJazz.com (you can read it here).
I found Campbell's solo work to be top-notch; it's great to see he isn't hindered in a band setting -- or by some of jazz's most challenging compositions.

A look at musicians' hard lives

If you'd like to get a pretty realistic glimpse of the life of a jazz musician, turn in to HBO's "Treme," set in post-Katrina New Orleans.
Several of the show's primary characters are musicians, jazz or other, who eke out a living in one of America's most musical cities. If you can't make it here, can you anywhere?
Wendell Pierce stars as trombonist Antoine Batiste, marching in funeral lines by day and gigging anywhere he can at night. In one early episode, a taxi driver holds onto his horn while Antoine checks in on a gig, getting an advance to cover the fare.
Rob Brown's New York-based Delmond Lambreaux walks out of a gig at Small's in one episode to head south.
The show has featured appearances by Allen Toussaint, Dr. John, Elvis Costello, Steve Earle, Sammie Williams, Donald Harrison Jr., Galactic, Trombone Shorty Andrews, Deacon John, The Pine Leaf Boys, and the Rebirth and Tremé Brass Bands for additional local flavor.
The show doesn't gloss over some of the hard realities of being a musician -- for example, both Antoine and Delmond are estranged from their families initially (Antoine seems to have a couple ...), which adds a smack of realism.
If you really want to see life on a jazz tour, though, check out the blog saxophonist Froy Aagre wrote for Jazz.com here. There's a bit of culture shock as she discovers the difference between being a professional musician in Europe and one in America, but it's also great to see things through her eyes ... and ears.

Summer's near and jazz is in the air

Last night launched John Henry Goldman's summer series of perfomances at Labyrinth Books on Nassau Street in Princeton, which will continue each Wednesday night through July. If you missed it, you can catch John Henry, with Luke Abruzzo, Gary Schaeffer and Mike Ipri at Tre Pieni in Forestal Village at 7:30 p.m. Saturday night.
Friday, you can catch the VooDudes at the South Brunswick Jazz Cafe at 8 p.m., Dick Gratton at the Chambers Walk Cafe in Lawrenceville from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. And next weekend, enjoy the Wendy Zoffer Jazz Group at the Princeton Shopping Center from noon to 3 p.m. June 12, or help Stanley Jordan raise money for CASA Mercer County at the Salt Creek Grille in Forrestal Village on June 13 (the same day Fred Hersch and Joel Frahm are at the Lawrenceville School as part of the Princeton Festival).
There's so much great music to enjoy in Central Jersey -- be sure to get out and show your support for your favorite musicians.

Time to move on?

I'm about to betray my generation, but I have to say I'm growing tired of the music of my youth. This is something that many of my fellow baby boomers apparently haven't felt ... yet.

While I still dearly love listening to -- and regularly do -- the music I grew up with, from the Beatles to George Benson, and Deep Purple to Return to Forever, I am forever hunting down new music to enjoy.

In recent years, I've found some recordings that I think will hold up over the years, just the way "Sgt. Pepper's" or "Kind of Blue" has, and I've mentioned them in other posts.

But I find the inability of many people to hear and fully enjoy such new music to be completely mystifying -- how can you find satisfaction in a steady diet of 50 or 60 year old music?

Dare I say it? Those recordings and musicians were great, but were not perfect. And you can be assured the last thing Miles Davis would have wanted is for his fans to stop hearing new music.

Thanks to sources like Napster, emusic and CD Baby, it's possible to consume a huge amount of new music, releases from musicians you've never heard of, from all around the globe.

Many are uninteresting or dully conceived; many are dazzling and brilliant. Are they as ground-breaking as "Giant Steps" was? No ... but how often can you listen to that and still feel it's originality?

I don't know if Ray Barretto's "Time is, time was" will be a classic, but I know I love to hear it as much as I love hearing Weather Report's "Black Market."

I don't know if critics and listeners will treasure Stefon Harris and Blackout's "Urbanus" as much as they treasure Charles Mingus' "Ah um," but I know it gives me the same pleasure as the first times I heard Mingus.

Some musicians attain greatness through ideas that flash like brilliant meteors; others are great through the brilliance of solid and steady performance. It's not always easy to tell which is which, when all we see is the brilliance, but you'll never know if you've closed your eyes.

Need proof? Check out the documentary "Jazz in the Present Tense," by directors Lars Larson, Peter J. Vogt and Michael Rivoira. It's not available widely yet, but here's a review by AllAboutJazz.com editor John Kelman that details the film's highlights.

Mary Lou, we hardly know ya ...

The Princeton University Concert Jazz Ensemble will be paying tribute Saturday to Mary Lou Williams, possibly jazz's most overlooked genius, on the centennial of her birth.

Maybe it was her gender, maybe it was the company she kept (she worked for Dorsey, Goodman, Ellington ... you name it, anyone with a decent band in the 1930s wanted her arrangements), maybe she's just not had the kind of continuous presence many others have gotten; whatever the reasons, it's time to correct the oversight and give her her due.

Let's hope this concert goes a long way towards doing so. If it doesn't, it won't be because of the music: the jazz ensemble -- directed by Anthony Branker -- will play Williams' "New Musical Express," "Mary’s Idea," "Walkin’ and Swingin,’" "In the Land of Oo-Bla-Dee" and other standards she wrote or arranged.

Tickets are $15 and can be reserved here.

If you want to sample Williams' work, check out the fun novelty boogie-woogie "47th Street Jive," or "Harmony Blues." On for a longer listen, try the "Zodiac Suite" from 1945. Later on, Williams took to writing gospel music, capped by the beautiful "Black Christ of the Andes" in 1964. She returned to writing jazz, releasing such gems as 1974's soul jazz outing "Zoning."

Mary Lou Williams' unerring ear kept her composing through five decades of music, and she was always able to bring something new to her work. She deserves wider recognition and appreciation, which Saturday's concert may help launch.

Enjoy a big band?

If you enjoy big band music, there are precious few opportunities to hear one outside of New York City.

One regular exception is the Jazz Celebration Big Band, which performs (almost) monthly at the Temperance House in Newtown, Pa. -- and will at 8 p.m. April 29.

The band will also have an added attraction: former Woody Herman saxophonist Larry McKenna. As Cadence magazine noted in a review of one of McKenna's releases, he shows "the skills and stylistic mannerisms that earned him a spot in the 1959 Woody Herman band and the high esteem of his home city's Jazz community."

Reserve tickets now for this event, which often sells out -- even without headliners like McKenna -- thanks to the band's quality and vocalist Claudia Perry.

Jazz writers pick award nominees

The Jazz Journalists Association announced the finalists for the 2010 Jazz Awards, with a nice mix of young and old musicians in the list of the nominated.

Some of the newer names worth checking out are bandleader Darcy James Argue (who garnered nominations in five categories (Up & Coming Artist of the Year, Composer, Arranger, Big Band for his Secret Society and Record of the Year) and Vijay Iyer (nominated for Musician of the Year, Composer, Record, Small Ensemble and Pianist).

Lifetime Achievement in Jazz nominees include Muhal Richard Abrams, Jimmy Heath, James Moody, Wayne Shorter and Randy Weston -- and how James Moody and especially Wayne Shorter haven't already been awarded this honor must be a bit of an embarassment for the JJA. From Art Blakey to Weather Report, Shorter was a great contributor to the sound of jazz in the '60s to the '80s. Any self-respecting musician should know at least a handful of Shorter's compositions.

Nominees for Record of the Year include Argue's "Infernal Machines" and the Vijay Iyer Trio's "Historicity," and "Travail, Transformation and Flow" by the Steve Lehman Octet, "Folk Art" by Joe Lovano, Henry Threadgill's "This Brings Us To" and "Esta Plena" by Miguel Zenón.

New Jersey is well represented on the list -- with Bucky Pizzarelli up for Guitarist of the Year honors, and two WBGO hosts nominated for the Willis Conover-Marian McPartland Award for Broadcasting: Josh Jackson, for his "The Checkout -- Live at the Village Vanguard" program and (naturally) Gary Walker's "Morning Jazz."

Before the winners are announced, check out the nominees you haven't heard -- I guarantee you'll find some excellent jazz.

Shows to see this week

I haven't been able to stay current with all of the great performances these days, but here are a few Central Jersey Jazz highlights to check out:

The John Bianculli Trio with Earl Sauls on bass and Taro Okamoto on drums will be at Steakhouse 85 on Church Street in New Brunswick from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday.

Philadelphia-based Ellipsis will be at Small World Coffee on Witherspoon Avenue in Princeton, 8:30 p.m. Saturday.

The Stryker-Slagle (that's Dave Stryker and Steve Slagle) are featured at Trumpets Jazz in Montclair, Saturday.

Bucky Pizzarelli should be declared some kind of national treasure -- see why when he plays at Shanghai Jazz Wednesday night.

And guitarist Dick Gratton is featured in Lawrenceville twice this week: Friday at Chambers Walk Cafe and Saturday at Amalfi's.

Get out and enjoy live jazz this week.

March: in like a jazz lion

Thursday, March 11
Join the fun at the Hopewell Inn with the jazz jam lead by Jim Popik, of Black Diamond Jazz. Bring your horn, ax or sticks anytime after 8 p.m.

Friday, March 12
The John Bianculli Trio, with vocalist Jackie Jones will be at Christopher’s at the Heldrich Hotel, 10 Livingston Ave., New Brunswick, from 8:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m.

Dick Gratton is at the Chambers Walk Café in Lawrenceville from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Fridays.

If you’re a fan of guitarist Dave Stryker, you’ll be glad to know he’s got a new CD out, One for Reedus (Steeplechase, 2010) -- head to Cecil’s in West Orange from 9 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. for the CD release gig. Appearing with him are Jared Gold on organ, and drummer Steve Williams.

Jerry Vivino brings his quartet to Shanghai Jazz in Madison tonight. It’ll be a good time – although he might be playing more blues since the gig with Conan ended …

Sarah Partridge
sings for the crowd at Hibiscus Restaurant at tonight’s Jazz Friday show, 7 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Eryn Shewell may be New Jersey’s next “big thing”: her compositions cover everything from folk to R&B; her voice moves from Norah Jones smooth to Janice Joplin rough … when matched with her guitar chops and terrific band, it’s a rich combination. You can catch her at Giamano’s Restaurant in Bradley Beach at 8 p.m. tonight.

Guitarist Jim DeAngelis will be at Bottagra Restaurant in Hawthorne at 7:30 p.m. tonight with Jake Kulik, Lady Ci Ci and Don Williams.

Saturday, March 13
Pepe Moralli is this week’s featured jazz disciple at the Candlelight Lounge, 24 Passaic St. in Trenton, today. Music starts at 3 p.m.

Rio Clemente will be performing at 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. with Carmine and Dorayne Lombardo at The Bickford Theater in Morristown.
Call 973-971-3706 to purchase tickets.

Gordon James will spice up the offerings on Princeton’s Salt Creek Grille menu. Stop in from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. and catch Gordon with his bandmates, Richard Cummings on piano, Chris Plunkett on bass, and Al Johnson on drums.

Sunday, March 14
The Brook Arts Center, in Bound Brook, is hosting an afternoon jazz event with guitarist Joel Perry at 3p.m. Tickets are $10 per person in advance ($15 at the door) and may be purchased at www.ticketweb.com, www.ticketmaster.com, at Mama Rosina’s Restaurant at the Bound Brook Train Station, or by calling the theatre at 732-469-7700. Perry has played with Lavern Baker, Joni Mitchell, Herb Ellis, Rosemary Clooney, Frank Foster and Ken Peplowski. His quartet will include Nick Scheuble on drums; Bill Crow on bass and vocalist Frank Noviello.

Pam Purvis, Bob Ackerman and Matt Chertkoff are at Cecil’s in West Orange at 5:30 p.m.

Monday, March 15
McCoy Tyner comes to Princeton's McCarter Theatre for a 7:30 p.m. Monday night gig with Gonzalo Rubalcaba.

Jim Jasion and His Jazz (the Somerset Jazz Consortium Horn Squad) will be at Home Town Buffet, 561 US Highway 1, Edison, beginning at 6 p.m.

Tuesday, March 16
Ron Oswanski tickles the keys on his Hammond B3 at the Hibiscus Restaurant Tuesday from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The Somerset Jazz Consortiumjam session lead by Jim Jasion has moved to the Subterranean Recording Studios in Edison. Call Jim if you’re interested in joining -- 732-325-7464.

Wednesday, March 17
The Somerset Jazz Consortium Second Generation Band will be at Home Town Buffet on Route 1 in Edison, beginning at 6 p.m.

Vocalist Margie Notte entertains at Libretti’s Restaurant, 554 Orange St. in Orange, at 7 p.m. Wednesdays.

Here's a movie to look for

Eric Reed and Stacy Dillard are testing out their acting chops in a new movie in production called "Chaography," which looks to be a fresh take on jazz music. Director Doug Chang is putting the film together, mixing stories his father told of the old Jazz Gallery Club in New York, with the thoughts and words of real-life musicians like Reed and Dillard.
To avoid falling prey to big studios' preconceived notions of jazz and jazz musicians -- think "Bird" and "'Round Midnight" -- Chang is working with a new business model (act fast and you too can be a co-producer!). Read R.J. DeLuke's story about it at AllAboutJazz.com.