StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: The return of Charlie Hunter

After a couple of Saturdays presenting historic videos, this week we're back on the straight-up "coming attractions" tip, and the featured artist is guitarist Charlie Hunter, who's returning to St. Louis next week to perform Friday, June 22 and Saturday, June 23 at Jazz at the Bistro.

Hunter's been a relatively frequent visitor here in recent years, appearing at the Bistro in January, 2009 and again in January, 2011. (You can see more video of Hunter in a couple of Saturday posts that preceded those gigs, here and here. Also, for a bit more of his back story, check out this piece about Hunter that I wrote last year for the Riverfront Times.)

This time around Hunter will be performing in a duo format, just him and a drummer. That's the configuration we're spotlighting today, starting up above with a tune called "Rendezvous Avec la Vérité" that appears to have been recorded a few years back, not long after Hunter's 1999 collaboration with drummer Leon Parker. Down below, you can see Hunter and drummer Adam Cruz playing the guitarist's “Ode To My Honda Odyssey" at the 2011 Long Beach New York Jazz Festival.

Following that, it's Hunter and Derrek Phillips performing “Tamp ‘Em Up Solid," from Hunter's Public Domain project, last June at a venue called Molly Malone's in Covington, KY. In the fourth spot, Hunter and drummer Geoff Clapp tackle “Swamba Redux,” a tune by Hunter and saxophonist John Ellie, in a clip recorded in April of this year.

We close out with a couple of solo pieces featuring Hunter, a version of the Stylistics' "People Make The World Go Round," taped this past February in Brooklyn, NY, followed by an undated performance of "Someday We'll All Be Free," which was composed by St. Louis native Donny Hathaway.