This 'n That 'n Uncommon Similarities

You’d think they have nothing in common.

Last Sunday morning I completed compiling quotes for last week’s post recalling Count Basie’s big band as it uniquely developed in Kansas City. Then Sunday night, at The Record Bar, I took in the quirky and unconventional People’s Liberation Big Band of Greater Kansas City (PLBB), a 21st century musical collaboration with a big band sound that couldn’t be more unBasie-like.

In one city, over seventy five years apart, two big bands epitomizing big band extremes. Opposites. The definition of dissimilarity.

Until the similarities start to strike.

Two big bands built in Kansas City.

Two big bands built on unique arrangements capturing and spitting right back out the youthful voice and attitude of their respective eras.

Two big bands built with musicians clearly enjoying themselves before audiences sharing in the joy.

Two big bands built with some of the most outstanding musicians of their time.

Dave Scott guested with PLBB last weekend. And hearing the band shift from their own accessibly eccentric compositions to Scott’s original but more conventional big band voicings, spoke to the magnificent and versatile talent stacked on that stage. Solos by Matt Otto, James Isaac and Rich Wheeler – for starters – only underscored that impression.

Here are some of Kansas City’s finest musicians coming together, imbuing big band jazz with a contemporary sense of fluke and fun, performing some of the most memorable solos you’re going to hear, and leaving a happy audience with a collective smile.

So did that last sentence describe the People’s Liberation Big Band or Count Basie’s Kansas City big band?

Wildly different sounds, yes. But more similarities than you may have thought.

(And among the similarities, I didn’t even bring up big, burly bassits.)

*****

PLBB’s big, burly, bassist, Jeff Harshbarger, and PLBB’s Rich Wheeler also make up half of Kansas City’s Turkish jazz combo, Alaturka. Beau Bledsoe on guitar and oud and Brandon Draper on percussion comprise the other half.

When I first wrote about Alaturka (here), Sait Arat’s nearly unhuman playing of the darbuka grabbed my attention most. But when Sait departed, Brandon Draper’s percussion took the void, and the group’s sound started to evolve.

On Alaturka’s first outstanding CD, Taman Abi, simply not being able to see Sait play brought a different focus to the music than seeing the group live. On recordings. Beau’s guitar and oud gained prominence.

Each member carries a pivotal piece of Alaturka’s voice. The first time I heard Brandon with the group, at Jardine’s, I heard that voice refocusing. In January at Jazz Winterlude, I heard a completed evolution. This is Turkish music by jazz musicians. Brandon contributes a percussive feel different from Sait, one with equal measures of expert support and wonderful surprise.

Last night at the Record Bar, Alaturka released their second CD, Yalniz. In Yalniz we hear a blending on Turkish stylings and jazz improvisation where every musician shines.

Here you’ll find a beautiful conversation between tenor, guitar and percussion on Children's Songs No.1 followed by a wonderful blending of all instruments on Nikriz Saz Semaisi.  All of the musicians, within a Turkish mold, contribute to setting this recording apart: Beau's solo and guest vocalist Nihan Yesil on Divane Aşık Gibi, Rich’s inviting yet commanding tenor on Faint, Brandon’s defining percussion on Ciftitelli Zenkov, Jeff’s solid bass upon which each song builds.

With Yalniz, Alaturka melds four of Kansas City jazz’s finest musicians – Beau Bledsoe, Jeff Harshbarger, Rich Wheeler and Brandon Draper – together at their best.

I don’t see Yalniz available online yet, but I suspect when it is you’ll be able to find it here and here.

*****

Vine Street Rumble is a new Kansas City jazz combo, led by Kent Rausch, recalling traditional Kansas City swing. Their premiere outing is Monday, March 11th at Californos in Westport at 8 p.m.

Vine Street Rumble. People’s Liberation Big Band. Alaturka. The diversity of jazz in Kansas City today is unprecedented. The talent of jazz musicians in this city is amazing. The number of young musicians here speaks to the music’s future, as do new clubs opening and finding an audience.

The days when Basie dominated Kansas City music have long since passed. But jazz still lives in Kansas City.

Built in Kansas City

Trombonist Dicky Wells:

“So I think the real difference between the Basie band and most others was the way they broke down arrangements the way they wanted them. Sometimes, Benny Carter’s bands sounded almost too perfect. That’s the funny thing about jazz. You may rehearse until you’re hitting everything on the head, and here comes a band like the Savoy Sultans, raggedy, fuzzy-sounding, and they upset everything. ‘What am I doing here?’ you wonder. But that’s the way it is. That’s jazz. If you get too clean, too precise, you don’t swing sometimes, and the fun goes out of the music….

“You could compare it to a lot of kids playing in the mud, having a big time. When the mother calls one in to wash his hands, he gets clean, but he has to stand and just look while the others are having a ball. He’s too clean and he can’t go back. Same way when you clean up on that horn and the arrangements are too clean: you get on another level. You’re looking down on those guys, but they’re all having a good, free-going time.”

Drummer Jo Jones:

“At that time in Kansas City a local band had to to play opposite visiting bands, and when some met up with Basie’s raggedy band they got egg on their faces. They’d rather have paid us and had us not play. You ask Earl Hines about the night his band and ours played together…. Fletcher Henderson? McKinney’s Cotton Pickers? They never had a rhythm section. Chick Webb? Great, but never had a rhythm section….

“We worked at it, to build a rhythm section, every day, every night.... I didn’t care what happened – one of us would be up to par. If three were down, one would carry the three. Never four were out.”

Dicky Wells:

“I don’t think the Basie band had anything new except the idea of the two tenors. After all, Fletcher had swung just about everything that could be swung. Maybe Fletcher’s things were a bit more polished, but Basie had those tempos like Bennie Moten had….

“Basie’s two battling tenors were two of the best, and the crowd went for them. I heard them going like that at the Cherry Blossom when I was in Kansas City with Fletcher Henderson. Plenty of bands had two trumpet soloists, or two trombones, but not two tenors…. As soon as Herschel  [Evans] stood up, before ever he went down front, the people would start yelling. The same when Lester [Young] stood up. I think that started the tenor sax duet within a band. Before that it had been drums and trumpet.”

Trumpeter Buck Clayton:

“Our reputation, before we came east, was built on nine pieces, and I don’t think we ever had a bad night in Kansas City. But when we added five or six men it made a lot of difference. The band had to be enlarged to go on the road, but it slowed everything down and made it sluggish.... Then Benny Morton, Dicky Wells, Harry Edison and Earl Warren came in and it began to sound like a good big band.

“At first it was a disappointment, especially as compared with the band in Kansas City. Anyone who heard it there heard the swingingest band in the world. It was really a pleasure to play in it. Of course, we weren’t making any money to speak of, but things were cheap then and I think my rent was only about three dollars a week.

“We always had fun some kind of way.”

*****

On Saturday, October 31st, 1936, Count Basie’s band played a farewell dance at Paseo Hall, at 15th and The Paseo, before leaving Kansas City.

Count Basie:

“The first Halloween dance was at Paseo Hall that last Saturday night. We advertised it as our farewell dance. They always liked farewells and homecomings in Kansas city, so we called this our farewell thing. But actually we went right back into Paseo Hall that very next Monday night and played our last gig as the local union band. The big headline attraction that night was Duke Ellington….

“It was a very special night for everybody, because Duke had been coming to Kansas City for at least several years by that time, but this was the first time he was coming to play a dance at Paseo Hall. All the other times he had been booked into the big theaters downtown….

[At that time, Black patrons could not attend Kansas City’s downtown theaters.]

“But I didn’t get to hear him that last night in Kansas City, because we went on first, and we couldn’t stay for the main event because we were scheduled to leave for Chicago that very same Monday night. In fact our bus was parked outside, ready to pull out as soon as we finished our set and loaded our instruments. Our suitcases were already on board….

“We went on early, and of course, we did our best to liven things up in there, and we always did. But then when Duke’s famous musicians began arriving, the crowd couldn’t help showing how excited it was about having them there. So, as many friends and well-wishers as we knew we had in Kansas City, I don’t think there were many more than about a dozen people who came outside to see us off.

“But Duke himself came out…. I hadn’t yet had a chance to get to know him personally at that time…. But that last night he made it his business to come outside of Paseo Hall and give us his congratulations and wish us good luck, and he gave me a few words of encouragement and a big pat on the shoulder just before I got on the bus. He was beautiful.

“‘Go ahead,’ he said. ‘You can make it.’”

*****

Quotes by Dicky Wells, Jo Jones and Buck Clayton are from The World of Count Basie by Stanley Dance. Quotes by Count Basie are from Good Morning Blues, The Autobiography of Count Basie.

This 'n That 'n Evolution

Granted, I was there nights when barely twenty people sat scattered around the room. But I was also there when they couldn’t honor my reservation because every table was filled, and on weekend nights when I stood at the bar for lack of open stools.

When I started this blog, coming up on four years ago, two clubs dominated Kansas City’s jazz scene: Jardine’s and The Blue Room. True, the Phoenix still booked The Scamps every Saturday afternoon, but it wasn’t long before they would mostly forsake jazz for the blues. And while The Majestic’s downstairs club was still swinging every night, the restaurant was floundering and would soon close.

Other spots featured jazz here and there. The People’s Liberation Big Band was building a following the first Sunday of each month at the Record Bar. The Drum Room gave over some floor space to a weekend band, but in a bar with TVs tuned to ESPN.

Not long into this blog’s life, if you wanted to hear jazz in Kansas City, you wanted Jardine’s or The Blue Room.

Then Jardine’s died.

One club, 1920 Main, hiccuped onto the scene and was gone.

The state of Kansas City jazz venues looked dire.

But what we didn’t recognize, what is now becoming apparent, is that with the dominance of Jardine’s gone, new opportunities could flourish.

Venues not known for jazz stepped cautious toes into the void. Grunaur in the Crossroads district booked some of the music. The Westport Coffee House hosted the premiere of Stan Kessler’s new group Parallax.

Meanwhile, out south, Take Five Coffee + Bar transformed from hey-did-you-hear-about-that-coffee-shop-in-Leawood-that-books-some-jazz-yeah-jazz-in-Leawood-for-godssake to a genuine weekend jazz bar where the musicians covet playing and where audiences applaud paying a cover charge to benefit the musicians. That’s right, they’ve applauded paying a cover charge. In Leawood.

Same time, The Majestic claimed a new owner and reopened. Cautiously, they first booked jazz downstairs on Fridays and Saturdays. But over time, music in the former speakeasy has expanded to seven nights a week.

And the young musicians started dominating the weekend jam sessions at the Mutual Musicians Foundation. First, they staged and broadcast on the internet their own Friday night jam sessions. Then they moved to the main jam stage upstairs.

The Power and Light District played with jazz. The lounge adjacent to the theaters was deemed a jazz club, but (from stories I’ve heard), internal squabbles doomed that venture. Which is why I was dubious when the Kill Devil Club opened last year. But Kill Devil has hit on a mix of music and high-priced rum that appears to be working and drawing a stylish crowd.

And recently, in the Crossroads district, the Green Lady Lounge quietly opened and started booking jazz. First, a couple nights, and now six nights each week. Where Kill Devil is upscale in a spanking-new abode, Green Lady lives in a building that’s been there forever, with a classic feel and prices the neighborhood can afford. It’s two jazz venues within a close drive, but with atmospheres and business models different enough that both can thrive.

And let’s not forget, The Blue Room continues to be the Kansas City jazz club that makes Downbeat’s 100 best list each year, and deservedly so. Four nights a week, this is where you go to experience where jazz began.

Kansas City boasts more jazz venues now than when Jardine’s and The Blue Room co-dominated. We no longer have a Plaza area jazz supper club lording over the scene. Instead, as it always has, the Kansas City jazz scene has evolved. In 1933, the Eblon Theater on Vine Street was remodeled into the Cherry Blossom, where some of Kansas City jazz history’s greatest moments occurred. In the 1940s, it was rechristened the Chez Paree. Later, it was turned into a bowling alley. Then it closed. Then it burned. Classic jazz dives along 12th Street succumbed to urban renewal. Jardine’s succumbed to a revolt against management. But Take Five and Kill Devil Club and Green Lady Lounge opened.

Evolution.

In Kansas City, jazz survives. I’ll not pretend it claims the dominance it held when Basie played the Cherry Blossom. But it’s not going away.

*****

And one of the quirkier but funnest bands jazz survives with is The People’s Liberation Big Band of Greater Kansas City. The first Sunday of each month this collection of outstanding musicians performs quite untraditional jazz spiced with whimsey at the Record Bar.

This coming Sunday, March 3rd, they’re joined by San Francisco trumpeter Dave Scott. Scott’s resume includes touring and recording with groups as diverse as those of Boz Scaggs, Rosemary Clooney and the Honolulu Symphony.

Sunday night, The People’s Liberation Big Band of Greater Kansas City will be playing Scott’s compositions and arrangements. The fun starts at 8:00. See you there.

Friday Night and the Green Lady Lounge

Bobby Watson put together a big band and, with the Kansas City Symphony, crammed the Kauffman Center. At the same time, The Folly stood nearly half filled – better than recent shows – for Kenny Garrett. Stan Kessler’s quartet was playing Louie’s Wine Dive over at 71st and Wornall. Ken Lovern’s trio entertained a packed Kill Devil Club downtown while Charles Williams brought piano mastery to The Blue Room at 18th and Vine and Michael Pagán’s trio played The Majestic’s one-time speakeasy and Rob Foster’s violin fronted Take Five way out in Leawood. Later, overnight, crowds would swarm the Mutual Musicians Foundation. And let’s not forget that Lonnie McFadden opened the night at The Phoenix.

So don’t try to tell me jazz is dead in Kansas City.

Especially when you can add another new club to the list.

By 9:00 on Friday night, on Grand Boulevard just south of 18th Street, in the Crossroads district, the Green Lady Lounge was filling up for Mark Lowrey on piano, Sam Wisman on drums and Shay Estes’s vocals.

With jazz six nights a week, the Green Lady Lounge is growing an urban audience in a distinctive space.

If listening to jazz in Leawood’s Take Five is like enjoying a live band with friends in your uncle’s living room, walking into the Green Lady Lounge is like stepping back in time some 70 years. This must be what it felt like in the jazz bars lining 12th Street when Count Basie and Mary Lou Williams played them. A long, thin space, the bar hugs one wall and black booths the other. A few tables sprinkle the front and back. A tin ceiling hangs overhead. Everything is red: the drapes, the walls. But near the front, as you step inside the door, sits a magnificent grand piano and the space where a jazz band performs. The room can be noisy, but speakers line the walls to carry the music just right.

The Blue Room books wonderful music, but looks like what it is: a bar in a museum. The Kill Devil Club is a modern delight. The Mutual Musicians Foundation is authentic history, and downstairs at the Majestic retains its speakeasy heritage. But there is something about this space – maybe it’s the red walls, or the faux-classic paintings hanging on them that pretend to bestow class, or maybe it’s that big grand piano greeting you – that transcends time and leaves 2013 outside the front door.

It’s an urban juke joint with a neighborhood atmosphere. Last Friday night, the crowd was friendly, predominantly thirty-somethings, not your stereotypical jazz aged. Some danced. The staff was welcoming. Drinks were priced reasonably. Food is a short offering of small plates. The one I sampled was quite good. The music was superb. Parking, as in most of the Crossroads district, is challenging. But if you don’t mind walking a block, south of 19th Street on Grand, at least last weekend, sat plenty of unused on-street spots.

The Green Lady Lounge is quietly building an urban jazz delight. Their website is here. Their calendar is here. Their Facebook page is here.

Re-Post: A Portrait of the Foundation Last Saturday Night

Preparing for a presentation at work claimed priority over prepping a new blog post this past weekend. So this week, I present a re-post from the past, specifically from the week of April 11, 2011. Enjoy.

*****

Around 3:45 a.m., they temporarily stopped letting people go upstairs. Too many guests were already up there.

Meanwhile, downstairs, the line of people snaked out the door. One man in a military uniform asked if he could get in free. No, he was told, this was the only means of income. Think of the cover charge as a donation. He did.

People wandered around downstairs, looking closely at the portraits of Kansas City jazz legends which line the walls. I prefer the ambiance downstairs.

“How do they do this?” one person asked, looking away from the wall, throwing the question out to anybody. “How can they stay open all night? Do they have a special permit?”

“The state of Missouri passed a special law just for this place,” I offered, from across the room. “This is a National Historic Landmark, after all.”

Upstairs, every seat was filled. People lined the back of the room and the thin aisles between tables. Most held a drink. Everyone I saw looked happy.

The crowd was diverse – black people, white people, Asian people – and enjoying each other’s company. I came alone and shared a table with strangers. But they weren’t strangers. We introduced ourselves. The other guests started asking questions.

“Do you come here often?”

“Not too often,” I answered. “At my age, I need an afternoon nap to stay out this late. But I’ve been coming here since the 1980s.”

“So who has played here?”

“Just about anyone associated with jazz. Count Basie, Charlie Parker, Mary Lou Williams, Big Joe Turner. In fact, I saw Big Joe Turner here.”

“You did?”

“Yes, downstairs. I was standing about an arm’s length away while he shouted the blues.”

People upstairs stood, bought a drink, apologized when they bumped into each other, then sat down to chat and to listen and to marvel.

Let’s be honest: This was a beautiful spring night. And at 3:45 a.m. on a weekend night in Kansas City, here and the casinos are the only places I know where you can (legally) enjoy entertainment and drink. Some people were here because they could be. Some just weren’t ready for bed yet on such a gorgeous night.

But some in the audience came for the jazz. The people I spoke with came to touch history. Here, it touches back.

On stage, a rhythm section anchored the Saturday night jam session (Sunday morning, actually; it started at 1 a.m.). They were joined by trumpet, trombone and tenor sax. There was solid experience, a veteran of Kansas City jazz, behind the piano. But on trumpet, Chalice is young and here regularly. I’ve heard him before, and before he sounded inexperienced. But tonight his sound is more controlled. He’s growing in mastery of his instrument. I’m not the only one who noticed.

Is this what Kansas Citians had the chance to hear 75 years ago, when a young Charlie Parker once squeaked his sax – in, among other places, this building – then gradually grew and mastered his instrument? Sure, we don’t know where any young player will end up. It’s improbable that I’m hearing the maturing of a future jazz great. I understand odds stand stacked against that.

But it’s possible. Because in this building, history touches back.

Downstairs, I chatted with Anita, who is in charge. I told her that after some recent turmoil on the Board here, I asked a friend, a musician, what was going on. My friend told me, “Don’t worry, Anita will take care of everything.” Anita laughed. My friend was right.

Outside, cars lined both sides of Highland Street, leaving a single lane on a two-way street. I stopped to chat with another friend. On the street, a car and a taxi approached from opposite directions and stopped, facing each other. Someone from the car, who maybe had a bit to drink, stepped out, flashing muscles (“he’s done steroids,” my friend decided) and yelled at then kicked the taxi. The taxi driver just talked on his cell phone. The car pulled to the side, between two parked cars, and the taxi passed. As it did, the driver of the car yelled at the taxi driver. The taxi driver continued to talk on his cell phone.

I walked down the street, smiling, to my car, then drove off for the night. I drove through the Crossroads district, seeing maybe two other cars on the road. The rest of Kansas City was asleep.

When I pulled out of my parking spot, on Highland, and drove off, I saw another car pull into the space. I saw two people step out.

As I drove up the ramp to I-35 from West Pennway, to head back home, I wondered if those two people had found their way upstairs yet.

— Last Saturday night at the Mutual Musicians Foundation.

The Good, the Bad and the Not So Ugly

One member of the trio has blonde hair. One has dark hair with grey streaks. One is completely grey.

This doesn’t actually define three generations of musicians. Not in this group, anyway. But it is an another thread of extraordinary talent coming together and the Kansas City jazz scene perpetuating itself.

Jeff Harshbarger’s newest group, Sequel, brings together Jeff on bass, Ken Lovern on organ and Brian Steever on drums, adapting in admiration the instrumentation of Modeski, Martin and Wood. Saturday night at Take Five Coffee + Bar, they played compositions by Ellington, by Coltrane, by Jimi Hendrix, and loads of rollicking funk.

Here’s musicians sharing music they clearly love and keeping a room swaying in its seats for a couple hours. Here's diversity finding a new outlet.

Here’s jazz in Kansas City in 2013.

*****

And here’s jazz in Kansas City in 2013: According to a review in The Kansas City Star, only about 300 people didn't fill the Folly for James Carter’s organ trio.

Let’s back up.

In his December 27th column, Star Jazz Town columnist Joe Klopus noted sparse crowds at some of 2012’s bigger KC jazz concerts. He added:

“Really, the audience is out there. You just have to connect with them somehow, to inspire them to move outside the comfort zone of consumer culture for a little while.

“It can be done. We’re proving it over and over again every weekend in small ways.

“We just need to make it happen on a bigger scale. That’s the thing that keeps eluding us, and keeps hurting us the most.”

I’m looking at you, Folly.

A few blocks over, in the shiny new palace to the performing arts, The Kansas City Jazz Orchestra’s last performance drew four times the crowds The Folly attracted for James Carter. Sure, performing in the shiny new palace helps. But the fact is, the Jazz Orchestra appears to have rebounded from a shrinking base a couple years back to now packing ’em in.

They’ve proven you can draw a crowd downtown for a jazz concert.

They do it in part through familiarity. The audience that comes knows and enjoys their sound. And their first couple of guest artists this year, Kevin Mahogany and Karrin Allyson, remain Kansas City favorites.

A year ago I chastised The Folly for failing to market jazz beyond its core audience. A year later, they’re still not reaching beyond the core, their audience hasn’t grown, and some of that core is walking out of the shows they’re booking.

The Folly is a wonderful facility. And this year’s jazz series stands as one of their most artistically exceptional seasons.

But this is a series started decades ago by a group of fans who incorporated as Friends of Jazz. Originally, Friends booked programs at various facilities, then settled on The Folly following its renovation. Eventually, The Folly took the series over as its own.

But now The Folly is booking acts, like Vijay Iyler, who are recognized as among the greatest talents in jazz today, but who play a more contemporary style of jazz than the longtime core will appreciate. They’re booking acts that some of the longtime core will walk out on.

Meanwhile, other groups prove that modern jazz can fill The Folly to its rafters. Witness the December performance of The Mouse King by the Owens/Cox dance troupe with music by The People’s Liberation Big Band of Greater Kansas City.

The difference? Owens/Cox has built the right following for their performances. They've built anticipation for their December show. They’re marketing – they're speaking – to a modern core.

You can program for the audiences the Jazz Orchestra is drawing to the Kauffman Center. Or you can build a modern core.

*****

Because Kansas City’s remarkable jazz talent, coming together in new ways to perpetuate itself, makes this city, this size, unique.

A New York Times article late last month (here) applauds the opening in San Francisco of “the SFJazz Center, a $64 million performance space, proudly billed as the first stand-alone building designed for jazz in this country.”

But the fact that stood out to me in the article was the size of the center’s star auditorium: 700 seats.

In San Francisco.

In a metropolitan area of 4.4 million people.

In a metropolitan area 2.2 times the size of the Kansas City area.

700 seats.

Maybe that speaks bundles about the state of jazz. Maybe that says if, in an area of 4.4 million people, they figure they’re not going to need more than 700 seats for a jazz performance, you can stick a fork in jazz ’cause it’s done.

But if so, what does it say about Kansas City that for the last performance of The Kansas City Jazz Orchestra, you would need to use every seat in that fabulous new San Francisco jazz center, plus you would need to add every seat in the Gem Theater at 18th and Vine to accommodate the crowd?

Maybe, just maybe, it says in Kansas City the audience is out there. Clearly, the talent is here. I’m not suggesting James Carter could fill the Kauffman Center. I am suggesting he could attract more than a few hundred souls.

Saturday night, Sequel connected with the audience. Their audience will grow.

Perhaps some venues can yet learn to connect.

In Lieu of 1000 Words: Saturday at Jazz Winterlude

I wasn’t sure what to expect. Sure, it was free. But it was indoors on an unexpectedly pleasant Saturday afternoon. It was jazz in suburban Johnson County starting at 1 p.m. And basketball was on TV. Two jazz fans told me they would love to come but they couldn’t because they’d be watching basketball.

So I was surprised to see probably a hundred fans start to fill Johnson County Community College’s Polsky Theatre when Megan Birdsall took the stage to open Saturday’s Jazz Winterlude. The crowd was easily up to 150 by the time her set ended. And it continued growing throughout the day.

Audiences rambunctiously cheered Everett Devan and Chris Hazelton’s dual Hammond B3s, sat thrilled by Diverse Quartet’s set of classic Ellington, and took to their feet for the New Red Onion Jazz Babies.

Meanwhile, the next door Recital Hall, a more intimate setting, needed more seats each time I looked in. In there, I caught some of Candace Evan’s wonderful trio and the Turkish jazz of Alaturka. Micheal O’Shiver and Alice Jenkins also packed the room.

At night, hundreds filled Yardley Hall for an opening set by Killer Strayhorn then the incredible piano of Eldar, who grew up in Prairie Village and who we in Kansas City will always consider to be one of our own.

Congratulations to the Winterlude staff for a magnificent weekend of jazz. Those of you who stayed home watching basketball have no clue about the magnificent music you missed. So let me show you a little of it. As always, clicking on a photo should open a larger version.

Saturday opened in Polsky Theatre with Megan Birdsall's quartet. Left to right: Wayne Hawkins on piano, Megan Bridsall, vocals, Bob Bowman on bass, Tim Cambron on drums.

Wayne Hawkins and Megan Birdsall

Next up in Polsky was the Everette DeVan / Chris Hazelton Group with a pair of Hammond B3 organs. Left to right: Everette DeVan on Hammond B3, Matt Hopper on guitar, Danny Rojas on drums, Chris Hazelton on Hammond B3.

Everett DeVan and Matt Hopper

Everett, Matt, Danny and Chris

I've photographed Diverse before. This day they performed as Diverse Quartet with, left to right, Andrew Ouellette on piano, Ben Leifer on bass, Ryan Lee on drums, and Hermon Mehari on trumpet.

Evening performances in Yardley Hall opened with Killer Strayhorn. Left to right: A hidden Chris Lewis on piano, James Isaac on saxophone, Greg Clinkingbeard on bass, Pablo Sanhueza on percussion, and Mike Shanks on drums.

Chris Lewis, Greg Clinkingbeard, Pablo Sanhueza and Mike Shanks

Headlining the night was pianist Eldar Djangirov, better known these days just as Eldar.

Eldar with his trio

Eldar on piano, leading his trio

Eldar in Yardley Hall

In Lieu of 1000 Words: Friday at Jazz Winterlude

If this past weekend’s Jazz Winterlude, staged Friday and Saturday at Johnson County Community College’s Carlsen Center, proved anything, it proved that Kansas City today is home to a wealth of extraordinary jazz talent.

Whether it was Deborah Brown on Friday night or Alaturka on Saturday afternoon, whether you enjoyed Diverse Quartet or the duo B3s of Everett DeVan and Chris Hazelton, whether you heard the saxophone of Matt Otto or Steve Lambert or Rich Wheeler, whether Mike Warren or Brian Steever or Ryan Lee drummed, whether Brandon Draper or Pablo Sanhueza played percussion, whether Joe Cartwright or Andrew Oullette or Wayne Hawkins was on piano, whether Jason Goudeau’s trombone or Hermon Mehari’s trumpet or Megan Birdsall’s vocals filled the stage, you had the chance to hear jazz mastery throughout the weekend.

And I haven’t even mentioned yet the national names organizers added to the mix: Julian Lage and ex-Kansas Citian Eldar.

I took photos throughout the weekend. So let’s start by taking a look at Friday night in Yardley Hall. Next week, we’ll see some of Saturday’s magic. As always, clicking on a photo should open a larger version of it.

Winterlude opened with the David Basse Orchestra. Talk about a wealth of talent, take a look at the musicians on this stage. Left to right: Joe Cartwright on piano, David Basse, vocals, Zach Beeson on bass, Brian Steever on drums, Steve Lambert on sax, Clint Ashlock on trumpet, Jason Goudeau on trombone.

David Basse, framed by Joe Cartwright ans Zach Beeson.

Yardley Hall filled as Basse's Orchestra performed.

Next up was a national act: Julian Lage Duo. Julian Lage is on guitar on the left, Jorge Roeder is on bass on the right.

Julian Lage and Jorge Roeder

Yardley Hall continued to fill for the Julian Lage Duo.

The night concluded magnificently with the Deborah Brown Quartet with Matt Otto. Left to right: Joe Cartwright on piano, Ben Leifer on bass, Mike Warren on drums, Deborah Brown, vocals, Matt Otto on saxophone.

Deborah Brown and Matt Otto

Joe, Ben, Mike, Deborah and Matt

Deborah Brown

Deborah surrounded by Ben, Mike and Matt

The Deborah Brown Quartet with Matt Otto in Yardley Hall

Three Tales

It must have been the mid 1970s, because I started driving in 1973 and it wasn’t long after that.

The family business stood on Locust, just south of 18th Street. I worked there that summer. One afternoon, I drove a customer back to his business, on 18th Street between Vine and Highland.

I pulled the car up to a worn door, paint peeling from it, of an old brick building. Before stepping out of the car, the man turned to me in his seat and said, “You’ve heard of the ghetto, son? This is the ghetto.”

I had heard of the nation’s ghettos. I’d heard talk of them on TV, on The CBS Evening News, at dinner time in our suburban home. I’d wondered if Kansas City had one and where it was.

I didn’t know Kansas City’s heritage then. The closest our family came to jazz was listening to Frank Sinatra on 8-track tapes in the Buick, our nicer car.

All I knew was that a man who worked in an old building on 18th Street between Vine and Highland, in the mid 1970s, identified his neighborhood as the ghetto.

I’d ridden through there dozens of times, going to the ballpark on Brooklyn, to see the A’s play, or the Chiefs, or to eat at Arthur Bryant’s.

I never realized that was the ghetto.

*****

It was 1983 or 1984 and I was three or four years out of college. A friend I’d attended high school with now sold records at Penny Lane in Westport. He’d introduced me to Kansas City jazz. He’d sold me albums by Count Basie and Charlie Parker and Big Joe Turner. He steered me towards the classic Basie and Big Joe, not their newer recordings on the Pablo label. Those, he advised me, weren’t nearly as good.

I was attending the first or second 18th and Vine Heritage Festival one Saturday afternoon, walking down 18th Street, blocked off from The Paseo to Woodland, from stage to stage. My friend, who sold records, saw me and grabbed my arm. “Come with me,” he said.

We walked over to Highland Street then up to 1823 and into what I would later learn was the Mutual Musicians Foundation. There, on a chair on stage, sat Big Joe Turner. I worked my way up front, through the crowd, and stood an arm’s length away from Big Joe. I listened, awed, while Big Joe Turner shouted the blues.

I returned to the Mutual Musicians Foundation repeatedly through the 1980s. That decade, more than once, on a summer afternoon or evening, a woman might lean out from a second or third floor window of the Rochester Hotel, next door to the Foundation, and ask me if I wanted to come up for a good time.

People lived in the houses across the street from the Foundation and the Rochester then. Older people, who had probably lived there forever. Over time, they moved out, or died, I’m not sure which. Plywood replaced the houses’ windows and doors. Surely, eventually, those houses would fall down.

*****

I’d heard the homes were nearing completion. Then, last Thursday, a story on them spanned the front page of The Star. So I went to see for myself.

The 18th and Vine district once thrived through a mix of businesses and homes. A smattering of churches attests to the residential. Churches generally don’t locate where you only find music and booze. And the Mutual Musicians Foundation building itself was originally either a duplex or apartments (I’ve seen references to both).

I parked on Highland at 18th Street and walked south, past a church. About midway up the block, I stopped.

Music flowed from the Mutual Musicians Foundation. Inside, a band was rehearsing. Across the street I heard hammering and sawing. And I stood and gazed at beautiful homes. Rebuilt, quaint, nearly ready to rent. 

Three of the houses on Highland, as a workman walks by.

It’s not the Rochester Hotel next to the Foundation anymore. A new sign identifies the building as The Rochester at Highland Place. An enclosed staircase has been added to the north side. This building looks clean, inviting, a blue awning shading each new window. A banner facing Highland proclaims, “Your Search Is Over! Apartments at Highland Place.”

The Rochester, left, and the Mutual Musicians Foundation, from the porch of one of the houses.

Just to the south, wrapping the corner of 19th and Highland, stand more newer and occupied apartments. And directly across 19th Street, where Highland dead ends, sits a modern residential community.

It’s a piece of the 18th and Vine District. There’s still work to do in the district. Historic Vine Street remains an embarrassment.

But this piece is bustling with music and life. People will come to the Foundation for music. People will live here, too, in enviable homes and apartments. It’s a piece of the district, presumably, much as it thrived long before I knew it.

Nobody will lean from these windows.

This is not the ghetto.

In Lieu of 1000 Words: Parallax at Take Five

Granted, the place isn’t huge. But I arrived 45 minutes before the show was to start and already every seat was filled. Stan carried folding chairs out of the kitchen. I was lucky to nab one of those.

By the start of the show, the audience packed every nook and every cranny available. And they paid a cover charge – first time ever here – to do that. When it was announced a weekend cover was something new, the crowd applauded.

This must be Bizarro Jazz Club.

But it’s not. It’s Take Five Coffee + Bar, packing ’em in for perhaps the hottest new jazz group in Kansas City, Stan Kessler’s Parallax. With Stan on trumpet, Roger Wilder on keyboards, Bill McKemy on bass, and Ryan Lee and Brian Steever on sometimes complimentary, sometimes dueling drum sets, this audience came for the night’s best jazz.

Think about it, and this night is mostly unbelievable. We’re in a coffee-shop-slash-bar on 151st Street in Leawood, Kansas – this is as suburban as the world gets, folks – and people applaud paying to be packed in sardine-like to hear jazz. Not only that, but when the band starts playing, the audience stops talking to listen to the music. To listen to jazz.

If it’s difficult to praise highly enough the venue Lori and Doug Chandler have grown, likewise it’s hard to say too much about this band. Playing mostly original compositions (though I also loved their take on Monk), Parallax pairs a trio of some of KC jazz’s most experienced and talented musicians with a pair of young drummers driving the band and driving each other to their musical best. The crowd didn’t applaud and cheer because most were standing and could probably only see someone else’s back. We applauded and cheered because this jazz earned it.

You can find out for yourself this Thursday, January 10, when Parallax plays again, at the Westport Coffee House.

Until then, here’s what it looked like on the last Friday of last year at Take Five. As always, clicking on a photo should open a larger version of it.

Parallax. Left to right: Roger Wilder on keyboards, Brian Steever on drums, Bill McKemy on bass, Stan Kessler on trumpet, Ryan Lee on drums.

Trumpeter Stan Kessler. Behind him, drummer Ryan Lee.

Roger Wilder on keyboards. Behind him, drummer Brian Steever.

Bill McKemy, who ususually looks happier than this, on electric bass.

Drummer Ryan Lee

Drummer Brian Steever

Parallax, with Bill McKemy on sousaphone

Leader Stan Kessler

Parallax, when the two drummers square off, at Take Five Coffee + Bar