Night After New Year: Bobby Watson & Horizon

Just the second of January, and KC hosted what will be remembered as one of the great jazz performances of the year, Bobby Watson and Horizon at The Blue Room. Fellow blogger Plastic Sax reviewed it here. KC Star editor Steve Paul reviewed it here. Even the Star’s and KCUR’s Steve Kraske tweeted, “Saw Bobby Watson Saturday night. If you weren't there you already missed the best jazz show of 2010.”

Now, I know better than to think I can compete with the pro’s prose. But I was there, too and, with a blog on jazz and Kansas City, of course I need to add my take on the evening. I call this, ’Twas the Night After New Year (I apologize in advance for some really bad rhymes. And, as always, clicking on a photo should open a larger version of it.)

*****

’Twas the night after New Year, two thousand and ten.
Snow started to fall as I watched from the den.
The show at The Blue Room would be good this night
But outside the cold and the snow were a fright.

Yet, to see Bobby Watson and his group Horizon,
For them it was worth from the sofa a’risin’.
Besides, who would get out on this kind of night?
I could stroll in and enjoy a front row delight.

I’ve seen Bobby often; he lives in KC.
But this famous group I’d heard just on CD.
In jazz they’re renowned, known as one of the best.
So weather be damned, as I drove to my quest.

I parked in a lot right at 18th and Vine
Then walked ‘cross the street. I’d arrived just in time.
And what to my wondering eyes should appear
But a room that was packed with fans, good drinks and cheer.
I walked up the ramp, far away from the door.
It was clear I would not find a seat on the floor.

The crowd spanned all ages: young, mid-age and old.
They came for great music, and out of the cold.
People came from the ‘burbs, from the city, all quarters
(One table was filled with ace Star reporters).
There was even a couple with pre-teens and treats
(I was jealous ‘cause those kids had much better seats).

The band took the stage. We sat rapt at attention.
Expectations were high, there’s no need to mention.
Bobby blew first, fingers nimble, then fast.
Horizon came in. We were there ’til the last.

With Edward on keyboards, Peter on bass,
With Victor on drums, the best anyplace,
With Terell on trumpet and Bobby on sax,
Most numbers blew hard, though some would relax.

They played one by Duke, one by Burt Bacharach.
They played one that’s hard bop, then subtle, then back.
But most were by Watson, and most he would drive.
The music exploded. The room was alive.

One beautiful number, just Bobby and Edward,
Still rolls through my head, may be there forever.
And when the show ended, we stood and applauded,
What better way for a year to get started.

No matter that snow from my car I’d now scrape,
’Twas worth it to sit there, my mouth wide agape.
And the staff did exclaim as we strode out of sight,
“Happy New Year to all, and to all a good night!”

In Lieu of 1000 Words: Diverse at the Record Bar

Let's open the year with some photos.

One of my favorite nights of jazz in 2009 was in late August at The Blue Room. The club was standing room only with a line out the door. The group was Diverse, mostly UMKC students with first place in a national competition and an album in the jazz top 50 both on their resume. Bobby Watson joined them at the end of each set. Pop star Kenny Loggins dropped by and sat in on a couple numbers as well. It was one of those nights where you feel magic in the room.

I had the pleasure of hearing Diverse again on Monday, December 14th at the Record Bar. The club was filled. This time, saxophonist Logan Richardson joined the group. Here's a sampling of what we saw (clicking on a photo should open a larger version of it).

 Diverse. Left to right: John Brewer on electric piano, Ryan Lee on drums, William Sanders on tenor saxophone, Ben Leifer on bass, Hermon Mehari on trumpet

 

Guest saxophonist Logan Richardson

John and Ryan

William and Ben

John, Ryan, Ben and Hermon

Logan Richardson and Diverse

The front line blows 

 

Diverse

In Lieu of 1000 Words: Shay Estes at Jardine's

Let's wrap up the year with some photos.

I don't pretend to know what's the best jazz CD of the year. But I'll tell you my favorite: Shay Estes and Trio ALL's Despite Your Destination. It's a terrific snapshot of the music and musical interplay singer Shay Estes, pianist Mark Lowrey, bassist Ben Leifer and drummer Zack Albetta deliver live.

The group played the late show at Jardine's on Saturday, December 12th, minus Mark Lowrey, who was out at another gig. Sitting in was T.J. Martley, a pianist I had not heard before but who I'm really looking forward to hearing again.

Here's a little of what we saw (clicking on a photo opens a larger version...I think).

Left to right: T.J. Martley on piano, Ben Leifer on bass, Shay Estes singing, Zack Albetta on drums

Ben in the background while Shay sings

T.J. and Shay

Ben, Shay and Zack

Drummer Zack Albetta

The group

Enjoying the piano solo

And this is what they're enjoying

Shay sings some more

This 'n That 'n Jazz Winterlude

This holiday week, a couple of unrelated thoughts.

*****

I write often of the terrific young jazz talent populating Kansas City today. After all, their music inspired the start of this blog. But that means I haven’t raved nearly enough of the outstanding musicians who preceded those young’uns and who still perform some of the best jazz heard anywhere. Now is my chance, thanks to, as far as I know, KC’s first January jazz fest.

Johnson County Community College turns juke joint January 8th through 10th for Jazz Winterlude. And what a chance it is to catch a sampling of KC’s jazz best.

For instance, for decades one of my favorite saxophonists has been Charles Perkins (Eddie Baker first pointed me his way when I chaired the Jazz Commission). He joins Rich Hill on Friday. Same day, the Danny Embry/Rod Fleeman performance doesn’t just pair two magnificent guitarists, but adds most of what was singer Karrin Allyson’s regular group when she lived here. I just pulled out a 1988 LP with Mike Ning and Sherry Jones and put it on the turntable to play while I write. Man, that’s good. Hear them on Saturday. Or at the same time you might choose Stan Kessler and Sons of Brazil. Then later that night, if you’ve ever heard Jim Mair’s Kansas City Jazz Orchestra you already know that here is a big band you do not want to miss.

And that’s just scratching the surface.

The festival web site is here. The complete list of musicians is here. Or, if you want to just take my word for it and head straight to the tickets, go here. And I’m told that students (any area school or college) with a valid student ID can get tickets at the door for just $5.

(A side note: Should you ever see the 1984 Kansas City Jazz Festival poster, you’ll see a shot looking down on a pianist in a Count Basie-style captain’s hat, hands poised over piano keys. The pianist in that photo is Luqman Hamza. Hear him in a group with KC native and current Basie guitarist Will Matthews on Friday.)

*****

So what’s going on with The Majestic?

They talked of Friday and Saturday night jazz downstairs when they reopened. But if there’s an easy way to find who’s playing, I can’t figure out what it is. Their newly redesigned web site (here) doesn’t tell. And they stopped maintaining their Twitter feed.

So I stopped by on a Saturday night a couple weeks back to see. What I saw (and heard): A jazz trio mostly providing what I’d call background lounge music.

When I was hoping to open a jazz club recently, I looked at The Majestic space. The consultants I engaged felt it would work best with a pianist upstairs weeknights and the downstairs club open weekends. Interestingly, that’s exactly what the new owner is doing. A reason I didn’t pursue that spot was that I want a rollicking jazz club every night.

But when I visited, rollicking it was not. Everyone there was extremely friendly and welcoming, and for that part of the experience I’d return. But not for the jazz club, at least based on what I saw that one night.

Maybe I’m naive. Maybe I really don’t understand what will work there. But I still think that space, especially downstairs, could be a jazz club renowned for nightly fun if properly programmed and promoted. I remember when the building was Fitzpatrick’s bar, before it became The Majestic. Fitzpatrick’s was on the Pub Crawl one of the years that I chaired the Jazz Commission. I went in and it was a blast. I’d love to have the chance to experience that, or something like it, driven by jazz, again and again.

The Future of Jazz Is This

What is it about the holidays that brings the vultures out to circle?

Last Thursday, our friend and the original KC jazz blogger, Plastic Sax, decried “shockingly small” jazz audiences. “The vast majorities of entire generations of music fans have been lost,” he says (here). “…It is a crisis.”

He cites pianist Mark Lowrey’s Radiohead tribute, last Friday at the Record Bar, as the type of concept which could pave jazz’s future.

Meanwhile, same day (was there something in the water last Thursday?), Newsweek posted an article titled Jazz is Dead. Long Live Jazz (here). The writer largely (though less succinctly) concurs with the Plastic Sax stance. He praises modern stylists “who can speak to that splintering pop audience.” But, he tells us, it’s time to accept that “as a mass-culture force, jazz is dead.”

It’s true: Jazz as a mass-culture force is dead. Has been since before I started listening over a quarter century ago. All that time, jazz has accounted for around 3% of music sales. Chicago’s web site touts the city's rabid jazz fans, but do the math and the number totals 3% of their population. About 3% of us out here are jazz fans. That’s not a mass-culture force. 97% non-jazz fans qualifies as decidedly not winning the vast majority of music fans.

And it’s true: Some KC jazz audiences have been shockingly small. Only 200 at last month’s Folly jazz series show? That’s embarrassing (I wrote about it here). The small crowd at Kurt Rosenwinkel’s Blue Room show still leaves me miffed at an opportunity lost (I wrote about that here).

And I have no objections to expanding the jazz audience through pop appeals. Jazz once was pop music. Charlie Parker turned Slow Boat to China into a bebop standard. Ella and Sarah sang the hits of their day (sorry, Judy Collins, but the best version ever of Send in the Clowns is by Sarah Vaughan). Miles played Michael Jackson hits. So send in the pop if that will draw new fans.

Maybe, then, these guys aren’t circling vultures to deride? Maybe they’re right? Maybe the size of the jazz audience is a crisis nearly lost?

Well, before I join in kicking the jazz bucket, I have a few questions.

* What’s the next step beyond pandemonium?

I have to ask because a couple Saturdays back, KC Star editor Steve Paul tweeted, “Pandemonium between sets for Shay Estes CD release gig at Jardine’s.” Now, had this been a show with a music style not death-bed-bound, no doubt the scene would have raged beyond pandemonium. What would that have been?

* What crowd size exceeds wall-to-wall?

I need to know because that’s how we were sardined into Jardine’s at 10:30 last Saturday night. Every table was filled, every bar stool in use. Yet people kept streaming in. But, of course, if this wasn’t music nobody goes out to hear anymore, I’m sure the crowd would have been larger. How big a crowd would that have been?

* Should I fear the 30-somethings?

Because they were a good percentage of that packed Jardine’s room. And we know they’re part of jazz’s lost generations. So why were they there? What’s their agenda? They’re 30-something jazz fans. And I was sitting next to them. Should I have been afraid?

* Why is Johnson County Community College warping our youth?

I’m concerned because at the Jon Faddis/T.S. Monk performance, which followed a day of mentoring, the upper level of The Blue Room was shoulder-to-shoulder with college students entranced by every note. Why is the college exposing those students to jazz? Don’t the students realize their passion will not be shared by 97% of their peers? Why is the college dementedly allowing this impressionable Johnson County youth to pack a bar at 18th and Vine on a school night?

* One more question: They’re all so young…what is this?

 

 

(Top photo: Shay Estes with Ben Leifer and Zack Albetta at Jardine’s; Middle photo: Diverse at the Record Bar; Bottom photo: Megan Birdsall at Jardine's)

Answer: The future of jazz is this.

Delayed

Lately I've been posting new entries to this blog early in the week. But lately I've had a computer with which to do that. Sadly, mine is currently in the shop for a video card transplant. So until it returns, later this week, my next post is delayed. Because typing out one of my way-too-lengthy diatribes on the phone ain't gonna happen.

-- Post From My iPhone

Just Had to Tell Someone

I started this blog, last August, because I heard some great music and I just had to tell someone.

It was like this: I knew the names of some of the young jazz musicians making an impact on Kansas City but, for the most part, I’d yet to hear them. I hadn’t been out to a jazz club in some time.

Then one day, last April I think, a friend mentioned a big band playing The Blue Room that night with one of those names I’d heard of but had never gone out and actually heard, a singer. I needed to get down there, Bill told me. He’d seen the band and singer separately, and together he expected to hear something spectacular.

It hadn’t been a good day. If nothing else, getting a drink wouldn’t hurt. So I went, and was at The Blue Room for the third set.

That night, that big band with singer Megan Birdsall blew me away. Turned out it wasn’t the drink that would hammer at my blues, that would make me feel good (no, make me feel great). It was the music. In particular, their up tempo take on Miss Otis Regrets was, well, Bill was right, it was spectacular.

I left The Blue Room knowing I needed to get out and hear those other young jazz musicians I’d been hearing about but had never gone out and actually heard. And when I did, I discovered that the jazz talent in Kansas City today is simply astounding, and by August I had to exclaim that somewhere, and somewhere turned out to be here.

(I had no idea what I’d write about after that post, and some of the entries since read like it.)

Well, these last few weeks I’ve been out and I’ve heard some great music. And I just have to tell someone.

Start with Trio ALL. Pianist Mark Lowrey, bassist Ben Leifer and drummer Zack Albetta each smartly drive the others’ strengths, delivering jazz that’s intriguing and compelling, and downright enjoyable. Solos can be wild yet precise or complex and controlled. A KC Star review last May called the group inventive and propulsive. That still fits.

Now add singer Shay Estes. When I first heard Shay last summer my thought was, fantastic voice on very traditional stylizations. I don’t know if it was just that performance (at The Phoenix, not with Trio ALL) or if her repertoire has evolved, or if Trio ALL just propels a different dynamic, but last month at Jardine’s and backed by Trio ALL, wow. I was taken not just by that voice, but by Shay and the group’s dynamism and wonderfully personal interpretations of jazz and some pop. The way Shay, Mark, Ben and Zack musically play off each other is a night of delight I’ll take any time it’s offered. Every song they perform, they own.

Matter of fact, KC is currently blessed with an abundance of don’t-miss-‘em vocalists, from Ida McBeth to The Wild Women of KC to Shay to Megan Birdsall. Photos of Megan and her group adorned my last post. Her voice turns any song into a unique musical gift, delivered as only Megan will sing it, from tempo-busting versions of Miss Otis Regrets and Lover Man to Wichita Lineman performed like it was meant to be a jazz classic. If you weren’t at Jardine’s last month to hear her version of Fire and Rain, you missed the song done as jazz that’ll break your heart.

And let’s not forget the night internationally renowned trumpeter Jon Faddis and drummer T.S. Monk came to The Blue Room, and our own Roger Wilder (on piano) and Ben Leifer (on bass) fleshed out the group. Ben’s bandmate from the group Diverse, Ryan Lee, played the drum set for a couple numbers before Monk sat down. Each one of them belonged on that stage. I sat in front for the second set, and I could see respect in the way Jon Faddis eyed Roger and Ben. I could see he was seeing talent that could play with anyone, any time, anywhere. I know that’s what I heard.

The quality of jazz in Kansas City today continues to astound me. Sure, the jazz scene now is not what it was twenty years ago. We need more locations to showcase our abundant talent. Then we need those locations and the musicians to market themselves 2010-style so everyone knows. But I don’t need to look hard to see all the pieces -- everything needed for the music to thrive -- out there, ready to grasp. I refuse to believe those pieces will not come together. When I hear the young musicians who this decade have started making their mark, I hear solid reason for optimism for jazz’s future.

Somewhere, I suppose, someone heard better live music these last few weeks than I did.

But I don’t know who. I don’t know where. I don’t know how.

In Lieu of 1000 Words: Last Wednesday at Jardine's

Today, I’ll mostly shut up. After an explanation of what we’ve got here.

My hobby is photography. But I’ve rarely taken a camera into clubs because I don’t carry a pocketable camera (I have one, and it and I don’t seem to like each other), and I’ve avoided walking in while sporting a hefty hip pack strapped to my considerable waist. Recently, though, I overcame the fear of looking like a freak (or, some might say, like more of a freak than usual), and nabbed a few shots of one of KC’s terrific young singers, Megan Birdsall, and her terrific group in performance.

So, here’s a visual sense of last Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving, 2009, at Jardine’s (clicking on a photo should bring up a larger version of it):

Megan lovin’ Paul Smith’s piano solo while Bob Bowman plays bass. The drummer was out ill this night.

Megan Birdsall sings. In black and white, she looks like quite the chanteuse.

Bassist Bob Bowman, while Megan enjoys his solo on the group’s outstanding interpretation of Fire and Rain. We were all enjoying it.

The group in performance.

Megan singing some more. Can’t get enough of that voice.

Festival Tales 3

From time to time I’ll recount stories from my days with the Kansas City Jazz Festival and the Kansas City Jazz Commission. This is one of those times.

*****

The 1986 festival headlined KC legend Jay “Hootie” McShann. We asked Jay to choose anyone - anyone - with whom he’d like to perform and told him we would try to book them. His choices: Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis on tenor sax, Buddy Tate also on tenor, Harry “Sweets" Edison on trumpet, Al Grey on trombone, Milt Hinton on bass and Gus Johnson on drums.

Milt was in Japan for the summer and unavailable, so Jay chose Major Holley instead. “Lockjaw” was too ill to perform (he would pass away a couple months after the festival). We suggested Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson on alto as a replacement, and Jay agreed. But “Cleanhead” was already scheduled in San Francisco that night and couldn’t break the engagement. So we settled on a group without the additional horn.

But there was one more complication: Buddy, “Sweets”, Al and Gus were booked in Europe (Belgium, if I remember correctly) in another festival that same weekend. Nonetheless, they wanted to play Kansas City, too.

Gus left the other festival a day early, deciding he needed a little rest between shows. But Buddy, “Sweets” and Al played the complete overseas event. They then traveled for over 30 continuous hours, sleeping on flights, and were in KC only about 5 hours before climbing the steps to our stage.

Al Grey was making arrangements for the group. Frankly, we were not paying these jazz icons all that much. One day, our contact asked Al why he, Buddy and “Sweets,” all in their 60s or 70s at the time, were putting themselves through such tortuous travel. It sure wasn’t for the money. They didn’t need our gig. They had more leisurely return plans in place before we called. So why do this? Why put themselves through this sleep-deprived travel hell?

Answered Al: “It’s a chance to play with Hootie! We’d never turn down a chance to play with Hootie!”

*****

Friends with a tape recorder were in the audience at that performance. I’ve since digitized the tape and keep mp3s of it among the music on my iPod and phone. From time to time, I’ll listen to the concert again.

“Sweets” Edison is clearly tired. Buddy Tate is good and some moments great. The others are consistently amazing. The way Jay drives the group and the way Al Grey and Major Holley in particular respond is Kansas City jazz at its best. It’s fun, a joyous reminder of why I love this music.

Every time I hear Buddy and Al sing, “She got it, she keeps it, she sits right on it, she just won’t give it away, anybody get it sure does got to pay,” then that transitions into a “One O’Clock Jump” tribute to Count Basie (who had died two years earlier), I smile. Anybody would.

(One tip from our sound man: The best place to record a festival is in front of the mixing tower, because that’s where the music is being adjusted to sound its best.)

*****

The next January, “Cleanhead” Vinson called us. He was booking his schedule for the coming year and wanted to know if we were putting together the same group for that year’s festival. Because if we were, he would leave the date open.

He did not want to miss another chance to play with Hootie.

*****

Instead, one of the most memorable happenings at the next year’s festival was the owner of our largest sponsor, a beer distributorship, driving his extraordinarily large personal RV over the curb, onto the grass and into Volker park, and parking it next to the stage.

We organizers looked at each other and asked, “What do we do?”

So what do you do when the owner of the company which gave you the largest chunk money to stage the event, whose money you couldn’t have done the festival without, and whose contribution you hope to see again next year, drives his extraordinarily large personal RV into the park and parks it next to the stage?

You tell him you’re glad he could make it and hope he enjoys the music.

(He did, and he sponsored the festival again the next year.)

*****

In my festival years, I had opportunities to meet Kansas City jazz history. Such as the year 87-year old bandleader Andy Kirk sat down with me for a half hour and told tales of Kansas City and jazz in the 1930s, and of Mary Lou Williams. But that’s a story for another blog post.

Fairness Follow-Up

Great minds, goes the cliche, think alike. Like, say, me and The New York Times?

A story in last Thursday’s Times begins, “Business owner, you might want to friend Facebook.” Sounds like one of the points I tried to hammer home in last week’s post.

Matter of fact, an author quoted in the article’s third paragraph makes my point precisely: “You need to be where your customers are and your prospective customers are. And with 300 million people on Facebook, and still growing, that’s increasingly where your audience is for a lot of products and services.”

Such as, maybe, jazz performances?

The story doesn’t address jazz specifically, but cites a theatrical play whose Facebook page “has 300 to 600 interactions every week” and is “one of the show’s top sources of new ticket sales.” It also cites a musical’s Facebook ad campaign which “generated 18 million impressions, more than 5,700 clicks and $40,000 in ticket sales - all for $4,400 spent on advertising.”

The article takes on much more, including the best ways for a business to utilize Facebook. It’s a good primer for businesses still needing to tackle one of the essential elements of new media. It can be read here.

*****

A comment following my last post (thank you, Burnett Music) makes excellent points on marketing jazz in 2009. One of them: “You also have to bundle things together - concerts, clinics, tv interviews/stories, radio and web technologies.”

When I helped stage Kansas City jazz festivals, TV and radio interviews were one of the most effective forms of event promotion. They still are. We knew who were the media jazz fans and would provide us a forum. For instance, back then Stan Carmack co-hosted channel 5’s noon news. Each year, we knew he would give us a slot on the show to plug the fest. Likewise, a then-afternoon host on KMBZ (whose name now escapes me) knew more about jazz organists than did I (much to my embarrassment) the year we brought in Jimmy McGriff.

I haven’t promoted a jazz fest in two decades. I don’t know who the jazz fans, ready to help, are amongst KC's broadcast media today. But surely jazz promoters (or their PR firms) do know and call them when there’s an event to promote.

While the many-tentacled media octopus has grown some new media limbs since my festival years, the traditional PR and promotional avenues remain every bit as viable today as they were way back when. Today, though, there’s more tentacles with which to tangle.

*****

In Cincinnati, a 30-year old jazz club has promoted a 23-year old marketing major to general manager as a “key to attracting a younger crowd and growing the influence of jazz in the region.”

What’s one way she’s accomplishing that? “I started marketing more. I made Facebook and Twitter accounts to bring it up to electronic times.”

Imagine that.

(Another way: “I want to find bands that infuse modern music with jazz.” I suspect that’s an approach Plastic Sax will heartily endorse.)

The full article can be read here.