StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Critics Poll winners in concert

DownBeat magazine this week announced the list of winners for 2020 in their annual Critics Poll, and since there still are no upcoming jazz or creative music shows here in St. Louis to be previewed, this seems like as good a time as any to check out some live performances from a few of the 2020 poll winners.

The first video up above features the year's big winner, drummer Terri Lyne Carrington, who with her band Social Science topped the DB poll in the "Jazz Artist," "Jazz Album," and "Jazz Group" categories.

The clip is from when Carrington and Social Science performed for NPR's "Tiny Desk Concerts" in March of this year, and in addition to the leader, the featured performers are Kassa Overall (vocals, percussion), Debo Ray (vocals), Malcolm Jamal Warner (vocals), Kokayi (vocals, percussion, effects), Aaron Parks (piano), Matthew Stevens (guitar), and Morgan Guerin (bass, saxophone).

After the jump, you can see Herbie Hancock, this year's poll winner in the "Keyboard" category, performing in September 2019 in Prague, Czech Republic, with James Genus on bass, Lionel Loueke on guitar, Justin Tyson on drums and Elena Pinderhughes on flute.

Next up is Charles Lloyd, this year's winning tenor saxophonist, performing in July of last year at New Morning in Paris with a band that included guitarist Julian Lage, bassist Reuben Rogers, and drummer Eric Harland (drums).

After that, you can see this year's poll-winning alto saxophonist, Rudresh Mahanthappam performing with his group Bird Calls USA in 2017 at the Jazz Festival Cape Town in South Africa.

The fifth clip features Mary Halvorson, 2020 winner in the poll's "Guitar" category, performing with her band Code Girl in May 2018 at the Vision Festival in New York City. Along with Halvorson, the group includes her frequent collaborators Michael Formanek on bass and Tomas Fujiwara on drums, plus trumpeter Adam O'Farrill
and vocalist Amirtha Kidambi.

Last but not least, today's final video features this year's winner in the "Male Vocalist" category, Gregory Porter, performing at the 2018 Rheingau Musik Festival in Germany with St. Louis' own Jahmal Nichols on bass and Emanuel Harrold on drums, plus tenor saxophonist Tivon Pennicott, pianist Albert "Chip" Crawford, and organist Ondrej Pivec.

You can see the rest of today's videos after the jump...