Monday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Jazz Coalescence
TRIPLE DOOR: Lynnwood High School Jazz Bands
NEW ORLEANS: New Orleans Quintet
AMORE: Ronnie Pierce Jazz Ensemble
TOST: Michael Shrieve’s Spellbinder
This week on Jazz Northwest and Jazz After Hours
There’s lots of live jazz around Seattle and the Pacific Northwest, and new CDs by resident artists appear nearly every week. On this week’s show there are new releases from an East-West Trumpet Summit with Ray Vega & Thomas Marriott, Nelda Swiggett’s Trio, Wellstone Conspiracy, and guitarist Corey Christiansen who’s celebrating a new CD with gigs in Seattle and Vancouver BC this week. You’ll also get an update where to go for live jazz in the coming week on Jazz Northwest.
HANK JONES REMEMBERED
Also this weekend on Jazz After Hours on PRI (12M – 5 AM Saturday and Sunday on KPLU), Jim remembers the rich legacy of pianist Hank Jones, who died last week at the age of 91. Hank Jones’ career spanned over sixty years, from Jazz at the Phil with Coleman Hawkins, Charlie Parker, and others to the present decade – he was to play with Joe Lovano at Birdland next week. There will be two or three selections by Hank Jones in each hour of Jazz After Hours this weekend.
Among his many awards, Hank Jones was recipient of the NEA Jazz Masters Award in 1989, The National Medal of Arts in 2008, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009. He toured all over the world and appeared on more than a thousand albums.
Catching up with Greta Matassa
So far this year, Greta Matassa has sung with the Spokane Jazz Orchestra in the Bing Crosby Theater, performed in the Muckleshoot Casino and the Edmonds Center for the Arts, packed the house at the Ballard Jazz Festival, and hosted a weekly gig at Tula’s.
In July, she will sing the national anthem before Seattle’s Fourth of July fireworks show – “one fun thing after another,” she said – and in September, she will be in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato taking part in an international arts festival. She will finish the year in Singapore, where she started 2010, at a New Year’s performance at a Singapore jazz club.
But the gig she is most excited about these days is her Friday variety show at Bake’s Place in Issaquah, the small jazz club housed in the former clubhouse of a retirement community. The unconventional venue is also home to an unconventional show, “Fridays in the Living Room with Greta.”
“If people (from Seattle) can get out there, it’s worth the 20-minute drive,” Matassa said. “It’s a warm and elegant place but not in a stuffy way. The concerts are special and loose at the same time. It’s not often that people get a chance to hear two singers who just shook hands a minute ago. The spontaneity of it is what makes it special.”
Each show has a different theme and usually features another vocalist. The shows are unscripted, informal and intimate, with plenty of back and forth with the audience, something Matassa has always been good at. She takes requests, sings duets, and even turned the tables on jazz announcer Jim Wilke, interviewing him one night as part of a tribute to the legendary jazz journalist and producer.
Matassa is backed up by Daren Clendenin on piano and her husband Clipper Anderson on bass. Because of the intimacy of the performance, she does not use a drummer although she did bring in Mark Ivester for one show so he could play with tap dancer Jovon Miller.
Matassa is taking a break from the living-room series in June to perform out of town (Brasserie Montmartre and Wilf’s in Portland, the Dockside Bistro in Olympia, and the Jazz at the River Festival in Eagle, Idaho), but will return to Bake’s Place in July with saxophonists Bill Ramsay and Gary Scott (longtime alto saxophonist who performed with Frank Sinatra more than 1,000 times in Las Vegas), among others.
In addition to performing, Matassa still teaches – she holds a weekly, three-hour scat clinic in her home for five students at a time – she also is in the middle of a four-record contract with Resonance Records. Her first album with the label, “I Wanna Be Loved,” was very well received by critics and fans alike, staying on the national airplay charts for three months, peaking in the mid-teens.
“In about six months we’ll start talking about the next project,” Matassa said. “I’m assuming and hoping I’ll have access to the same personnel (which included rising star Tamir Hendelman on piano)…Having the contract puts me in the position of not having to think about fundraising and being able to think about content.”
Friday Jazz
BAKE’S PLACE: Connie Evingson with Pearl Django
LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: Jason Parker Quartet
TULA’S: Kelley Johnson Quartet
NEW ORLEANS: Mark Taylor, Rick Mandyck, Phil Sparks, John Bishop
JAZZ ALLEY: Bob James and Earl Klugh
TRIPLE DOOR MAINSTAGE: Skerik’s Syncopated Taint
EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Katrina Kope/Nate Omdal duo
9pm – The Kareem Kandi Band, with Kareem Kandi (saxophone), Louie Ledbetter (bass), Jacques Willis (drums)
AMORE: Lonnie Williams
LAKESIDE BISTRO: Greta Matassa & Darin Clendenin
SERAFINA: Kiko de Freitas
SORRENTO HOTEL: Karin Kajita
LATONA PUB: Phil Sparks Trio
Ron Carter Clinic – May 28
Bassist Ron Carter, who is playing with his Golden Striker Trio (guitarist Russell Malone and pianist Mulgrew Miller) at Jazz Alley May 27-30, is going to hold an informal clinic and performance at the University of Washington Friday, May 28, from 1:30 to 3:30 in the Brechemin Auditorium. The clinic is free and open to the public. Brechemin, upstairs in the Music Building, seats about 200 people.
With the passing of Ray Brown, Carter can safely be called the greatest living jazz bassist. A part of jazz history, he was a member of the Miles Davis Quintet with Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter and Tony Williams.
The UW jazz department has hosted several jazz greats for workshops lately, including Bill Frisell and Pat Metheny. Frisell jammed with faculty members Marc Seales and Cuong Vu; Metheny just answered questions. Carter is expected to play, although it’s unclear if he’s going to play with anyone.
His visit was arranged by faculty member and instructor Barry Lieberman, who teaches bass and is a member of the Seattle Symphony.
“We had a lot of great jazz people come through here with hardly any notice,” said Joanne De Pue, with the UW School of Music. “This one’s going to be great. When we had Pat Metheny, a lot of fans and superfans showed up. We love it when the public comes.”
Good One KPLU …
Just wanted to post a quick comment about our disappointment in KPLU. On Monday, May 17, we posted a link to the New York Times article on the passing of legendary pianist Hank Jones.
How did KPLU choose to honor a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master (1989), National Medal of Arts winner (2008) and Grammy Lifetime Achievement recipient (2009)? KPLU played a total of 2 tracks from Hank Jones. By comparison, that same day they played 3 cuts by Diana Krall.
Dear KPLU,
We deserve better!
Sincerely,
The Seattle Jazz Community
Thursday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Sonando
JAZZ ALLEY: Bob James and Earl Klugh
TRIPLE DOOR: Skerik’s Syncopated Taint & Charlie Hunter Trio
EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Jon Sheckler Group with Jon Sheckler (drums), Nate Parker (bass), Mack Grout (piano) and Eli Meisner (guitar)
9pm – Judd Wasserman and The Elderly, acoustic duo William Ransom and Whitney Lyman
BARCA: Clark Gibson Trio
HI-FIDELITY LOUNGE: Ray Ohls Trio
2711 6th St, Bremerton, 8:30pm
NEW ORLEANS: Ham Carson Quintet
SORRENTO HOTEL: Overton Berry
THAIKU: Jon Alberts, Jeff Johnson & Tad Britton
Wednesday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Corey Christiansen Quartet CD Release for Outlaw Tractor
NEW ORLEANS: Legacy Quartet w/Clarence Acox
EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – The Hooky Band with Brian Kent (tenor sax), Mark Bullis (bass), Gregg Robinson (piano) and Lionel Cramer (drums)
9pm – “Ahmad Jamal the Music of”, with Geoff Harper (bass), Ryan Burns (keys) and John Wicks (drums)
THAIKU: Ron Weinstein Trio
LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: Jon Sheckler Acoustolectric Trio
Jason Parker Quartet at Lucid – May 21
The Jason Parker Quartet returns from their west coast tour with a performance at Lucid Jazz Lounge on Friday, May 21.
FRIDAY, MAY 21 – LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE
5241 University Way NE
Seattle
9:30pm, No cover
JASON PARKER QUARTET
featuring:
Jason Parker – trumpet
Josh Rawlings – piano
Evan Flory-Barnes – bass
D’Vonne Lewis – drums
Tuesday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Roadside Attraction
JAZZ ALLEY: Pinetop Perkins with Willie Big Eyes Smith
NEW ORLEANS: Holotradband
DULCES LATIN BISTRO: Eric Verlinde
THE MIX: Don Mock
OWL ‘N THISTLE: Jam w/ Eric Verlinde & Jose Martinez
Hank Jones, Versatile Jazz Pianist, Dies at 91
from The New York Times:
Hank Jones, whose self-effacing nature belied his stature as one of the most respected jazz pianists of the postwar era, died Sunday at a hospice in Manhattan. He was 91.
Wendy Oxenhorn, executive director of the Jazz Foundation of America, confirmed Mr. Jones’s death.
Mr. Jones spent much of his career in the background. For three and a half decades he was primarily a sideman, most notably with Ella Fitzgerald; for much of that time he also worked as a studio musician on radio and television.
His fellow musicians admired his imagination, his versatility and his distinctive style, which blended the urbanity and rhythmic drive of the Harlem stride pianists, the dexterity of Art Tatum and the harmonic daring of bebop. (The pianist, composer and conductor André Previn once called Mr. Jones his favorite pianist, “regardless of idiom.”)
But unlike his younger brothers Thad, who played trumpet with Count Basie and was later a co-leader of a celebrated big band, and Elvin, an influential drummer who formed a successful combo after six years with John Coltrane’s innovative quartet, Mr. Jones seemed content to keep a low profile.
Continue reading at The New York Times.
“Jazz Loft” Making History
from CBS News: An exhibit commemorating a little-known part of the New York Jazz scene will soon begin a nationwide tour. Randall Pinkston shows us the second home to some jazz legends.
(Watch the story that appeared on CBS News — there is a commercial before the story … but it is worth the wait)
Watch CBS News Videos Online
For more information about the Jazz Loft Project, visit their website here.
Monday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Jazz Jam w/ Darin Clendenin Trio
NEW ORLEANS: New Orleans Quintet
AMORE: Ronnie Pierce Jazz Ensemble
POGGIE TAVERN: Better World w/ Marc Smason & Joanne Klein
TOST: Michael Shrieve’s Spellbinder
Corey Christiansen at Tula’s May 19
Guitarist Corey Christiansen returns to Seattle after his performance at The Ballard Jazz Festival to celebrate the release of his new CD, Outlaw Tractor, at Tula’s Jazz Club on Wednesday, May 19 at 7:30pm.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 19
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB
2214 2nd Ave, Seattle
7:30pm, All Ages
Reservations: 206-443-4221
http://www.tulas.com
Corey Christiansen – guitar
Mark Taylor – saxophone
Chuck Deardorf – bass
Matt Jorgensen – drums
ABOUT COREY CHRISTIANSEN:
Following up on 2008’s Roll With It, Corey Christiansen’s critically acclaimed Origin debut, the dynamic guitarist returns with a vengeance on Outlaw Tractor, another grooving, soul-jazz offering featuring his working band, including New York organist Pat Bianchi, saxophonist David Halliday and drummer Matt Jorgensen. Moving easily from the funky “When You Want” and “Outlaw Tractor” to the driving “Big Kids” and “Starstepper,” Christiansen’s soulful compositions and precise yet earthy guitar talents define an album that’s destined to become a classic. One listen to Outlaw Tractor and you’ll understand why All About Jazz called Christiansen’s Origin debut, “one of the most satisfying soul-jazz recordings of the year.”
In case you missed it …
Once an orthodontist, Gail Pettis now evokes smiles with music
from The Seattle Times:
Call it a midlife crisis or call it an epiphany. Either way, Gail Pettis got bit by the jazz bug and reinvented herself as one of the most sensuously swinging new singers on the American scene.
One day she’s tuning up smiles at her successful orthodontic practice in Issaquah, and the next she’s spreading grins from the bandstand, where she’s forged deep creative ties with some of Seattle’s deepest players.
“I enjoyed the patients, but I was looking for a change,” Pettis says. “At the time I wouldn’t have said, ‘I’m leaving my practice to pursue music,’ but it turns out that’s what happened.”
For jazz fans outside the Seattle area, Pettis seemed to emerge out of nowhere in 2007 with the release of her luminous debut CD “May I Come In?” on OA2 Records. She confirmed her status as an exceptional interpreter of the American Songbook with the January release of “Here In the Moment.” Soulful and understated, her voice caresses each melody, transforming even the most familiar standards into highly personal narratives.
Continue reading at The Seattle Times.
I/O Jazz Awards
The nominees for the I/O Jazz Awards have been posted for voting on the Lucid website. Make sure and go online and vote. The I/O Jazz Awards will be held Monday, May 31 at Benaroya Hall’s S. Mark Taper Foundation Auditorium.
Outstanding Vocalist: Alisha Roney, Greta Matassa, Emily McIntosh, Flora McGill, Bridgid Roney
Outstanding Instrumentalist: Eric Verlinde, Evan Flory-Barnes, Alexey Nikolaev, Randy Halberstadt, Scott Morning
Rising Star (16-25): Jon Sheckler, Andy Clausen, Brendan O’Donnel
Contribution to The Community: Faire Gallery Cafe, Clarence Acox, Ev Stern
Free-Jazz Band of The Year: Speak, Bad Luck Band, Operation ID
Straight Ahead Album of the Year: Straight Ahead by Hadley Caliman, Unreal Reality by Industrial Revelation, Spectre by Mark Taylor
Latin Jazz Album of the Year: Manghis Khan (Live at Sonarchy), Live at Caramoor (Jovino Santos), Sambatuque – Brazilian Songbird
Mixed Genre Album of the Year: Hardcoretet – experiments in vibe, Guardian Ear, Gravity – Grimy
Band of the Year: The Fabulous Party Boys, The Teaching, McTuff
Most Dynamic Concert: Acknowledgment of a Celebration, Soul Kata at the Triple Door, Lucid Anniversary w/ the Teaching
Outstanding Stage Presence: Jason Parker, Mark Sampson, Owuor Arunga
Composition of the Year: Con Miki (Tim Carey), Acknowledgement of a celebration (Evan Flory Barnes), Beautiful Brooklyn (The Teaching)
Outstanding Lyricist: Katrina Kope, Darrius Willrich, Michele Khazak
Friday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Gail Pettis Quartet
NEW ORLEANS: Thomas Marriott’s Flexicon
JAZZ ALLEY: Eddie Palmieri Latin Jazz Band
EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE: AMA, with Amy Denio, Madeleine Sosin and Abel Rocha
BAKE’S PLACE: Greta Matassa with special guest Patti Wicks
LATONA PUB: Phil Sparks Trio
LUCID: Jazz Committee
JAZZ VOX: Kelley Johnson & Keith Ganz
EL GAUCHO BELLEVUE: Trish Hatley Trio
SERAFINA: Djangomatics
Thursday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Dave Marriott Quartet
JAZZ ALLEY: Eddie Palmieri Latin Jazz Band
NEW ORLEANS: Ham Carson Quintet
SEATTLE ART MUSEUM: Art of Jazz: Rochelle House
TRIPLE DOOR MAINSTAGE: Sex Mob Plays Sexotica w/ DJ Olive
SORRENTO HOTEL: Overton Berry
THAIKU: Jon Alberts, Jeff Johnson & Tad Britton
BARCA: Clark Gibson Trio
Wednesday Jazz
TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Smith/Staelens Big Band
NEW ORLEANS: Legacy Quartet w/Clarence Acox
JAZZ ALLEY: Joey DeFrancesco
LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: Dave Gagnon Trio
THAIKU: Ron Weinstein Trio
DULCES LATIN BISTRO: Eric Verlinde
EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Vocal Jam hosted by Julie Olson. Backed by Chris Morton (piano) Dan O’Brien (bass) and Robert Rushing (drums)
9pm – Vocal Showcase hosted by Julie Olson. Vocalists are Emily McVicker, Paul Richter and Grace Scrobisz. Backed by Chris Morton (piano) Dan O’Brien (bass) and Robert Rushing (drums)