So What: Local News, Notes & Links

Here's the latest wrap-up of links and short local news items of interest that you may have missed:

* Pianist Kenny Barron (pictured) just did a short interview with Calvin Wilson of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, previewing his duo gig with Mulgrew Miller next week at Jazz at the Bistro. Read the article online here.

* In a column just posted at the Jazz Times website, veteran critic and jazz journalist Nat Hentoff gives a rave review to St. Louis author and artist Kevin Belford's recent book Devil at the Confluence: The Pre-War Blues Music of St. Louis Missouri. You can check out Hentoff's column here.

* Linda Purl's performance last week to open Cabaret St. Louis' fall season at the Kranzberg Arts Center was reviewed by Chuck Lavazzi for his Stage Left blog here.

* KSDK newsman Art Holliday talked with the Post's Kevin Johnson about his documentary film on St. Louis blues/rock piano great Johnnie Johnson, and you can see the article online here. Johnson's former St. Louis bandmates will back NYC pianist Dona Oxford for a set paying tribute to Johnson at tomorrow's Old Webster Jazz and Blues Festival. Then on Sunday, Oxford and the Johnson band will join Jimmy Vivino, Mike Merritt and James Wormworth III of Conan O'Brien's band for a benefit concert at the Sheldon to raise money for Holliday's film.

* P-D business writer Lisa Brown interviewed Joe Schwab of Euclid Records about the St. Louis-based store's newly opened New Orleans location and changes in the music retail business.

* Saxophonist Dave Stone's trio will play and burlesque performer Lola Von Ella will dance to accompany Missouri Poet Laureate David Clewell in a reading of his poem "Jack Ruby's America" next Thursday, September 23 at The Foxhole at Atomic Cowboy, 4140 Manchester Ave.

* To help stir up interest in events associated with next month's American Arts Experience - St. Louis, the Sheldon Concert Hall and HEC-TV will present "State of the Arts Live and Uncut - American Arts Experience" from 7:30 to 10:00 p.m., Thursday, September 30 at the Sheldon. The multi-media event will feature performances from vibraphonist Jonathan Whiting with bassist Darrell Mixon; singer Brian Owens; pianists Peter Henderson and Stephanie Trick, and several others. Tickets to see the show in person are $10, or you can tune in to HEC-TV (Charter Channel 989 and 118-26 or AT&T U-Verse Channel 99) or watch a live stream at www.hectv.org.

Jazz this week: Christian McBride & Peter Martin, Hamiet Bluiett, The Cunninghams, Garage A Trois, Ben Sidran, and more

The fall presenting season of jazz and creative music in St. Louis gets off to a fast start this week, with season openers from three different concert series; homecoming visits from some St. Louis natives; and two local musicians with international reputations playing on local stages. Let's go to the highlights:

Tonight, Cabaret St. Louis opens its season with actress and singer Linda Purl's show "Come Rain or Come Shine," which runs through Saturday at the Kranzberg Arts Center.

Then on Thursday, the jazz vocal duo The Cunninghams, featuring St. Louis native, multi-instrumentalist and Gaslight Square veteran Don Cunningham, make their way from their current home in Las Vegas back to the Gateway City for a concert at the Sheldon Concert Hall. For more about them and Don Cunningham's history in St. Louis, see this post.

Also on Thursday, the Jazz at Holmes series at Washington University begins its fall schedule with a free outdoor concert on Brookings Quadrangle featuring the St. Louis Nu-Jazz Quintet.

On Friday, guitarist Eric Slaughter and his trio begin a two-night stand to open the fall season at Jazz at the Bistro; and the jazz-influenced experimental rock band Ahleuchatistas plays at Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center.

Also on Friday, Robbie's House of Jazz will kick off their first-anniversary weekend with guitarist Daryl Darden, a St. Louis native who's back from California for a visit. Then on Saturday, the club presents baritone sax giant Hamiet Bluiett (pictured), who played for their opening weekend a year ago, with keyboardist Reggie Thomas. Bluiett is unquestionably one of the all-time great baritone saxophonists in jazz history, and any opportunity to hear him play, especially in an intimate venue like Robbie's, is worth seizing. It's a bit problematic this weekend, though, because Bluiett isn't the only internationally known St. Louis musician gigging locally on Saturday.

That same evening, pianist Peter Martin will continue his eponymous series at the Sheldon Concert Hall via a duo performance with bassist Christian McBride. McBride is one of the most in-demand bassists on the music scene, and you can read more about him (and see and hear samples of his playing) here and here. To make this performance extra-special, Martin says they're planning on doing it without microphones - something possible only in an acoustically superior venue like the Sheldon, which was designed before mics and PA systems were even invented.

UPDATE, 10:00 a.m., 9/10/10: Martin talked to the Post-Dispatch's Calvin Wilson for a short feature about his duo concert with McBride, and you can read it online here. Also, Metrotix is offering a last-minute "buy one, get one free" deal on tickets for the concert. To access the offer, go online here and use promo code PM2010.

Choosing between the two aforementioned shows is tough, but I suppose one could always catch Martin and McBride, then hustle out to Webster Groves for Bluiett's second set, and in any event, there are worse problems to have. And as if that weren't enough for one evening, Saturday is also the night singer Denise Thimes headlines a benefit for the United Way at the Foundry Art Centre in St. Charles.

On Sunday afternoon, the St. Louis Jazz Club holds its annual picnic at the Concord Farmer's Club, 10140 Concord School Rd, with traditional jazz, swing and ragtime music from the Big Little Big Band, the St. Louis Banjo Club, and Bud Schulz and the You Can't Beat Experience Jazz Band with Polly Waddell.

That evening, pianist and singer Ben Sidran comes to town to talk and play at Kol Am Temple, 1023 Chesterfield Parkway in Chesterfield, with a CD and book signing to follow and KWMU's Dennis Owsley as MC.

Then on Monday, guitarist Steve Schenkel and friends perform at Webster University's Winifred Moore Auditorium, and on Tuesday, the jam/funk/fusion band Garage A Trois takes the stage at the Old Rock House. (You can see some videos of Garage A Trois here.)

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.)

Sutton Foster featured in Riverfront Times

Singer and actress Sutton Foster, who will be here this coming Thursday, February 4 to headline a benefit gala for Cabaret St. Louis at the Sheldon Concert Hall, is the subject of a feature story by theater critic Dennis Brown in this week's Riverfront Times. You can read it online here.

UPDATE - 4:40 p.m., 1/31/10: Foster also talked with the Post-Dispatch's Judith Newmark for a story in the weekend paper, which you can read online here.

Notes from the Net: Miles in Montreal; the persistence of "audiophoolery"; plus news, reviews, interviews, and more

Here's the latest compilation of assorted news briefs and links related to jazz, improvisation, and creative music in St. Louis, including news of musicians originally from the Gateway City, recent visitors, and coming attractions, plus assorted other items of interest:

* In this week's Miles Davis-related news, the museum exhibit in Paris devoted to the trumpeter is closing, but will be reborn on this side of the Atlantic in April as "We Want Miles" at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. The multimedia retrospective includes musical excerpts; film and documentary clips; paintings by Jean-Michel Basquiat and Mati Klarwein; and photographs by Annie Leibovitz and Irving Penn, plus Davis' own drawings, costumes, musical instruments and scores, on loan from the Davis family, and more. Though the History Museum mounted a Davis exhibit of its own here a few years ago, it sure would be nice to see this new one here in St. Louis, too...

* Here's a review from Jeff Simon of the Philadelphia Inquirer of Only Everything, the new CD saxophonist and former St. Louisan David Sanborn (pictured).

* Jason Crane's The Jazz Session recently featured a new podcast interview with multi-instrumentalist and St. Louis native Marty Ehrlich.

* Moving on to news of recent visitors to our town, here's a review by AllAboutJazz.com's Martin Longley of some recent NYC shows, including The Bad Plus week at the Village Vanguard between Christmas and New Year's. TBP were in St. Louis the following week to kick off 2010 at Jazz at the Bistro.

* The Juilliard School will present the New York premiere of bassist Christian McBride's "The Movement Revisited" on Tuesday, February 2. McBride's musical tribute to the civil rights movement blends spoken texts from Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with music to be performed by the Juilliard Jazz Orchestra and Choir, under the direction of McBride and Brandon Lee. The bassist's group Inside Straight played the Bistro in December.

* Opening the "coming attractions" file, actress and singer Tyne Daly has just opened her new cabaret show in New York, and the Times' Stephen Holden has a favorable review here. Daly and her pianist and music director, St. Louis native John McDaniel, will perform February 10-13 at the Kranzberg Arts Center under the auspices of Cabaret St. Louis.

* Pianist, singer and newlywed Jamie Cullum recently let photographers have a peek inside his London recording studio, and you can see the pix here. Cullum will play St. Louis' Roberts Orpheum Theater on Sunday, March 14.

* Here's a review of Pat Metheny's new CD Orchestrion from AllAboutJazz.com's John Kelman. Metheny's label also has released an "electronic press kit" for the CD, which you can see in the embedded video window at the bottom of this post. The guitarist and the roadie's-worst-nightmare setup that is the Orchestrion are coming to St. Louis on May 8 at the Touhill Performing Arts Center.

* And last, but not least, from the "general interest" file: Science may have disprovne many of the claims made by manufacturers of high-end audio equipment, but that doesn't stop them from continuing to engage in what one professional audio engineer and writer calls "audiophoolery." Let the buyer beware, indeed.



(Edited after posting to add tags.)

Cabaret St. Louis announces benefit gala, more shows for 2010

Cabaret St. Louis has announced its schedule for the first part of 2010, and will kick off the year with a benefit gala at the Sheldon Concert Hall featuring actress and singer Sutton Foster.

Foster (pictured), who has starred on Broadway in Thoroughly Modern Millie, The Drowsy Chaperone, Little Women, Young Frankenstein and Shrek the Musical, will perform at the Sheldon on Thursday, February 4. VIP tickets are $200 each, and include priority seating, free parking and a post-concert champagne reception with Foster. Regular seats are priced at $50 and $45, and tickets at all price levels are now on sale via Metrotix.

Meanwhile, Cabaret St. Louis' winter/spring 2010 schedule announced this week would seem to downplay jazz influences while emphasizing the theatrical and pop aspects of the form.

The schedule will include performances at the Kranzberg Arts Center by Broadway and television actress Tyne Daly, with St. Louis native John McDaniel on piano (February 10-13); Lennie Watts, another St. Louis native, with a tribute to Barry Manilow (March 3–6); Eric Michael Gillett, doing songs from and about the movies (April 7-10); and Karen Akers in "Anything Goes," a collection of Cole Porter songs (April 28-May 1).

Tickets for all of these shows go on sale next Monday, December 14 via Metrotix.

Nellie McKay featured in Post-Dispatch

This weekend's Post-Dispatch had a feature story by Calvin Wilson about singer/songwriter/pianist Nellie McKay, who will be in St. Louis on Wednesday and Thursday to perform at the Kranzberg Arts Center under the auspices of Cabaret St. Louis. You can read the article online here.

Notes from the Net: Phil Perry recovering; the continuing legend of Miles Davis; plus news, reviews, interviews, and more

Here's the latest compilation of assorted news briefs and links related to jazz, improvisation, and creative music in St. Louis, including news of musicians originally from the Gateway City, recent visitors, and coming attractions, plus assorted other items of interest.

* Starting, as we usually do, with some Miles Davis items, it seems that the impending release of Miles Davis: The Complete Columbia Album Collection, the upcoming book The Blue Moment by Richard Williams, and the exhibit "We Want Miles" at the Cité de la Musique in Paris recently prompted the London Times to ask, "Why is Miles Davis so legendary?"

The answer, in part: "Miles’s celebrated urge to keep moving — to play music that was one minute beguiling, the next baffling (“It’s my curse”) is one reason...But music aside, Miles remains an eminently marketable star...Today’s jazz names — from Diana Krall to Pat Metheny — look a meek lot by comparison. "

In other Miles-related news, AllAboutJazz.com has a review by C. Michael Bailey of the recent reissue of Davis' 1950s sessions with Sonny Rollins, and another by George Kanzler covering the 50th anniversary reissue of Sketches of Spain plus a new tribute CD, Miles Ahead Live, by saxophonist Dave Liebman and the Manhattan School of Music Jazz Orchestra.

* Moving on to news of other locals past and present, singer Phil Perry, another former East St. Louisan, is recovering after collapsing while on stage in Connecticut with Pieces of A Dream on October 23. Perry spent three days in the Hospital of Saint Raphael in New Haven, Conn and was equipped with a new defibrillator. Perry says he is doing fine and will be back on the road soon: “My heart is wired like the Energizer Bunny, with a nifty little defibrillator to keep me on beat and keep me on my feet.”

* Writing on the band's blog Do The Math, The Bad Plus' Ethan Iverson recently linked to an interesting 1994 interview with the late saxophonist and former St. Louisan Julius Hemphill.

* The prolific saxophonist and composer John Zorn, who once studied at our town's Webster University, has a new CD called Femina, featuring an all-female ensemble performing a suite dedicated to women artists from various disciplines, such as Louise Bourgeois, Gertrude Stein, Sylvia Plath, Meredith Monk and Yoko Ono. Here's a review from AllAboutJazz.com's Troy Collins.

* Turning to news of recent visitors, here's a review of Stone Shift, the most recent CD from saxophonist Larry Ochs & Drumming Core. Ochs and the Core were here last month for a performance at the Sheldon Concert Hall.

* Moving on to the "coming attractions" file, bassist Christian McBride and his band Inside Straight, with St. Louis' Peter Martin on piano, will be featured on a live audio/video Webcast from NYC's Village Vanguard starting at 9:00 p.m. Eastern time Wednesday, November 11 (tomorrow evening). They'll be here in St. Louis next week for a four-night run at Jazz at the Bistro; meanwhile, you catch the Webcast on the site of NYC public radio station WBGO,

* An article by Nate Chinen in the latest Jazz Times calls singer Kurt Elling "the most influential jazz vocalist of our time." Elling will be in St. Louis in December to perform at Jazz at the Bistro.

* Here's a review of singer/songwriter/pianist Nellie McKay's new CD Normal as Blueberry Pie, written for AllAboutJazz.com by Matt Marshall. McKay (pictured) is coming to St. Louis under the auspices of Cabaret St. Louis to perform next Wednesday and Thursday at the Kranzberg Arts Center.

* Organist Joey DeFrancesco has a new disc called High Note, reviewed here by Music and More's Tim Niland. DeFrancesco returns to St. Louis at the end of March for four nights at Jazz at the Bistro.

* Pianist Vijay Iyer, who will play the Bistro from January 20 through January 23, just wrapped up a gig at NYC's Jazz Standard, reviewed here by the New York Times' Ben Ratliff, and also was just featured on NPR's "Song of The Day."

* Last but not least, from the "miscellaneous items of interest file": A new research paper done by the Council for Research Excellence (CRE) with support from the Nielsen Company challenges many of the myths about how people today listen to music. The study tracked 752 days of audio media usage last year by participants in five markets and found that "from broadcast radio to MP3 players, some popular notions about listening in the digital age appear to be horribly off the mark." Read more about "How U.S. Adults Use Radio and Other Forms of Audio" here.

Jazz this week: Kenny Garrett, Maude Maggart, benefits at SIUE and Webster U, and more

As fall weather really begins to settle in to the St. Louis area, here's what's going on around town over the next few days with jazz and creative music:

Tonight, saxophonist Kenny Garrett (pictured) begins a four-night stand that continues through Saturday at Jazz at the Bistro. For more on Garrett, see last Saturday's video post here, and his interview with the Post-Dispatch here.

Also tonight, singer Maude Maggart begins a four-night run for Cabaret St. Louis at the Kranzberg Arts Center. Broadly speaking, Maggart seems to come more from the theatrical side of cabaret than from jazz, but she's known for interpreting works by great American songwriters such as Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Harold Arlen, Johnny Mercer, Vernon Duke, and Rodgers and Hart, so there may indeed be some interest there for some local jazz fans.

Tomorrow night, trumpeter Danny Campbell and drummer Maurice Carnes will do a free concert of hard bop and straight-ahead jazz for the Jazz at Holmes series at Washington University.

Also on Thursday, the Unity Theatre Ensemble resumes their production of Lady Day at the Boston Bistro (An Evening with Billie Holiday), which feature singer Mardra Thomas and her husband, pianist Reggie Thomas, and continues through Sunday at the Ivory Theatre in south St. Louis. You can read a review of the show here.

Moving ahead to Sunday, singer Erin Bode will headline the annual benefit for the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville Friends of Music benefit at Dunham Hall on the SIUE campus. Proceeds from the event go to support music scholarships at SIUE.

Then on Monday, Webster University holds the annual benefit concert for its TKT Scholarship Fund at Winifred Moore Auditorium on the Webster campus. The"Celebration of the Great American Songbook" concert will include songs by Hoagy Carmichael, George Gershwin, Sammy Fain, Tadd Dameron, Burton Lane and Paul Simon performed by vocalists Amanda Carr, Ashley Mason and Peter Ayres; the Webster Jazz Singers directed by Debby Lennon; and Webster jazz faculty members Steve Schenkel (guitar), Paul DeMarinis (saxophones) , Kim Portnoy (piano), Carolbeth True (piano), Willem von Hombracht (bass) and Kevin Gianino (drums).

Proceeds benefit a scholarship established in memory of former Webster music students Terry Jackson, Kirk Cappello and Tony Saputo, who in 1991 were all killed in a plane crash while on tour with country singer Reba McIntyre.

For more jazz and creative music events this weekend and beyond, check out the St. Louis Jazz Notes Calendar, available for viewing on the left sidebar or by clicking here.

(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.)

Cabaret St. Louis tickets going on sale Monday, October 5

Tickets for Cabaret St. Louis' fall series of touring artists go on sale at 10:00 a.m. Monday, October 5 at all Metrotix outlets.

For jazz fans, the pick show of the season probably is the pairing (pictured) of pianist Bill Charlap, a fine jazz player who was here most recently in February with the Blue Note 7, and his mother, singer Sandy Stewart.

They'll be in town December 9 - 12 to perform at the Kranzberg Arts Center, which also will serve as the venue for shows by Maude Maggart (October 21-24), Steve Ross (November 4-7), and Nellie McKay (November 17 & 18). As has been mentioned here before, the Kranzberg only holds 80 people, so if you're interested in seeing one or more of these performers, you'd best act quickly to purchase your tickets.

Beacon article spotlights local cabaret scene

An article written by Terry Perkins for the Saint Louis Beacon local news site takes a look at our town's cabaret offerings, covering the work of promoter Jim Dolan's Cabaret St. Louis organization at the new Kranzberg Arts Center at Grand and Olive, as well as an upcoming local conference for cabaret singers. You can read the whole piece online here.

Pollstar: Sandy Stewart and Bill Charlap coming to St. Louis in December

The online tour information service Pollstar has added a listing showing four nights of performances by singer Sandy Stewart and her son, jazz pianist Bill Charlap (pictured), Wednesday, December 9 through Saturday, December 12, at the Kranzberg Arts Center, 501 N. Grand (at Olive) in St. Louis' Grand Center arts district.

Stewart and Charlap have worked together as a duo in cabarets and jazz clubs since Stewart began her comeback in the mid-1990s. A big band singer and actress in her youth, Stewart had retired from the stage to raise a family after meeting and marrying Broadway composer Mark "Moose" Charlap in the 1960s. (You can read more about the circumstances of her retirement and comeback in this 1994 article from the New York Times.) Bill Charlap is well known in the jazz world for his six albums as a leader for the Blue Note label and his work with Gerry Mulligan, Benny Carter, Tony Bennett, Phil Woods and others. He played in St. Louis most recently in February of this year with the Blue Note 7 at the Sheldon Concert Hall.

Although the Pollstar listing does not include a presenting organization, the artists, dates and venue would suggest the work of Cabaret St. Louis and its impresario Jim Dolan, who have staged a number of shows already at the KAC. At present, the Cabaret St. Louis Web site doesn't list any dates beyond the current spring schedule, which wraps up with four shows this week at the KAC by torch singer Lina Koutrakos, and one on May 14 at the Sheldon featuring drag performer Varla Jean Merman.

However, a bit of Google-assisted sleuthing turned up this blog post from KDHX theater reviewer/host Chuck Lavazzi, which says that the Stewart/Charlap show is indeed part of a fall Cabaret St. Louis schedule that also will include "return engagements at the Kranzberg by Maude Maggart (October 21 - 24) and Steve Ross (November 4 - 7) along with first-time appearances by Nellie McKay (November 18-21)" and the Stewart/Charlap duo.

(This info is conveyed in the context of a review of Cabaret St. Louis' recent benefit at the Fox Theatre, so perhaps there was some information disseminated that night for the advance benefit of the patrons who attended. That's just my speculation, though, as there's nothing in the post indicating the source of the info, save a link to the Cabaret St. Louis site.)

Regardless, as always, Pollstar listings should be considered unconfirmed until officially announced by the venue and/or presenter. If/when an official announcement is made, StLJN will have the details for you right here. In the meantime, for a bit more on Sandy Stewart and Bill Charlap, check out the video in the embedded window below for a clip that includes a brief interview and some footage of them in the recording studio.

Jazz this week: Liz Callaway, the Sheldon's "Mardi Gras Mambo," Good 4 The Soul, Jeanne Trevor's "Love Notes," Dan Rubright, and more

It looks like this weekend will bring a break in the winter weather here in St. Louis, so it should be a good time to go out an here some live music. Here's a brief look at what's happening over the next few days:

The new not-for-profit presenter Cabaret St. Louis resumes its inaugural season this week with shows by Liz Callaway on Thursday and Friday upstairs at the Sheldon. Like many cabaret performers, Callaway's background is more in musical theater than in jazz - she's performed in a number of Broadway shows, including a long run in Cats - but she also seems to share a sense of humor, some serious vocal chops and an ability to swing with her sister, singer, pianist and songwriter Ann Hampton Callaway, who is well-known to St. Louis listeners from appearances at the Sheldon, Jazz at the Bistro and elsewhere. .

Also this evening, there's a free Jazz at Holmes concert at Washington University that was not mentioned in the news release referenced in the post here yesterday. (I only found out about via an email listserv.) The featured performers are 4 City Saxes, and I wish I could tell you more about them, but there's not much information available from Wash U, or anywhere else online. Google does tell me they performed as pre-show entertainers last summer at the Muny, and were part of UMSL's woodwind festival in December, but beyond that, your guess is as good as mine. .

On Friday and Saturday, Good 4 The Soul bring their mix of jazz, funk, soul, hip-hop and various other genres to Jazz at the Bistro, replacing trumpeter Terence Blanchard, who was originally supposed to play this week but had to postpone until May. Also on Friday, singer Jeanne Trevor teams up with pianist/singer Kevin Kurth for a Valentine's themed show called "Love Notes" at the Kranzberg Arts Center, 501 N. Grand (at Olive, in the Big Brothers-Big Sisters building).

Sunday night brings the Sheldon Concert Hall's big "Mardi Gras Mambo" benefit gala, with music from the Neville Brothers and Dr. John and the Lower 911. Single tickets for this show have been sold out for several weeks now, but it's possible there still may be some of the $250 and $150 "patron" tickets left. For the latest information, call the Sheldon directly at 314-533-9900.

Looking beyond the weekend, on Monday guitarist Dan Rubright and Tangole are performing at Webster University's Winifred Moore Auditorium. This particular project is new to me, but judging from the name, it seems to have something to do with tango and/or Latin music. Regardless of genre, Rubright is a fine player with wide-ranging musical ideas and tastes, so it's probably going to be worth hearing.

On Tuesday, it's the monthly meeting of the Jazz St. Louis CD Listening Club at Borders in Brentwood. Dr. Gerald Early of Washington University and Gene Dobbs Bradford of Jazz St. Louis. will discuss the "golden age" of the Blue Note label and the compilation CD The Best Blue Note Record in the World. Also on Tuesday, the quartet Utter Chaos plays a no-cover-charge show at The Gramophone.

Then on Wednesday, there's another free event presented by Jazz St. Louis, as keyboardist Reggie Thomas and his Hammond organ-jazz ensemble OGD will put on a concert dubbed "A Celebration of Blue Note Records" at Third Baptist Church, 620 N. Grand (just across Washington Ave from the Bistro).

As always, these are just a few of the highlights of what's going on around town, so for more jazz-related events in St. Louis this weekend and beyond, please visit the St. Louis Jazz Notes Calendar.

(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.)