StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Samora Pinderhughes, jazz, and justice

This week, StLJN's video spotlight is focused on pianist and composer Samora Pinderhughes, who will be here in St. Louis to perform next Thursday, July 20 at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation.

A 25-year-old Juilliard graduate who grew up in Berkeley, CA and now lives in Harlem, Pinderhughes has toured with jazz artists including Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah and Branford Marsalis.

For his performance here, the pianist will lead a quartet with Scott, bassist Luques Curtis, and percussionist Mark Whitfield, Jr, playing music inspired by his soundtrack for the documentary Whose Streets?, which was co-directed and produced by St. Louis artist and activist Damon Davis (aka FarFetched).

Writing the soundtrack for a film about the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson and the subsequent protests would seem to fit neatly with Pinderhughes' ongoing interest in multidisciplinary projects that address social issues, as exemplified by "The Transformations Suite," which has brought him to wide public attention since the release last November of his album of the same name.

A multi-media event combining music, words and visuals that took the composer/pianist five years to complete, "Transformations Suite" examines the history of oppression and protest throughout the African-American diaspora, connecting contemporary issues like social justice and prison reform with the history of "revolutionary movements of color."

"Transformations Suite" was the subject earlier this year of an episode of NPR's "Jazz Night in America," and you can see that recording, made at the Way Christian Center in Berkeley, in the first embedded window up above.

In addition to Pinderhughes, the ensemble includes his key collaborators Jeremie Harris, who performs the spoken word parts, and Jehbreal Muhammad Jackson, who sings lead vocals, along with Riley Mulherkar (trumpet), Lucas Pino (tenor sax), Joshua Crumbly (bass), and Jimmy Macbride (drums).

After the jump, you can see an earlier performance of "Cycles," one segment of the "The Transformations Suite," recorded in May, 2016 at Joe's Pub in New York City. The ensemble features Pinderhughes, Jackson, Harris, Mulkerhar, Pino, and Macbride, plus the leader's younger sister Elena Pinderhughes on flute and vocals, Tony Lustig on baritone sax, and Clovis Nicolas on bass.

After that, there are a couple more videos demonstrating Pinderhughes' penchant for collaboration and socially relevant topics, as he performs "Black is the Color" with poet Jules Latimer and "For Those Lost" with singer Lalah Hathaway.

Finally, you can see a couple of clips of Pinderhughes playing other peoples' music. The penultimate video is a medley of "Cosmia" by Joanna Newsom and "Over There" by Derrick Hodge, recorded in 2013 at La Peña in Berkeley and featuring the Pinderhughes siblings, Jackson, Crumbly, and Macbride.

And for something completely different, the last video shows Pinderhughes as part of a group backing singer Claudia Acuna, recorded in 2015 as part of the NYC club Jazz Gallery's "Mentoring Series."

For more about Samora Pinderhughes, check out the recent coverage of him and his work from Salon.com, CBC, and the Village Voice.

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

Samora Pinderhughes to perform Thursday, July 20 at Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts

Pianist Samora Pinderhughes is coming to St. Louis to perform at 7:00 p.m. Thursday, July 20 at the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts in Grand Center.

Pinderhughes (pictured) will play music inspired by the Pulitzer's exhibition "Blue Black" and by his score for the documentary film Whose Streets?, which was co-directed and produced by St. Louis activist and artist Damon Davis (aka FarFetched). He'll be accompanied by bassist Luques Curtis, percussionist Mark Whitfield, Jr. and special guest trumpeter Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah.

A Juilliard graduate who's in his mid-twenties, Pinderhughes grew up in Berkeley, CA and now lives in Harlem. In addition to his solo career, he's performed or recorded as a sideman with Scott, Branford Marsalis, Harvey Mason, and others.

Pinderhughes also has made news recently with his album The Transformations Suite, released last year as part of a multimedia work that NPR calls "inspired by African-American resistance and protest movements, as well as the oppression that many still endure."

While Pinderhughes' performance at the Pulitzer is free and open to the public, promotional materials say that "a suggested donation of $5-20 in support of the artists is welcomed. Please pay only what you can. Space will be limited, so early arrival is encouraged."

Sunday Session: June 25, 2017

Ahmad Jamal

Here's the weekly roundup of various music-related items that have landed in StLJN's inbox over the past week:

* 'It’s just me, on the phone in my son’s bedroom.' The church hall that became contemporary music’s hottest venue (The Guardian)
* Thelonious Monk: Lost Liaison - Inside the Forgotten 1959 Studio Session (Jazz Times)
* Is the Printed Circuit Board a Form of Musical Notation? (New Music Box)
* The Story Behind ‘I’ll Be Around’ (Wall Street Journal)
* Alice Coltrane: “The Gifts God Gave Him” (Jazz Times)
* Team-Ups & Supergroups Power San Francisco Jazz Festival (DownBeat)
* In New Orleans, Party Buses Drive The Legacy Of Bounce Music (TheFader.com)
* Generation Next: Four Voices From Seattle (AllAboutJazz.com)
* The Story of Tropicália in 20 Albums (Pitchfork.com)
* Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah On World Cafe (NPR)
* Money Ain’t a Thang: 11 of the Most Expensive Albums Ever Produced (Soundfly.com)
* Philadelphia Orchestra composer Hannibal finds humanity amid the loss (Philly.com)
* Tony Bennett to Receive Library of Congress Gershwin Prize (Rolling Stone)
* Ann Hampton Callaway Says Her Return to Singing Is ‘Scary and Thrilling’ (Playbill)
* Q&A with Ahmad Jamal: Continuum of Influence (DownBeat)
* "My goal is to reach people on an emotional level" — The Kenny Barron interview (Ottawa Citizen)
* Paul McCartney on making music with Kanye West: ‘You basically don’t write songs’ (NME.com)
* Why my guitar gently weeps - The slow, secret death of the six-string electric. And why you should care (Washington Post)
* Mills College’s Plan to Ax Jazz Legend Roscoe Mitchell Draws International Outrage (East Bay Express)
* Red Hook Jazz Festival: Neighborhood Feel, Avant Sound (DownBeat)
* The Secret Lives of Playlists (CashMusic.org)
* What I'm Listening to Now: Mats Gustafsson (AllAboutJazz.com)
* Why didn’t famous composers write national anthems? (Classical-Music.com)
* The Ethereal Genius of Craig Taborn (New York Times)
* Artist’s Choice: Bobby Watson on Unsung New York Masters - The saxophonist and educator reflects on his mentors (Jazz Times)
* Langston Hughes Creates a List of His 100 Favorite Jazz Recordings: Hear 80+ of Them in a Big Playlist (OpenCulture.com)
* Bon Iver’s Dad Helped Me Discover the Secret Jazz History of His Hometown (Vice.com)
* Is Jazz Still Sexist? (Jazz Times)
* The Weird World Of One-Hit Wonders (UDiscoverMusic.com)

Sunday Session: April 2, 2017

Regina Carter

Here are some interesting music-related items that have landed in StLJN's inbox over the past week:

* Streaming Music Services, From Most Screwed to Least Screwed (Gizmodo)
* Hardware Store With a Jazzy Past Prepares to End its 95-Year Run (WTTW)
* How Artificial Intelligence Is Changing Music Making (Billboard)
* With a big benefactor, Detroit Jazz Festival aims to find other revenue sources (CrainsDetroit.com)
* Fragments of Louis Armstrong when he was on the cusp of greatness (New Orleans Times-Picayune/NOLA.com)
* How inner city apartment developments have killed Australian rock’n’roll (Domain.com.au)
* Here’s how technology is fueling the home-recording industry (DailyNews.com)
* Orrin Evans Among Headliners of Inaugural Philly Jazz Fest (DownBeat)
* Big Ears 2017: Where Jeff Tweedy Is Noise Star, Symphony Plays on Floor (Rolling Stone)
* Chick Corea Announces ‘The Musician’ Documentary Film & Live Album (Jambase.com)
* The Microscopic Septet - Pioneers Across Jazz Boundaries (PopMatters.com)
* Meet the encephalophone: An instrument you can play with your mind, just by thinking (Seattle Times)
* Carter Honors First Lady of Song with New Ella Tribute Album (DownBeat)
* Q&A with ‘I Called Him Morgan’ Filmmaker Kasper Collin (DownBeat)
* Jazz great Arthur Blythe, who grew up in San Diego, is dead at 76 (San Diego Union Tribune)
* Dizzy in the Daylight (New York Review of Books)
* Sculpting Sound: The Life of a Field Recordist (RedBullMusicAcademy.com)
* Rolling Stones Drummer Charlie Watts Plots New Big Band Record (Rolling Stone)
* Where Have All The Bob Seger Albums Gone? (NPR)
* Once We Listened to the Beatles. Now We Eat Beetles. (Bloomberg.com)
* When a record label gets into making cool, weird instruments (Create Digital Music)
* Big Ears Festival Embraces Jazz Experimentalism (DownBeat)
* Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah Talks Jazz as Protest Music, Trap Influence (Rolling Stone)
* The Poetry of Pop (The Paris Review)
* Monterey Jazz Festival Announces Lineup and Artists-in-Residence (Jazz Times)
* Q&A with Allan Holdsworth: “The Man Who Changed Guitar Forever” (DownBeat)
* Artificial Intelligence: Your New Best Friend? (ProSoundNetwork.com)
* Was Chuck Berry the lone genius he’s made out to be? (TheConversation.com)
* U.S. Music Industry Sees First Double Digit Growth in Almost 20 Years as Streaming Takes Over (Billboard)
* Never Mind Her Stellar Jazz Career, Young Ella Fitzgerald Just Wanted to Dance (Smithsonian)
* 7 Indie Labels On How Technology Has Changed Their World (Pitchfork)

Sunday Session: January 31, 2016

Thelonious Monk

For your Sunday reading, some interesting music-related items that have turned up recently in StLJN's inbox:

* Incoming Director On Her Vision For The American Jazz Museum In Kansas City (KCUR)
* Breaking down David Bowie's 'Heroes' - Track-by-track (BBC)
* Quarter streets are just fine for classically trained Ketchens (WGNO)
* The life and death of early jazz drummer Black Benny Williams (New Orleans Times-Picayune)
* Streaming Is Killing Great Music in Favor of Familiar Formulas (Newsweek)
* Live365 to close because of SoundExchange rate changes (CompleteMusicUpdate.com)
* Opinion: Electronic artists should make their own music (ResidentAdvisor.net)
* “The Best Of Friends Must Part Someday” "The Lonesome Road" and the folk-pop divide. (Washington University Common Reader)
* New and interesting music is harder to find than ever (The Economist)
* David Bowie’s Blackstar - Philip Clark reflects on Bowie's final album and its engagement with free jazz and the avant-garde (Gramophone UK)
* The Case For Original Jazz (Jazz Truth)
* Are Sixty Second Songs The Future Of Pop? (HypeBot.com)
* Vandermark Celebrates Photo Book Release in Chicago (DownBeat)
* Unreleased Live Professor Longhair Album Due in April - Recorded in Chicago in 1976 (Jazz Times)
* Judge LaDoris Cordell: A secret musical life (San Jose Mercury News)
* The Death of Internet Radio (New Jersey Stage)
* Sax legend Lloyd still chasing ‘sound in my head’ (Boston Globe)
* Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah: Don’t Stream; Stretch (Jazz Times)
* Americana: is the 'dirt in your ears' genre a way forward for country? (The Guardian UK)
* Is YouTube killing the UK’s live music scene? (BBC)
* Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche explores percussive byways (Boston Globe)
* Carnival Tales (Offbeat)
* Black Death - How Africa Became Heavy Metal’s New Frontier (FactMag.com)
* Terry Adams on Monk: ‘Like Nothing I Had Ever Heard’ (DownBeat)
* Jazz Record Mart for sale (Chicago Tribune)

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

Here's the latest wrap-up of assorted links and short local news items of interest:

* Pianist and St. Louis native Tom McDermott, who now lives in New Orleans, turned up again in last Sunday's episode of the HBO series Treme, which is set in the Crescent City. McDermott and Connie Jones were shown performing the pianist's composition “Kermit’s Rag” at The Columns hotel. You can read a brief interview about the show that McDermott (pictured) did recently with NOLA.com here.

* Meanwhile, New Orleans native Wynton Marsalis was in St. Louis last week, leading the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra in a performance of his composition "Swing Symphony" with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra. While Marsalis and JaLCO were in town, they also spent some time teaching and playing with the East St. Louis High School Jazz Band. You can read more about that in Terry Perkins' article for the St. Louis Beacon, found here, and see some photos in an album posted on the SLSO's Facebook page.

* Jazz St. Louis will begin their first educational residency of the 2012-13 season next Monday, October 29 with a week-long return visit from well-known jazz educator Dr. Gene Aitken. A former winner of DownBeat Magazine’s Jazz Educator of the Year and a member of the International Jazz Educators Hall of Fame, Aitken will work with Jazz St. Louis’ JazzU ensembles, and conduct a series of lectures, workshops, and clinics at area schools including Ladue High School, Riverview Gardens High School, Seckman High School, Parkway South High School, Bishop DuBourg High School, and Webster Groves High School, the University of Missouri-St. Louis, and Webster University.

* And speaking of Jazz St. Louis, they've posted to their Facebook page an album of photos from last week's performances by yet another New Orleanian, trumpeter Christian Scott, at Jazz at the Bistro. Nextbop.com also just published an article on Scott's new quintet lineup here.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

Here's the latest wrap-up of assorted links and short local news items of interest:

* Trumpeter Christian Scott spoke with the Post-Dispatch's Calvin Wilson for a short article in yesterday's paper. Scott continues at Jazz at the Bistro through tomorrow night.

* While they're in town getting ready to perform Saturday night with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra also are spending some time mentoring young musicians from East St. Louis High School. The St. Louis American's Kenya Vaughn has the story here.

* Back over at the P-D, book editor Jane Henderson writes briefly about Miles Davis: The Complete Illustrated History (pictured), a new book due out November 17 from Voyageur Press.

* The Sheldon Concert Hall has posted on their Facebook page a set of photos from last week's 100th anniversary gala.

* The Route 66 Jazz Orchestra is the new name of the group formerly known as the Meramec Jazz Band, and they've posted to their Facebook page a set of photos from Wednesday's gig at Sky Music Lounge in West County.

* And in one more Facebook photoset, the 2012-13 lineup of the trombone-centric student group Metrobones is captured for posterity here.

* A recent performance of music and poetry by saxophonist Oliver Lake in Pittsburgh is reviewed here.

Jazz this week: Christian Scott, Alarm Will Sound, Wynton Marsalis' "Swing Symphony," Jazz in Pink, Mike Metheny, and more

If you're a fan of jazz trumpet, it's a good week to be in St. Louis, as the calendar of live jazz and creative music performances for the next several days includes visits from three stellar trumpeters. Other concerts this weekend offer a variety of musical textures and styles, ranging from the intimate to the orchestral and from traditional to ultramodern. Let's go to the highlights....

Tonight, trumpeter Christian Scott (pictured) opens a four-night gig with his band at Jazz at the Bistro, with two sets each evening continuing through Saturday. The 29-year-old New Orleans native recently released the most ambitious recording of his still-young career, the 2-CD set Christian aTunde Adjuah, which offers a sprawling 23 tracks worth of varied moods and grooves. For more about Scott and the album, plus video clips of him performing some of the music from it, check out this post from a couple of Saturdays ago.

Tomorrow night, the contemporary chamber ensemble Alarm Will Sound kicks off its first-ever St. Louis season at the Sheldon Concert Hall. The group, whose 20 members live all around the USA, has performed regularly in NYC for a decade and toured across the country and in Europe. They'll play three concerts here this year, starting with a program featuring music by John Adams, Aphex Twin, Conlon Nancarrow, Edgard Varèse, and Charles Wuorinen, plus pieces written specifically for them by Israeli composer Yotam Haber and AWS cellist Stefan Freund. For more, see this interview with the group's artistic director Alan Pierson by the Post-Dispatch's Sarah Bryan Miller.

Then on Friday, the annual Wine, Dine and Jazz Festival in Belleville will get underway with a lineup including the Yard Dawgs Jazz Quartet, the Usual Suspects, and Musica Slesa. The free outdoor festival continues on Saturday with guitarist Tom Byrne and singer Ralph Butler in the Pat Metheny inspired ensemble Have You Heard?, along with singer Zena Bott-Goins, Milwaukee blues guitarist Alex Wilson, and Santana tribute act Stantana.

Also on Friday, guitarist Dave Black leads a trio at the Cigar Inn, just a short distance from the festival site in Belleville; saxophonist Michael Anthony Fitzgerald is at Jazz on Broadway in Alton; and saxophonist Sammy Hag will play at Robbie's House of Jazz.

On Saturday afternoon, saxophonist/clarinetist Victor Goines will do a free workshop and performance at Saxquest. Goines will be in town to play Saturday night with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, who are teaming with the St. Louis Symphony for a performance of Marsalis' "Swing Symphony" at Powell Hall.  You can hear "Swing Symphony" in its entirety and see Marsalis talk at length about the project in this post from last Saturday. For more, check out Marsalis' brief interview with the P-D's Miller here. 

Also on Saturday, singer Feyza Eren performs at Robbie's House of Jazz; Sarah Jane and the Blue Notes are at the Wine Press; and the Funky Butt Brass Band returns to the Broadway Oyster Bar.

On Sunday, the St. Louis Jazz Club will present the St. Louis Stompers at the Doubletree Hotel at Westport; the Los Angeles-based, all-female group Jazz In Pink will be at the Sheldon Concert Hall in a benefit performance for Community Women Against Hardship (CWAH); and the St. Louis Jazz and Blues Vespers series at Second Baptist Church begins its 2012-13 season with a free concert featuring saxophonist Ray Vollmar and singer Deborah Sharn.

Looking beyond the weekend, on Monday trumpeter and Electronic Valve Instrument (EVI) player Mike Metheny will make the trip over from Kansas City to perform at Webster University. Metheny is a talented composer and player who sometimes doesn't quite get his due, perhaps simply because his guitarist brother Pat happens to be one of the most famous jazz musicians in the world. For this concert, he'll be backed by a local rhythm section including Kim Portnoy (piano), Nick Savage (drums), Willem von Hombracht (bass), and Steve Schenkel (guitar). Schenkel tells StLJN that the program will include one of Metheny's original tunes as well as interpretations of compositions by Bill Evans, Jimmy Smith, Duke Ellington, Benny Golson, Charlie Parker and more.

For more jazz-related events in and around St. Louis, 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.)

StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: The evolution of Christian Scott

This week, we take a closer look at the latest phase in the career of trumpeter Christian Scott, who will be in St. Louis to perform Wednesday, October 17 through Saturday, October 20 at Jazz at the Bistro

The 29-year-old New Orleans native a couple of months ago released the two-disc, 23-track album Christian aTunde Adjuah. The title refers to the new last name Scott has adopted in acknowledgement of and tribute to his African heritage, and the record - his sixth major label release as a leader - is not only his most expansive in terms of sheer length, but also is being called by critics his most personal and musically ambitious to date.

The nephew of saxophonist Donald Harrison, Scott was something of a teenage phenom, entering Berklee College of Music at age 17 and completing his degree in just three years while also touring with his uncle and performing, recording and self-releasing music with his own band.

Though Scott subsequently has done some work as a sideman with Harrison, and has guest-starred on recordings by Mike Clark, David Benoit, Marcus Miller, the hip-hop group X Clan and some others, he's mostly eschewed the traditional approach to jazz apprenticeship to concentrate on making his own music. His band in recent months often has included St. Louis native and fellow Berklee grad Lawrence Fields on piano, as well as long time bassist Kris Funn, drummer Jamire Williams, and guitarist Matthew Stevens, who seems to play a big role in setting up the texture and feel of many of Scott's recent compositions.

That's the lineup of musicians you can see and hear up above in today's first video clip, a version of the song "Spy Boy" from Scott's new album that was recorded last November in a concert on the Berklee campus in Boston. ("Spy boys" are the advance scouts/lookouts for tribes of New Orleans' black "Indians" when they parade through the streets on Mardi Gras day. Growing up in New Orleans, Scott - who appears in traditional Indian garb on the cover of the new album - and his twin brother Kiel served as "spy boy" and "flag boy" for the tribe headed by his uncle Donald Harrison.)

Down below, you can hear another piece from Scott's new album called "New New Orleans (King Adjuah Stomp)," which was recorded earlier this year at the North Sea Jazz Festival with the same band save for Fields, who's supplanted by John Escreet on piano.

Below that, it's a version of Scott's composition "KKPD," again featuring the same band except this time with Milton Fletcher on piano. This was recorded in 2010 at the Festival de Jazz de San Sebastián in Spain.

The fourth clip showcases Scott's ballad skills on "Isadora," also recorded in 2012 at the North Sea festival. The fifth video is from 2011, and shows Scott on ABC's Jimmy Kimmel Live playing "Angola, LA & The 13th Amendment" from his previous album Yesterday You Said Tomorrow.

To wrap things up, today's sixth clip is the electronic press kit for Christian aTunde Adjuah, which features Scott talking about the album as well some brief musical excerpts.

For more about Christian Scott and Christian aTunde Adjuah, check out this interview that ran in August in the Village Voice; this interview with Capital Bop from around the same time; and this interview done last month with a San Diego radio station. The recent piece on Scott from Wax Poetics, and his 2011 interview with The Revivalist also are worth a look.

StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Fall 2012 jazz preview, part 2

This week, we present part two of StLJN's fall jazz preview, featuring video samples of some of the musicians who will be coming to St. Louis to perform between now and the end of the year. (You can see part one of the preview here.)

Today's first video up top features guitarist John Scofield playing "Trio Blues" with bassist Steve Swallow and drummer Bill Stewart in November 2010 in Leverkusen, Germany. Scofield will be back here in St. Louis to perform Friday, September 28 and Saturday, September 29 at Jazz at the Bistro

Down below, you can see and hear singer Bett Butler (vocals) performing an excerpt from "Come Rain or Come Shine" at the Elephant Room in Austin, TX during this year's SXSW festival. Though she's accompanied here by Joël Dilley (bass), Paul Klemperer (sax), and Philip Marshall (drums), Butler will be in St. Louis with writer Pam Houston to present a collaborative program called "Words and Music" on Sunday, September 30 at the Ethical Society.

Below that , it's pianist Billy Childs playing a solo piece called "The Red Wheelbarrow" in May 2010 at WNYC radio in New York. Childs is coming to St. Louis to perform Wednesday October 3 through Saturday October 6 at Jazz at the Bistro with an all-star quartet that also will include drummer Brian Blade, saxophonist Steve Wilson, and bassist Scott Colley.

Next up, we've got a clip showcasing the first of four stellar trumpeters who will be visiting St. Louis during a four-week stretch this fall. It's the Cuban-born virtuoso Arturo Sandoval, playing "There Will Never Be Another You" in January of last year in the studios of Seattle radio station KPLU. His band in the clip includes Mahesh Balasooyria (piano:) Zane Musa (saxophone), John Belzaguy (bass) and Johnny Friday (drums). Sandoval returns to St. Louis for a concert on Saturday, October 6 at the Sheldon Concert Hall.

Then, it's New Orleans native and trumpeter Christian Scott, doing his tune "Spy Boy" last November at Berklee College of Music in Boston. Scott's band here features Berklee grad and St. Louis native Lawrence Fields on piano, plus Matthew Stevens (guitar), Kris Funn (bass) and Jamire Williams (drums). He'll be in St. Louis to perform Wednesday, October 17 through Saturday, October 20 at Jazz at the Bistro.

Right on Scott's metaphorical heels is trumpeter Terell Stafford, seen here with his quintet playing "Blues for J.T." at the 2006 Jazz Baltica festival in Salzau, Germany. Stafford's accompanists in the clip include Tim Warfield (tenor sax, soprano sax), Martin Wind (bass), Matt Wilson (drums) and Mulgrew Miller (piano). For his upcoming St. Louis gig, which will take place Wednesday, October 31 through Saturday, November 3 at Jazz at the Bistro, Stafford will be showcasing music from This Side of Strayhorn, his 2011 release on St. Louis' MAXJAZZ label.

Today's final video features cornetist Taylor Ho Bynum's sextet performing a piece called "Asphalt Flowers Forking Paths" at the 2010 Saalfelden Jazz Festival in Germany. Along with Bynum, the group's current lineup includes Jim Hobbs (alto saxophone), Bill Lowe (bass trombone, tuba), Mary Halvorson (guitar), Ken Filiano (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums), and they'll be playing Saturday, November 3, at the Luminary Center for the Arts in a concert presented by New Music Circle.

Join us again in this space at the same time next week for the third part of StLJN's Fall 2012 jazz preview...

Jazz St. Louis polling fans on potential Bistro bookings

Once again this year, Jazz St. Louis is looking for input from local jazz fans regarding who they'd like to see booked next season at Jazz at the Bistro. Interested individuals may offer their opinions by responding to a survey on the Jazz St. Louis Web site.

Musicians listed in the poll as under consideration for the Bistro's 2010-11 season include Patricia Barber, Bill Charlap, Stefon Harris, Lionel Loueke, Russell Malone, Gretchen Parlato, Jeremy Pelt, Chris Potter, Christian Scott, Esperanza Spalding (pictured) and Tierney Sutton.

Jazz St. Louis also is accepting "write-in" suggestions on their Facebook fan page and, presumably, via other means such as email, postal mail and in person as well. Many of the artists in this year's survey have played the Bistro at least once before, with the exceptions including Loueke, Parlato, Potter and Scott. JSL usually announces the next season's lineup for the Bistro in the latter part of May.