Seattle Jazz Scene

TRIPLE DOOR MAINSTAGE: The Teaching DVD Release Party

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Tim Huling Jazz Composers Showcase

NEW ORLEANS: New Orleans Quintet

TOST: Michael Shieve’s Spellbinder

JAZZ ALLEY:  Dr. John and the Lower 911

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB:
3pm – Easy Street
8pm – Jim Cutler Orchestra

MARTINS OFF MADISON: Tim Kennedy

SERAFINA: Alex Guilbert Duo, 11am

CONCERT: Jovino Santos Neto Quintet
Teahouse Concerts Series, 939 25th Ave S, 5pm

TRIPLE DOOR MUSICQUARIUM: Sunday Night Salsa: Tor Dietrichson and Mambo Cadillac

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Greta Matassa Quartet

JAZZ ALLEY: Dr. John and the Lower 911

BAKE’S PLACE: David Lanz

LOCAL COLOR: Hillary Harris

LUCID: Joe Doria Trio

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Manghis Khan, w/ Yaw Amponsah (West African Ashanti drums/djembe), Tony Grasso (trumpet), Viren Kamdar (cajon/congas) and Tim Carey (bass)
9pm – Jess Klein – Austin based singer-songwriter
11pm – Jim Knodle and the Distract Band

SORRENTO: Sue Bell Quartet

JAZZVOX: Cathy Segal-Garcia w/ John Stowell
http://jazzvox.com, Auburn, 7:30pm

EL GAUCHO BELLEVUE: Trish Hatley Trio

from The Seattle Times:

For a high-school junior in the grips of a jones for jazz and sourdough pizza, the road trip made perfect sense.

Growing up on the Olympic Peninsula in the late 1990s, aspiring jazz bassist Nate Omdal had to drive 50 miles to find Miles Davis’ seminal album “Birth of the Cool.”

“I’d get paid from my job and I’d drive to Port Townsend to buy some records at Quimper Sound,” recalls Omdal, 27. “I had started a 10-piece band the year before, so I was really motivated to get a copy of ‘Birth of the Cool’ and a piece of Waterfront Pizza.”

Omdal’s latest project, the Seattle Jazz Composers’ Ensemble (SJCE), was born on a similar quest. On the way from Seattle to a Port Townsend gig with pianist Mike Owcharuk several months ago, they came up with the concept of assembling an ensemble with the same expanded brass instrumentation as “Birth of the Cool.” The SJCE makes its debut tonight at Lucid Jazz Lounge, just north of the U District.

Continue reading at The Seattle Times.

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Kelley Johnson Quartet

JAZZ ALLEY: Dr. John and the Lower 911

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Karin Blaine
9pm – Zazou
11pm – Nikki & Kiko

JAZZVOX: Cathy Segal-Garcia w/ John Stowell
http://jazzvox.com

EL GAUCHO BELLEVUE: Trish Hatley Trio

LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: Birth of the Cool Nonet w/ Jason Parker, Michael Owcharuk

HIROSHI’S: Monkstone Theocracy Creamery

PAMPAS ROOM: Brian Nova Quartet

LATONA PUB: Phil Sparks Trio

SERAFINA: Fred Hoadley

from the New York Times:

Rashied Ali, whose expressionistic, free-jazz drumming helped define the experimental style of John Coltrane’s final years, died Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 76.

The cause of his death was a heart attack, his wife, Patricia Ali, said.

Mr. Ali, who first encountered Coltrane in their Philadelphia neighborhood in the late 1950s, made the leap from admiration to participation in the mid-1960s, when he joined Elvin Jones as a second drummer with Coltrane’s ensemble at the Village Gate in November 1965 He recorded with Coltrane and Jones on the 1965 album “Meditations” and, after replacing Jones as Coltrane’s drummer, on the duet album “Interstellar Space” (1967), one of the purest expressions of the free-jazz movement. On Mr. Ali’s Web site, his playing is described as “a multi-rhythmic, polytonal propellant, helping fuel Coltrane’s flights of free-jazz fancy.”

Mr. Ali was born Robert Patterson into a musical family in Philadelphia. He started out on piano and dabbled with trombone and trumpet before finding his way to the drums, which he began to play seriously while serving in the Army.

Continue reading at the New York Times:

from The New York Times:

The crowd was robust, lively and engaged at a recent jazz gig in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and by the looks of it most people were in their early 20s to mid-30s — about the same age as the band members. It could have been almost any given night on the New York club scene, though you might not have had that impression, depending on your sources.

Over the last week or so, as Woodstock commemoration reached its happy zenith, the jazz world has been rumbling with a more panicked sort of nostalgia. What set it off was an Aug. 9 column by the critic Terry Teachout — headlined “Can Jazz Be Saved?” — in The Wall Street Journal. A longtime advocate of jazz, Mr. Teachout weighed its cultural advances against its popular decline, reaching the conclusion that “it’s no longer possible for head-in-the-sand types to pretend that the great American art form is economically healthy or that its future looks anything other than bleak.”

Jazz has had more than its share of hand-wringers, and so this Chicken Little lament felt wearily familiar. But Mr. Teachout came armed with data from Arts Participation 2008, a recent survey by the National Endowment for the Arts. Conducted in partnership with the United States Census Bureau, it found that only 7.8 percent of adults in this country claimed to have attended a jazz performance last year. The figure reported in previous years — 1982, 1992 and 2002 — was closer to 10 percent. A demographic breakdown showed steady upticks among respondents 55 and over, and a downward trend for everyone else. (Attendance also slipped for art museums, classical concerts, the ballet and the theater.)

Mr. Teachout wasn’t the first to sound an alarm: the jazz historian Ted Gioia weighed in last month at the Web site Jazz.com. “The most likely — indeed the only plausible — explanation for these numbers is that very few new fans have discovered jazz since the 1980s,” Mr. Gioia wrote. “The old fans continue to follow the music, but teenagers and 20-somethings have very little interest in jazz.”

But there’s a wealth of anecdotal evidence to the contrary, as many jazz bloggers and commentators, responding mainly to Mr. Teachout, have been quick to point out. Try dropping in one night this week at the Village Vanguard, where Jason Moran and the Bandwagon are appearing. Or head to the Stone in the East Village, which is likely to hit sweaty capacity for each set programmed by the young drummer-composer Tyshawn Sorey. Or stop by the Highline Ballroom in Chelsea on Friday night for a show by the Bad Plus. Scratch anywhere past the surface and you might begin to wonder whether the likes of Mr. Teachout and Mr. Gioia don’t see young people listening because they don’t know where to look.

Continue reading at The New York Times.

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Isabella Du Graf Quartet

JAZZ ALLEY: Dr. John and the Lower 911

NEW ORLEANS: Ham Carson Quintet

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – JC and his BFF’s, with John Cheadle (sax), Colin Pulkrabek (trombone), Zach Para (drums), Gus Carns (piano) and Birch Periera (bass)
9pm – Brian Heaney Group, with Brian Heaney (guitar), Greg Campell (drums), Bill Jones (trumpet), and John Seman (bass)

LO-FI: Gravity w/ Tim Kennedy, Ian Sheridan, & Claudio Rochat Felix

LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: The Hang w/ The Teaching

August 24th at the Triple Door
The Teaching DVD Release Concert

J&J Music & The Teaching are proud to announce the release of The Teaching’s premier DVD. The release concert is set for Monday, August 24th at the beautiful Triple Door music venue across the street from Benaroya Hall.

During the concert scenes from the new DVD will be projected on the big screen behind the band. The DVD features footage captured from The Teaching’s CD release concert at the Triple Door last January, interviews with the band members about their weekly jam session called The Hang, and other special footage from performances, studio hangs and more.

Please mark your calendars and join The Teaching as they play new music they’ve created over the past year. The concert will feature a special guest, saxophonist Serafin Sanchez, who they had the chance to work with last winter in Colorado.

Make a reservation by calling Triple Door at (206) 838-4333 or click here.

August 24th, 2009 at 7:30pm
Triple Door
216 Union Street
Seattle, WA 98101
(206) 838-4333
www.tripledoor.com

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Kate King Vocal Showcase

JAZZ ALLEY: Dr. John and the Lower 911

TRIPLE DOOR MAINSTAGE: Larry Carlton

NEW ORLEANS: Legacy Quartet w/Clarence Acox

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Eli Meisner Trio with Xavier McHugh (drums), Nathan Parker (bass) and Eli Meisner (guitar) ($7 cover)
9pm – Vocal Jam hosted by Cara Francis

THAIKU: Ron Weinstein Trio

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Jazz Jam with Darin Clendenin

JAZZ ALLEY: Kent Meridian Jazz Ensemble Tribute to Hal Sherman with special guest Danny Gottlieb

NEW ORLEANS: New Orleans Quintet

TOST: Michael Shrieve’s Spellbinder

HIGH DIVE: Owcharuk 5

from The Seattle Times:

In the two small buildings on the Bellevue College campus that house radio station KBCS-FM (91.3), music spanning from jazz to the Grateful Dead drifts through as volunteers come and go. Colorful posters for shows like the World Rhythm Festival and “An Evening with Robin and Linda Williams” hang on the walls.

But on Aug. 24, the community radio station once dubbed “Place to Catch the Craziest Music” by a local magazine will eliminate four morning music shows and use that time instead to air the same show every day. The station also is cutting a staple: two hours of early-morning jazz in lieu of public-affairs news.

Continue reading at The Seattle Times.

JAZZ ALLEY:  Ahmad Jamal

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB:
3pm – Jay Thomas Big Band
8pm – Jim Cutler Orchestra

MARTINS OFF MADISON: Tim Kennedy

SERAFINA: Conlin Roser Duo, 11am

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Susan Pascal Quartet

JAZZ ALLEY: Ahmad Jamal

BAKE’S PLACE: Tingstead and Rumbel

LOCAL COLOR: Benjamin Doerr

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – ThorNton Creek
9pm – Sunship, with Brian Heaney (guitar), Michael Monhart(sax), Stuart Dempster (trombone), Andrew Luthringer (bass) and David Revelli (drums)
11pm – Michael Owcharuk Trio, with Cody Rahn (drums), Michael Catts (bass) and Mike Owcharuk (piano)

SERAFINA: Leo Raymundo w/Sue Nixon

SOUTH PORT CAFE: Gail Pettis Trio
1083 Lake Washington Blvd N, Renton, 7pm

GRAZIE: Sue Bell Quartet
23207 Bothell-Everett Hwy SE, Bothell, 7pm

NEW ORLEANS RESTAURANT: Voices Of Seattle w/ Elnah Jordan, Katie King, Reggie Goings

CONCERT: Monktail Creative Concern’s Sounds Outside
1:00 – Melbatones
2:30 – Figeater
4:00 – Greg Sinibaldi
5:30 –  Syncopated Taint
7:00 – Bert Wilson
Cal Anderson Park, 1625 11th Ave., 1pm, Sounds Outside

Doug Miller, bass and Benny Green, piano in a Tribute to Oscar Peterson at Jazz Port Townsend 2009
photo by Jim Levitt

The general consensus is that one of the major highlights at this Summer’s Jazz Port Townsend was The Tribute to Oscar Peterson played by the Benny Green Trio. This exciting performance brought the capacity audience to its feet with the brillance of Benny Green’s Tribute to piano great Oscar Peterson. Most of the music was also composed by Oscar Peterson. This special concert will air on Jazz Northwest from 88.5, KPLU and kplu.org on Sunday August 16 at 1 PM PDT.

Benny Green was officially designated a protegé of Oscar Peterson in connection with the Glenn Gould prize awarded to Mr. Peterson in 1993. As a result, the two spent considerable time together as friends and fellow pianists. They recorded one CD together, “Oscar and Benny” for Telarc in 1998.

Jazz Northwest is recorded and produced by Jim Wilke exclusively for KPLU. The program is also available as a podcast from kplu.org after the airdate.

South Lake Union Summer Concert Series: McTuff
(2200 Westlake Ave, upper plaza), 11:45am

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Hadley Caliman Quartet

HIROSHI’S JAZZ AND SUSHI: Ocho Pies (Afro-Cuban music and more.)
featuring: Connie Bunyer – vocals, Paul Hjelm – guitar, Steve Luceno – guitar and bass, Michael Olson – percussion

LATONA PUB: Phil Sparks Trio

JAZZ ALLEY: Ahmad Jamal

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Pat Donohue with Tamara Lewis opening – Pairie Home Companion’s Grammy-winning acoustic guitarist! Guitar legend Chet Atkins once said, “Pat Donohue is one of the greatest finger pickers in the world today.”
9pm – The Side Project: Suzie Bradford (vocals/piano) and Ben Bradford (bass/synth/vocals)
11pm – Stick Trio, with Jacob Stickney (tenor sax), Evan Flory-Barnes (bass), Jeremy Jones (drums)

GRAZIE: Sue Bell Quartet

EL GAUCHO BELLEVUE: Trish Hatley Trio

PAMPAS ROOM: Brian Nova Quartet

LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: Mercedes Nicole Trio

Les Paul, who helped revolutionize popular music with his innovations on the guitar and in the recording studio, died today of complications from pneumonia. He was 94.

As the recording executive Ahmet Ertegun said in 1988 upon Mr. Paul’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, “Les Paul is an inspiration to a world of guitarists for his playing, for the instrument he created and his multiple-track recording innovations. Without him, it’s hard to imagine how rock and roll would be played today.”

continue reading at The Boston Globe

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Sonando

JAZZ ALLEY: Ahmad Jamal

NEW ORLEANS: Ham Carson Quintet

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Ideal Bread West featuring the music of Steve Lacy, with Josh Sinton (baritone sax), Tom Varner (french horn), Geoff Harper (bass) and Paul Kikuchi (drums)
9pm – Dan Czaran with Karin Kajita (piano), Kevin McCarthy (bass) and Larry Bergman (drums)

LO-FI: Gravity w/ Tim Kennedy, Ian Sheridan, & Claudio Rochat Felix

LUCID JAZZ LOUNGE: The Hang w/ Teaching

THAIKU: Jon Alberts, Jeff Johnson & Tad Britton

TULA’S JAZZ CLUB: Tatum Greenblatt Quintet

JAZZ ALLEY: Ahmad Jamal

NEW ORLEANS: Legacy Quartet w/Clarence Acox

THAIKU: Ron Weinstein Trio

EGAN’S BALLARD JAM HOUSE:
7pm – Jessica Stenson with Darin Clendenin (piano) and Clipper Anderson (bass)
9pm – Vocal Jam hosted by Marti MacEwan, with the Dan Sales Trio

Photos by Jim Levitt

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