The winding road back to jazz normalcy (updated Aug 17)

The journey back to jazz festivals performed to live audiences has many different approaches. No matter which on-ramp you choose, normalcy, as we know it after the extended pandemic pause, appears to be a year away.

Let’s look at some of the ways that festivals organizations, working with government health officials, are bringing their events back this season. Most have reduced capacity, fewer stages, fewer artists, and shorter hours than in the past. Social distancing and other good-health protocols are the norm in most cases.

New Orleans on parade - and other surprises

Singer Lisa Kelly and trumpeter JB Scott had a few surprises up their sleeves for their return performance at the Charlotte County Jazz Society on Monday, February 13. The Jacksonville-based musicians spent about one-third of their two-hour concert digging deep into music associated with New Orleans. They also.brought a larger band than anticipated and featured Scott on several vocal numbers in addition to his solid trumpet artistry.

Freshening classic jazz

Trombonist Bill Allred knows how to honor the earliest jazz and the finest in big band swing without sounding dated in any way. He did so with his eight-piece Classic Jazz Band Monday, March 9 in the Charlotte County Jazz Society's concert series in Port Charlotte FL.

Bill Allred

The Orlando-based octet is a high-energy outfit that knows how to make the music swing, and then some. "Let's get this party started," the leader said as the band launched into Duke Ellington's "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)" before beginning a first-set examination of Louis Armstrong-associated New Orleans staples, then moving north to Memphis and Chicago, much as the music did in its formative decades.

Randy Morris

Allred described New Orleans' Storyville district, where jazz and ragtime were born, as "the first adult theme park" before pianist Randy Morris worked his way through a bit of Jelly Roll Morton ragtime. Trumpeter and singer Bobby Pickwood had very strong features on "West End Blues and "What a Wonderful World."

Bobby Pickwood

The second set focused on the big band era, coursing through material from Glenn Miller, Count Basie, Buddy Morrow, sneaking in a bit of the Ray Charles songbook with "Hard-Hearted Hannah" and Bob Crosby's Bobcats' "Big Noise from Winnetka" before winding down with a nod to Benny Goodman on "Sing, Sing, Sing."

This version of Allred's band also featured David MacKenzie on reeds, trumpeter Greg Little, trombonist Herb Bruce, bassist Jay Mueller and drummer Dick Maley. 

Allred's band, now in its 25th year, was last in Port Charlotte in December 2011. It was an ideal choice for the jazz society's 25th season, in a concert that drew 400+.

Morris, MacKenzie, Pickwood, Little, Mueller (partly hidden), Allred, Bruce, Maley.

A Newport state of mind

Jon Batiste

Here it is mid-January, and they've already got us thinking about - and planning for - this summer’s Newport Jazz Festival. The 2015 edition will run July 31-August 2 at Fort Adams State Park on picturesque Newport Harbor and the International Tennis Hall of Fame at Newport Casino. The latter site was the festival’s original home in 1954. Now it hosts the fancier Friday night concert.

Ellis Marsalis on music





Ellis Marsalis

The November issue of Hot House is out. It includes my profile of pianist Ellis Marsalis, patriarch of today's first family of jazz. Marsalis, whose work is rooted in the styles of his native New Orleans, chooses his notes with great care. That focus is essential to his subtle and relaxed sense of swing. He is at the Blue Note in New York November 8-11 with his quartet. Three days later he turns 78.



Celebrating music and culture in the Big Easy

Amid the tragedy and devastation of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, many of us found an even deeper appreciation for New Orleans musical contributions – past, present and future. Quite simply, there is no other city like it. And it is important that seven years after Katrina, New Orleans survived, continues to rebuild its infrastructure and remains such a music incubator.

There is a lot of focus on that tradition this fall, as the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra, founded and led by trumpeter Irvin Mayfield, is celebrating its 10^th anniversary. Mayfield, who lost his father to Katrina, is a modernist with a bright, swinging sound. He is also a busy fellow. Besides running the big band, he co-leads Los Hombres Calientes, runs two jazz clubs bearing his name, is an educator and New Orleans’ cultural ambassador. 

New Orleans to Newport

Offbeat magazine, which covers Louisiana music and culture, has just published several more of my Newport Jazz Festival images. The focus was on the opening night angle, as the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Dr. John's Lower 911 Band and special guests performed, bringing music from the birthplace of jazz to the birthplace of the jazz festival.

More depth on Newport

 Jazz Times has just posted Bill Beuttler's extensive review of last weekend's Newport Jazz Festival, along with 10 of my images. With more than 30 acts performing on four different stages Friday-Sunday, there was a lot more to hear and see. Here for your viewing pleasure are 12 more of my images.

Singer Kurt Elling

Jenny Scheinman and Bill Frisell

Steamy days and music at Newport

More in the coming days on the 2012 edition of the Newport Jazz Festival, which took place over the weekend. As usual, the three overlapping stages provide an opportunity to park yourself for a full set by a favorite or intriguing band or to nibble at the music tapas-style by wandering from stage to stage. The daytime crowds were a bit light but the weather was New Orleans-like with oppressive sun and high humidity.

A special day for jazz - globally

Naysayers who claim jazz is dead or dying will find a lot of contrarians today at Congo Square in New Orleans and the United Nations Headquarters in New York City.

This is the first International Jazz Day, an official designation that was made last November by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization for each April 30.

New Orleans comes to Newport in an ideal way



Dr. John

There may be no better way to open the Newport Jazz Festival than what founding producer George Wein is doing this summer.

 

New Orleans is widely acknowledged as the birthplace of jazz. The opening night concert at Newport Casino and International Tennis Hall of Fame - the birthplace of the Newport Jazz Festival back in 1954 - is going N'awlins in a big way.

A Must Read

John Swenson, my music writing collaborator for many years at UPI, is out with a gem. “New Atlantis: Musicians Battle for the Survival of New Orleans” (Oxford University Press) captures the determination of New Orleans’ stylistically varied music makers to survive after Hurricane Katrina and to help keep the city’s soul alive.

John has been writing almost exclusively about New Orleans and its musicians since the late 1990s, principally for Offbeat magazine, and has come to understand his adopted city well. (He splits his time between New York and the Crescent City.) As you dig into this book, you’ll fast appreciate the depth of his keen understanding of the city’s contemporary music scene (jazz, R&B, brass band, rock, and hip hop), as well as the music’s deep roots.

The city’s problems are far from solved post-Katrina (or as John repeatedly calls it, “the federal flood”) in August 2005. But through John’s insightful perspective and to-the-point writing, we get an appreciation of just how important music and its makers are to its continued rebirth.

There is more than just a cultural phenomenon at play here, in a city where music is so much more than mere entertainment. As John reflected in an interview with The Beachcomber: “New Orleans musicians treat music like a sacred trust, handed down from their ancestors. It’s different from the commercial pop world.”

It is so very different, and the United States, and indeed, the world, are so much richer because of it.

A spectacular night - marred by one idiot

Guitarist John Scofield was a great choice to open the New Orleans portion/final phase of the 2010 Montreal International Jazz Festival. His Piety Street Band released an exceptional funky New Orleans-gospel and blues-based CD under the Piety Street name earlier this year. The band was even better in person last night at the Theatre Maisonneuve. Pianist/B3 player/ vocalist Jon Cleary was a strong foil for Scofield, at one point echoing or extending Scofield's guitar lines on the centerpiece, "Walk With Me." "Glory Land" was a strong shuffle beat romp. The quartet also included bassist George Porter Jr. and drummer Terence Higgins.

Was Keith Jarrett going to play one or more encores after his two-set Montreal perforamce with triomates Gary Peacock and Jack DeJohnette? We'll never know. The band's performance was beautiful, digging deeply into a wide range of standards that tended to have you / me / romance at their core. (But don't they all really?) "You Go to My Head," "Everything Happens to Me," "Too Young to Go Steady," Autumn Leaves," "All the Things You Are," "My Ship" and "I've Got a Crush on You" were all on the agenda. The players' empathy and synergy is always a joy to witness. DeJohnette's delicate and airy drum solo on "Too Young" was exquisite.

Jarrett's zero tolerance for photography during his concerts is notorious, preferring perhaps that rather than distract the band and surrounding audience members, that attendees savor the moment for what it is. There was a firm "no photography" request before the show, and again right after intermission - for both the performance and the bows that followed. In this world of people wanting to do their own thing in their own moment, some believe they are exempt from rules set for others. During the third bow, possibly before the band was ready to do another tune or so, the aforementioned IDIOT fired off a flash with his/her point-and-shoot. Too bad the neighboring ticketbuyers didn't gently push his/her arm down so there would be no mood interruption. Jarrett suggested that the neighbors take his/her camera away - and walked off stage to end the night.

At the dark and intimate Salle Gesu space an hour later, Polish trumpeter Tomasz Stanko's quintet explored a half-dozen originals that blended rhythms rooted in swing and an ethereal tone that bordered on the exotic. The packed house loved it. Stanko's young bandmates supported his music wonderfully, with very strong piano, electric bass and guitar solos throughout.

Double dose of a fresh talent

More often than not, one of the great aspects of the jazz festival format is a listener’s opportunity to hear fresh talent - players who for one reason or another have not yet reached their musical radar. It's a chance to hear how these voices - perhaps fresh talent, perhaps from another region, are carrying forward the music.

One of this year’s most interesting newcomers at Freihofer’s Jazz Festival in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., during the last weekend in June figures to be trumpeter Mario Abney. Attendees on Saturday, June 26 have a chance for a double dose of Abney’s sextet (actually billed as a quintet plus one).

The band will be featured early in the day on the SPAC Main stage, and later in the afternoon closes the more intimate Gazebo stage up the hill.

Not a bad gig for a 32-year-old player who doesn’t have his own Web site yet, a CD in distribution, or even a computer. He does have talent, a tight band - and a quality horn that was partly subsidized by Wynton Marsalis. There is a CD in the works called Spiritual Perception.)

Freihofer’s Jazz Festival Artistic Director/Co-Producer Dan Melnick, who developed his production chops as part of George Wein’s Festival Productions team, now runs his own firm called Absolutely Live Entertainment, LLC.

Melnick first heard Abney last year while working as backstage manager at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival’s Jazz Tent. (Abney photo by Reed Hoffmann)

“Mario opened the tent there last year and completely tore it up. He is exciting, intense, beautiful and leads a great, great band. As soon as he got off the stage (I had no idea who he was or what he was about when he arrived), I literally bear-hugged him and told him he was coming to Saratoga this year,” Melnick said. “He's from Chicago, lived in Ohio for a few years, and has been in New Orleans for a few years. He plays hard-bop/funk/modern jazz all wrapped up into one high-fueled package.”

Abney leads three different bands [The Avante Garde, The Abney Effect and The Mario Abney Quintet], and gigs with other bands. The Abney Effect has been performing at all-night sessions in New Orleans at the headquarters of the Mardi Gras Indians Brothers & Sisters Association owned by Ivory Holmes.

His band at Saratoga will include Kaliq Woods on clarinet, Josh Atkin on alto saxophone, Jessy Morrow on bass, Jason Butler on piano and keyboard,s and Julian Addison on drums. You can get a little taste of his music here…

The lineup at this year’s 33rd annual Freihofer’s Saratoga Jazz Festival also includes Gladys Knight, Al Jarreau and the George Duke Trio, Taj Mahal, Al Di Meola, Ramsey Lewis and Ahmad Jamal. More than half of this year’s bands are performing at the festival for the first time.

Here is the full lineup: (performing generally in reverse order of listing)

Saturday, June 26, 2010 (noon to 10:30 p.m.)
Main Stage
Al Jarreau and the George Duke Trio
Sax for Stax - Gerald Albright and Kirk Whalum
Ahmad Jamal
Taj Mahal
Al Di Meola - World Sinfonia
Evan Christopher
Mario Abney Quintet
Gazebo Stage
Tomasz Stanko Quartet
Alyssa Graham
JD Allen Trio
Steve Kroon Sextet
Mario Abney Quintet

Sunday, June 27, 2010 (noon to 8:30 p.m.)
Main Stage
Gladys Knight
Juan De Marcos and The Afro Cuban All Stars
Ramsey Lewis Trio
Ann Hampton Callaway
Stefon Harris and Blackout
Trio of Oz featuring Rachel Z and Omar Hakim
Gazebo Stage
Linda Oh Trio
Kendrick Scott Oracle
Ralph Lalama Quartet
Hailey Niswanger
Trio of Oz featuring Rachel Z and Omar Hakim

Geaux Saints, with a trumpeter’s fanfare

Once in a while, jazz and popular culture conveniently cross paths. And how fitting that it was on the sporting world’s biggest stage last weekend with the NFL’s Super Bowl XLIV festivities.

CBS’s pre-game broadcast leading up to the New Orleans Saints' gritty, stunning - and most welcome - win over the Colts included Wynton Marsalis’s music-and-spoken word tribute to The Big Easy, and the Saints organization's perseverence through 43 years of suffering before this season.

He did a masterful job of putting the spirit of his beloved city in perspective. And today… it was live-streamed out to the jazz world and other Marsalis followers after an online conversation with the trumpeter/bandleader/Jazz at Lincoln Center Artistic Director on Ustream.

“Down on the Bayou where the mighty Mississippi kisses Lake Pontchartrain and spills into the Gulf of Mexico. There sits that jewel of the Southland. What the French lost to the British who gave it to the Spanish who lost it back to the French who sold it to America for…. Well, some folks say Jefferson conned Napoleon in a card game and won it for some jambalaya and a chicory coffee….” Read more about the ‘haints and the Saints’

here on Wynton's Web site.

Yes, the musical sage captured it perfectly… a unique city in America, a city of struggles, a team of struggles - and pride and perseverance.

Sunday’s improbable victory signaled more - and shined a spotlight back on a city that, with a new mayor-elect ready to take office, that does and will continue to persevere - and someday flourish again post-Katrina. Its spirit is undeniable and unstoppable.

The music hasn’t lost a beat… as it provides the essential rhythm. So how fitting that Mardi Gras began nine days early this year. How uplifting for New Orleans, its team, its residents and its longtime admirers and visitors.

A mouse, a museum and music

The three M’s headlined above are the prime ingredients in an exhibition that’s making its only North American appearance through March 14 in New Orleans.

The Walt Disney Animation Research Library and New Orleans Museum of Art teamed up on "Dreams Come True: Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio." The Crescent City is the ideal location for the exhibition. It coincides with the release of Disney's animated feature, "The Princess and the Frog," which is set in New Orleans during the 1920s Jazz Age.

Jazz at Lincoln Center is involved in the project by adding a live music series, a professional training session and donating Jazz for Young People curriculum sets, thanks to The Brian J. Ratner Philanthropic Fund.

The exhibit showcases original artwork from legendary Disney animated films including "Snow White," "Cinderella," "Sleeping Beauty," "The Little Mermaid" and "Beauty and the Beast" and celebrates Disney's connections with jazz and the Crescent City.

New Orleans native and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra member Victor Goines is programming a live-music series at NOMA featuring New Orleans-based musicians. The performances, free to the public, began today with Don Vappie and The Creole Jazz Serenaders. The music series runs through March 14.

Jazz at Lincoln Center will also hold a workshop at NOMA for New Orleans area music teachers and educators to learn how to introduce jazz in their classrooms. JALC will distribute a number of its Jazz for Young People curriculum to various New Orleans schools.

In addition, children and parents who visit the exhibition will receive a copy of the "The Princess and the Frog" Curriculum, created in partnership by Disney, Scholastic and Jazz at Lincoln Center.

For more information on "Dreams Come True: Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio," go to the museum's Web site.

Bridging the musical waters

One of the most poignant moments at the Rock & R0ll Hall of Fame's 25th anniversary concert (night one, October 29) when Art Garfunkel joined old musical partner Paul Simon on stage at Madison Square Garden to sing several of their hits. There's no need to wonder if more reunions might happen anytime soon.

There is one such event set for the remainder of 2010. Further blurring the lines between jazz events and other musical genres, it will be an opening weekend performance, April 24 to be exact, at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. The "Bridge Over Troubled Waters" analogy will be everywhere - and it is most appropriate, given how music has helped galvanize New Orleans, its residents and the city's appreciators in their drive to rebuild post-Katrina.

It is also appropriate because that work is far from over.

Kudos to festival producer Quint Davis for making the connection happen.

The pulse of New Orleans

Larry Blumenfeld’s “Cultural Conversation” with TV producer David Simon in today’s Wall Street Journal is a highly recommended read. Simon, producer of HBO’s acclaimed series “The Wire,” is now focusing on a new jazz-tinged program that will debut on HBO in April.

Tinged is not a strong enough word. Jazz is the undercurrent, and the heartbeat, of the program, scheduled for 10 episodes in Season One.

“Treme” is the series… and it is named for Tremé, a hotbed of jazz that is considered one of America’s oldest black neighborhoods.

Simon is using New Orleans as his new focus on why the American city matters. In Blumenfeld’s view: “With any success, he can achieve something mightier too - an understanding of the essential role musicians play in New Orleans’s social order and recovery, as well as the embattled position they often find themselves in.”

Several actors (Wendell Pierce and Clarke Peters to name two) who had prominent roles in “The Wire” are cast in the new series as musicians. Trumpeter Kermit Ruffins will appear regularly in the series - as himself.

This is shaping up as a series that will keep many of us with HBO glued to our TVs.

Bennett joins the post-Katrina assistance brigade...

Tony Bennett may have left his heart in San Francisco, but he leaves behind a significant monetary/cultural investment in New Orleans after a performance at JazzFest this weekend.

This past week, the singer's Exploring the Arts program was among the funders who donated $100,000 worth of new musical instruments to students at KIPP Believe College Prep, a charter school founded in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The instruments can help extend the city's great musical tradition to newer generations of players. Details on the funding, and its origins, can be found at Newsmax.com.

So we can add Tony Bennett - singer, painter, philanthropist - to the list of people who have found creative ways to help rebuild in ways NOLA needs it.Action like Bennett's is welcome, especially as parts of the city still haven't been rebuilt... and work on its infrastructure is far from complete.

It still baffles me that Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal rejected the federal government's economic stimulus aid this year, aid that this state and city that likely need it the most. It could have gone a long way to continue work on levees and rebuild the Ninth Ward and other areas still blighted from Katrina's flooding effects.

Hope amid New Orleans’ slower-than-slow recovery

Another glimmer of hope and positivity among turtle-slow efforts to bring New Orleans back from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina occurred in grand style on Thursday night, January 8.

It was the reopening of the Mahalia Jackson Theater of the Performing Arts in Armstrong Park. A $22 million renovation brought the theater back from the brink of ruin three years ago. The opening concert featured local musical fixtures (would anything else be appropriate?) including the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Rebirth Brass Band, Irma Thomas, Freddy Omar, Marva Wright, Philip Manuel, Michael Ward and Ingrid Lucia.

One other appropriate touch… tickets were free but were required since seating was limited.

For reopening details, check out Michelle Krupa’s reporting in The Times-Picayune, The curtain rises at Mahalia Jackson Theater.

Since President-elect Barack Obama has made it clear that an essential ingredient in America’s recovery from the current economic travail is rebuilding the country’s infrastructure as a way to put people back to work, he ought to make sure a lot of that effort is committed to rebuilding New Orleans. In that way, Obama can fulfill the promise that W. made but soon forgot as his presidency spiraled and sputtered out of control in so many ways.