StLJN Saturday at the Movies: The Kim Portnoy Trio, plus Ornette Coleman and Prime Time

This first of this week's video clips is another Jazz@Cookie's segment that's been YouTubed, this one featuring St. Louis pianist/composer Kim Portnoy and his trio. To see parts two and three of this episode, go here and here.

Video #2 is from 1979 and shows the great Ornette Coleman and his electric Prime Time band performing on Saturday Night Live. (Yes, kids, believe it or not - once upon a time, SNL occasionally featured actual musicians who were not flavor-of-the-month pop/rock/hiphop acts.) The band's lineup includes Coleman on alto sax and his son Denardo on drums, as well as bassist Jamaaladeen Tacuma, guitarists Bern Nix and Charles Ellerbee, and drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson. There's no particular local connection here; I just enjoyed seeing Ornette & Co, especially in the somewhat-unusual context of a commercially oriented national TV program, and hope you will too.