Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Jazz this week: Charlie Hunter, Bonerama, Bloom Project, Dave Black, and more

This week's schedule of jazz and creative music in St. Louis offers a grab-bag of styles, from a funky, soul-jazz-inspired guitar trio to straight-ahead standards to free improv. Let's go to the highlights....

The big name in town this week is guitarist Charlie Hunter, who plays with his trio tonight through Saturday at Jazz at the Bistro. Hunter was in St. Louis most recently in 2009 at the Bistro, playing in a duo format, and has released a couple of CDs since then, including his most recent effort, the 2010 solo disc Public Domain.

His current trio includes drummer Eric Kalb and bass trumpeter Michael Williams, and you can see some footage of them performing live in this post from last Saturday.

Also tonight, the New Orleans-based Bonerama brings its four-trombone front line to The Gramophone, and saxophonist Christopher McBride plays an early evening gig at Brandt's, which recently underwent a change in management and seems to be doing better both at updating their online music schedule and at once again booking some jazz-oriented acts.

On Thursday evening, the Webster Groves HS and middle school jazz bands hold their "Cool Nights, Hot Jazz" fundraiser at The Pageant, and on Friday, pianist Ptah Williams leads his trio at Robbie's House of Jazz.

UPDATE - 10:00 a.m., 1/20/11: Webster Groves HS jazz band director Kevin Cole just emailed with the news that tonight's fundraising event at the Pageant has been postponed due to the snowstorm that hit St. Louis today. Cole says they'll try to reschedule, and when they do, StLJN will have the news right here.

On Saturday morning, pianist Carolbeth True and singer Christi John Bye will play a program of jazz and pop standards at the Sheldon Concert Hall, and later that afternoon, pianist Heather Bosshardt has a CD release event at Robbie's.

On Saturday night, Bloom Project, aka pianist Thollem McDonas and saxophonist Rent Romus (pictured), will offer a performance of improvised music at the Kranzberg Arts Center under the auspices of New Music Circle, and vibraphonist Peter Schlamb is at Brandt's.

Looking beyond the weekend, on Monday bassist David Certain's CertainBeat WorldBop returns to BB's Jazz, Blues and Soups, and on Tuesday, guitarist Dave Black will perform in a "Notes from Home" concert at the Sheldon.

Black's concert will feature original music performed by four different ensembles, with a cast of players including violinists Asako Kuboki and Justin Branum; cellist Ranya Iqbal; saxophonist Paul DeMarinis; bassists David Deriso, Marc Torlina, Willem von Hombracht, and Dave Troncoso; drummers Kevin Gianino and Joe Meyer; and vocalists Margaret Bianchetta and Javier Mendoza.

For more jazz-related events in St. Louis this weekend and beyond, please visit the St. Louis Jazz Notes Calendar, which can be found on the left sidebar of the site or by clicking here. You also can keep up with all the latest news by following St. Louis Jazz Notes on Twitter at http://twitter.com/StLJazzNotes or clicking the "Like" icon on the StLJN Facebook page.

(If you have calendar items, band schedule information, news tips, links, or anything else you think may be of interest to StLJN's readers, please email the information to stljazznotes (at) yahoo (dot) com. If you have photos, MP3s or other digital files, please send links, not attachments.)

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