* Singer Jan Shapiro's performance tonight at the Ozark Theatre features a reunion more than 40 years in the making, as drummer, former St. Louisan, and Wash U alumnus Henry Ettman will join Shapiro (plus pianist Dave Venn and bassist Ben Wheeler) on a local bandstand for the first time since the mid-1970s.
As Shapiro tells the tale in an email to StLJN:
"Henry Ettman was one of the drummers that played all around the St. Louis area in the 1970s. He played with jazz pianist Eddie Fritz, Dave Venn and other jazz musicians.
In 1975 Henry joined up with me and pianist Eddie Plitt. At that time, Eddie Plitt played the Hammond B3, piano (when there was one present) and electronic keyboards. Eddie often played bass using his feet to play the Hammond B3 bass pedals - while at the same time playing chord changes and soloing on the keys! So in those days we did not use a bass player very often. So during 1975 Henry Ettman played with us in St. Louis and traveled on the road with us. I recall we spent about 6 months in Florida during the ‘winter season.’"After leaving St. Louis, Ettman has lived in Nevada, Oregon and Florida, working in education and continuing his involvement with jazz. "I have continued to keep in touch with Henry and am delighted that after so many years we will share the stage once again on June 7," said Shapiro, seen in the photo above with Ettman, who's holding a promotional pic of the two of them and Eddie Plitt from "back in the day."
* What happened to the trumpet that Miles Davis played on the sessions for his landmark album Kind of Blue? A story last week in the Greensboro, NC newspaper YES Weekly traces the horn's path from Davis to his friend, Arthur "Buddy" Gist, to its current home on display in the music building at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro.
* Elsewhere on the Miles Davis beat, the new biographical documentary Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool was screened at the Sydney Film Festival in Australia, and the new box set documenting the Complete Birth of the Cool Sessions is out today.
* Sherry Jones, author of the historical novel Josephine Baker’s Last Dance, was in town for a signing and was interviewed about the book and Baker's life on St. Louis Public Radio's "St. Louis on the Air."
* Pianist and St. Louis native Dred Scott's latest album Rides Alone was reviewed by Glide magazine.
* The Riverfront Times' Daniel Hill offers a look at the St. Louis area's newest vendor of vinyl, the SOHO Record Shop, which opened recently in the Manhattan Antique Marketplace in St. Ann.
* In other record-retail news, Euclid Records recently acquired and is preparing for sale an 8,000-piece collection of jazz vinyl, including rare 1950s and '60s LPs from Blue Note, Prestige and other iconic labels. You can see a video "flip-through" of part of the collection with narration by Euclid's head honcho Joe Schwab here.
* Pianist Tom McDermott's latest album, which feature him performing a collection of Scott Joplin compositions, is the subject of a feature story by the New Orleans Advocate's Kieth Spera.
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