Notes from the Net: Miles, Sanborn, Erhlich and Green reviewed; Hemphill honored; new WSQ CD on sale; and more

In the video window above, you'll find a clip of "Cantaloupe Island," as performed by the same all-star ensemble of Dave Holland, Herbie Hancock, Pat Metheny and Jack DeJohnette featured in one of the clips posted last Saturday. Why? Well, because I needed some sort of visual to go with this post, and this one seems as good as any.

But let's start this text-and-links portion of this installment with a couple of Miles Davis-related reviews - specifically, "extended analyses" of Miles' Complete Prestige Sessions box set and saxophonist Joe Lovano's new CD Streams of Expressions, which features a suite by Gunther Schuller based on the music that Davis wrote for Birth of the Cool...And as long as we're on the subject of reviews, check out these articles about Marty Ehrlich's recent concerts at NYC's Museum of Modern Art and the Newport Jazz Festival; this review of a recent David Sanborn show at Indianapolis' Music Mill; and this assessment of Live at the Club Mozambique, a recently issued CD by the late guitarist (and St. Louis native) Grant Green...Oliver Lake will perform at the upcoming Edgefest in Ann Arbor, MI, while the World Saxophone Quartet's new CD Political Blues - previewed during their appearance in St. Louis last February - is set to go on sale...The late Julius Hemphill will be one of the featured composers in this year's Miller Hall series at Columbia University in NYC....Also in NYC, John Zorn is planning a mini-festival of sorts featuring all four versions of his Masada band, and the 4th Annual Festival of New Trumpet Music (aka FONT Music) will run from September 15 to October 15. The monthlong fest curated by trumpeters Dave Douglas, Roy Campbell and Jon Nelson is dedicated this year to the memory of Don Cherry, and will feature all manner of workshops, master classes, concerts and club shows, including one on September 19 at the Jazz Standard that will feature St. Louis native Keyon Herrold and Jeremy Pelt, who's coming to Jazz at the Bistro this season.

A little closer to home, guitarist Rick Haydon has been named by St. Louis Commerce magazine as one of the region's "key players" in information technology for his work establishing a digitial audio recording studio at SIU-Edwardsville...And pianist and St. Louis expat Linda Presgrave writes with the news that she's just returned from playing a couple of festivals in Ceret and Le Boulou, France; is staying busy with performances in NYC; and will return to St. Louis on Thursday, October 5 to play a free concert in the Jazz at Holmes series at Washington University.

Keyboard phenom Taylor Eigsti, who was in St. Louis in June to play Jazz at the Bistro, just performed at the Summer Music Festival in Butte, MT, and will be interviewed this evening on KRML radio in Carmel, CA by Leroy "The Jazzcat" Downs at 7:15 p.m. Central time. KRML's audio stream is here, and an archived version of the interview should show up here soon...Saxophonist Kirk Whalum, (nephew of St. Louis favorite Hugh "Peanuts" Whalum) who performed here most recently in July with the Rendezvous All-Stars, was just named the first musician-in-residence for the Stax Music Academy in Memphis.

Finally, with the approach of the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent destruction of much of New Orleans, trumpeter Wynton Marsalis is planning a benefit concert and three-day celebration of the city's culture, even as recovery and reconstruction slowly continue. Those planning a visit to New Orleans in the near future might also want to take a look at this article, which discusses the situtation from a vacation traveler's perspective.