Winard Harper coming to the Kennedy Center

2012 Midatantic Jazz Festival Day 1-2174109, a photo by NoVARon on Flickr.

The wonderful drummer Winard Harper (seen here leading his group Jeli Posse at the 2012 Mid-Atlantic Jazz Festival) will be at the Kennedy Center's K.C. Jazz Club on October 18 with Jeli Posse. Winard recently took to Facebook to share with folks this upcoming appearance.

This is what he had to say:

"Hoping the DC and Baltimore folks will help spread the word about the Kennedy Center appearance October 18. Looking forward to performing there and working with some of the neighborhood schools while we're in town."

As a subscriber to the the Kennedy Center Jazz Program, I purchased tickets to this show when they were announced early this past summer. I enjoyed seeing Winard back in February 2012 and look forward to this upcoming show. If you are in the DMV area and love straight-ahead hard bop, you will not want to miss Winard and Jeli Posse.

Here is a clip of Winard Harper & Jeli Posse in performance.

DC Jazz Festival Picks for June 5

This is the fifth post I am making to highlight some of the shows associated with this year’s DC Jazz Festival. I am specifically not highlighting the DC JazzLoft Fest since I have posted on this already. I will may also pick a few other shows around the DC Virginia area that should not be overlooked. I am posting this a day ahead of the date of performances.  For more information visit http://www.dcjazzfest.org/content.cfm/schedule_and_major_events.

Jimmy Heath

At 6:00PM the Millennium Stage will host The Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra. For information of them visit http://www.bohemiancavernsjazzorchestra.com/live/.

The Hamilton hosts a show with the Antonio Hart Organ Trio and NEA Jazz Master, Jimmy Heath. Hart is a Baltimore Native who has become amongst the most acclaimed alto saxophonists today. In addition to his own seven albums, he has worked with the David Holland Big Band, Roy Hargrove, Frank Wess, Gary Bartz and others. Jimmy Heath is a little giant of the tenor saxophonist, acclaimed as a composer, as well as a musician and part of the legendary Heath brothers. One probably cannot name a major jazz figure with whom he wasn’t friends or worked with ranging from John Coltrane, james Moody to Miles Davis (who recorded Heath’s Gingerbread Boy among other tunes.

DC Jazz Festival Picks for June 4

Kris Funn

This is the fourth post I am making to highlight some of the shows associated with this year’s DC Jazz Festival. I am specifically not highlighting the DC JazzLoft Fest since I have posted on this already. I will may also pick a few other shows around the DC Virginia area that should not be overlooked. I am posting this a day ahead of the date of performances.

At 6:00 PM, the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage will feature bassist Kris Funn. This Baltimore, Maryland native is currently a member of trumpeter Christian Scott’s Band. He currently leads Kris Funn & Corner Store. which also features drummer Quincy Phillips of the Roy Hargrove Quintet. The band features Funn’s blues-battered bass lines, rocking originals, and dramatically danceable revisions of John Coltrane and Sam Cooke tunes.

The Kennedy Center at 7:30 hosts Jazz Meets The Classics with the Classical Jazz Quartet featuring Kenny Barron, Stefon Harris, Ron Carter, Lewis Nash; Paquito D’Rivera Sextet; Pepe Rivero; Michael Phillip Mossman and Pernell Saturnino. This is the signature concert featuring a number of NEA Jazz Masters.

Jonathan Batiste

The Hamilton hosts a show with groups led by pianist Jonathan Batiste and bassist Ben Williams. Batiste is a member of the celebrated Batiste Family of New Orleans and with Henry Butler, and Davell Crawford, is among the leading contemporary proponents of the New Orleans piano tradition. But he is so much more as indicated by his performances with Roy Hargrove's Big Band, Wynton Marsalis, Cassandra Wilson and others and has issued several albums. Bassist Ben Williams is a Washington DC native who won the Theloious Monk International Competition for Bass in 2009. He has performed with such artists as Wynton Marsalis, Terence Blanchard, Roy Hargrove, Mulgrew Miller, Cyrus Chestnut, Ron Blake, Stefon Harris, Karreim Riggins, Hamiett Bluett, James Williams, Bobby Watson, and Winard Harper. His recently issued the excellent album State of Art on Concord Jazz.

The Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra has its weekly performance at the Bohemian Gardens. For information of them visit http://www.bohemiancavernsjazzorchestra.com/live/.


For more information visit http://www.dcjazzfest.org/content.cfm/schedule_and_major_events.

Kennedy Center Audiences Want To Hear Music Not Camera Shutters

This past Saturday night I attended the Kennedy Center’s NPR Christmas Piano Jazz concert at the Terrace Theatre here in Washington. I have enjoyed the Jazz at the Kennedy Center shows I have attended. I had the misfortune to sit in Row W in front of the photographer who had two Nikon DSLRs on tripods and telephoto. It is curious that the Kennedy Center rules against photography does not apply to the Kennedy Center itself. Furthermore, to have the loud shutter and mirror slap noise during solo piano performances in a room of attentive listeners shows no respect for people who paid to see and listen to the performances. Every time she took pictures, it completely distracted me from enjoying the performances. The fact that she did not show restraint in shooting the performances but shot during every song at that show (Each of the two numbers by the four pianists) showed total disregard for those sitting near her.

I will acknowledge that I was told that I could be moved if I wanted, but as my wife stated to me afterwards, they shouldn’t sell any seats near the photographer. I would assume the Kennedy Center’s policy against people taking photographs isn’t merely proprietary, but also to prevent the visual and aural distractions of camera shutters and flashes. Yet the Kennedy Center impacted the enjoyment of my wife, myself and I would assume those sitting adjacent to me by the highly distracting shutter sound.

I understand the Kennedy Center wishes to document performances, but certainly they can do it less obtrusively than with a noisy DSLR (She used a Nikon although I suspect Canon DSLRs would also be similarly loud). If they insist on shooting from far away from the stage they must look into using quieter equipment or find ways to totally muffle the sound. Additionally, during a jazz performance such as this one, the photographer might be on stage using a quiet camera like a Leica. While some in the audience may be briefly visually distracted by a photographer on the side of the stage, at least no one’s attentive listening will be interrupted by a loud shutter.

One other point is that in future shows of this type, the photographer be restricted in when they take pictures of each performance. If the photographer had limited herself to simply shooting during the first of the two performances, it would have been somewhat tolerable. However, my evening of seeing and listening to wonderful solo jazz piano was spoiled by the Kennedy Center itself.

Since I posted this initially, it was suggested that whoever is shooting be required to use a sound blimp around the camera to muffle the sound. In any event, there are solutions that the Kennedy Center needs to implement

Mary Lou Williams Music Celebrated Wonderfully

One centerpiece of the Jazz program that the Kennedy Center initiated a number years ago under the direction of the late Dr. Billy Taylor is the annual Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival. At this year’s festival, held May 19-21 in Washington, Kennedy Center Jazz Records issued Walkin’ & Swinging: Highlights From the Kennedy Center Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival No. 2.

The CD compiles performances from the 2010 Festival which celebrated the centenary of the birth of Mary Lou Williams. Williams was a renown jazz pianist, composer and arranger whose career spanned the territory big bands to modern jazz where she befriended numerous visionary jazz artists including Herbie Nichols, Thelonious Monk and even played duets with Cecil Taylor. Last year’s festival celebrated Williams in a program devoted to her music (with the exception of the closing Ellington Cotton Tail).

The recording opens with a rendition of Walkin’ and Swingin,’ the Williams composition that was the theme for Andy Kirk and His Clouds of Joy, the Territory Band that helped Williams gain prominence. It is one of three performances by Sherrie Manicle & The DIVA Jazz Orchestra and the contours of the performance are not far removed from the Clouds of Joy original. The other two selections featuring this Big Band have them fronted by the wonderful vocalist Catherine Russell on What’s Your Story, Morning Glory? (Pha Terrell sang on Kirk’s 1938 original recording), and In the Land of Oo Bla Dee. The latter number was an amusing original that she composed during the hey day of bebop and Ms. Russell provides a fine treatment that I am sure Dizzy Gillespie would have approved of. One other performance employs a big band and that is Ann Patterson’s Maiden Voyage on Scratchin’ In the Gravel/ Truth. Scratchin’ was originally for a septet and then arranged for Duke Ellington in 1966 and the performance here is a medley of the two treatments, wonderfully scored and played with a very impressive tenor saxophonist (Ms. Patterson?).

A couple of performances showcase pianists. Miss D.D. showcases some wonderful playing by Geri Allen as part of The Women in Jazz All-Stars, joined by Esperanza Spalding on bass and Terri Lynn Carrington on drums, while Carmen Staff interprets Aries, from the ambitious The Zodiac Suite, with the incorporation of boogie woogie and strides in this intriguing solo showcase. Tenor saxophonist Virginia Mayhew transcribed several Williams solos that Mayhew employs in her performance of a hot blues, Medi II. The phenomenal young saxophonist Grace Kelly, displaying her somewhat incisive, dry tone, is featured on the Women in Jazz All Stars as they play Terry Lynn Carrington’s arrangement of Pisces, the last movement of The Zodiac Suite. Kelly’s playing shows a maturity far beyond her years while displaying the influence of Lee Konitz with whom she has recorded with.

This disc concludes with Dee Dee Bridgewater joining the All-Stars for a rousing Cotton Tail, a feature in the Ellington Band for Williams friend, Ben Webster. It is a remarkable performance with Bridgewater leading with a stellar scatting performance with a rousing piano solo from Allen and solos from the others. Its the longest performance here and a moment of musical magic including trading fours with Kelly that ends this terrific celebration of the 2010 Festival and the music of Mary Lou Williams. It is available from the Kennedy Center, http://www.kennedy-center.org/giftshop/html/itemDetail.cfm?item_sku=1023989&categ_id=2003092214202595.


This was a personal purchase.

Catherine Russell's Supreme Sentimental Streak

I became aware of Catherine Russell when she appeared as a backing vocalist on the wonderful Marie Knight tribute to Reverend Gary Davis. She is the daughter of the legendary bandleader, Luis Russell, and bassist-vocalist Carline Ray, and has worked with Jimmy Vivino’s Little Big Band, Steely Dan, Paul Simon, Cyndi Lauper and others.
In the 90s, her mom was subbing on bass with Doc Cheatham so she came down and later regularly saw the late trumpeter and started singing with him and the spirit of his music lives in this, her marvelous new album.
This recording is produced by Larry Campbell, who also contributes guitar, violin and mandolin to this project that showcases Ms. Russell’s marvelous way with a song. And, there is a fine collection of songs presented here for Ms. Russell, including I’ve Got That Thing, which her father wrote and recorded (it was released as by King Oliver who was ill that day); Kitchen Man, a vaudeville blues cowritten by Andy Razaf that was a staple of so many singers of that time with its double entendre-filled lyrics; Hoagy Carmichael’s New Orleans; the Wilder-McGlohon South to a Warmer Place (with Rachelle Garniez’s accordion and
Campbell’s violin evoking a French bals-musette); Nellie Lutcher’s playful You Better Watch Yourself, Bub; Willie Dixon’s I Don’t Care Who Knows (originally done by Harold Burrage for Cobra); Garniez’s Broken Nose (again with her accordion) and the sultry Harburg-Gensler Thrill Me.
Russell evokes a variety of influences including Alberta Hunter, Billy Holiday, Ivie Anderson, and Nellie Lutcher throughout this disc. I find Holiday an apt comparison as she phrases the lyric. She does not come across as a Holiday sound-alike in the manner of a Madeline Peyroux, but rather her delivery and timing is reminiscent of Lady Day, and the backing is so complimentary and sympathetic.
Many tracks eschew drummer while several tracks have horns and strings, yet never overwhelm the vocals and the lyric and one can appreciate Campbell’s marvelous mandolin solo chorus on Broken Nose as simply one of the elements that make it such as splendid performance. The acoustic bent of the performances here lend this disc a flavor of the thirties and forties cabaret scene yet everything sounds so contemporary.
This is not a campy revival of such vintage tunes like Brian Seltzer’s Louis Prima pastiches. Instead it is a compelling modern take on such material that will certainly end up on a number of Best of 2008 lists.

She is appearing at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC on May 15 as part of the Mary Lou Williams Women In Jazz Festival