Jazz this week: Russell Malone & Cyrus Chestnut Trio, Craig Hultgren & Luna Nova, NIU Jazz Ensemble & Victor Lewis, and more

It's a mixed bag of jazz and creative music happening this weekend around the St. Louis area, with performances including straight-ahead, mainstream jazz sounds from both small groups and big bands; a triple bill of female guitarists; a cabaret take on Southern rock; an innovative cellist who bridges free improv and contemporary compositions; and more. Let's go to the highlights:

Tonight, guitarist Russell Malone and pianist Cyrus Chestnut and his trio will team up for the first time ever in St. Louis*, beginning a four-night engagement at Jazz at the Bistro. Both Malone and Chestnut have proved popular with local jazz fans, and to sweeten the deal, Jazz St. Louis is offering two tickets for the price of one for Wednesday and Thursday nights.

Tomorrow night, Lewis and Clark Community College presents a "Musicians' Gathering" at Jazz on Broadway in Alton, while saxophonist Paul Antion, a senior at Washington University, is the featured performer for this week's Jazz at Holmes concert on the Wash U. campus.

Friday, the Old Rock House will host "La Guitara," a package show highlighting female guitarists including singer-songwriter Patty Larkin, "new acoustic music" performer Muriel Anderson, and Vicki Genfan, whose resume includes a variety of genres including jazz.

Also on Friday, singer Jeffrey M. Wright, backed by pianist Carol Schmidt and guitarist Steve Schenkel, performs the first of two nights of his "Southern Roots" cabaret show at Kranzberg Arts Center under the auspices of the Presenters Dolan; saxophonist Jay Hutson leads a quartet at Robbie's House of Jazz; and saxophonist Tim Cunningham is back at Jazz on Broadway, where management has announced that he'll continue weekly through at least June 8.

On Saturday, New Music Circle presents cellist Craig Hultgren (pictured) and members of the Memphis-based experimental music group Luna Nova at Christ Church Cathedral. Hultgren has played St. Louis several times before, but if you don't know him or his music yet, you can catch up by checking out this post from last Saturday.

Also on Saturday, singer Feyza Eren performs at Robbie's, fronting a rhythm section including pianist Brad Ellebrecht, bassist Willem Von Hombracht and drummer Tom Kernan.

On Sunday afternoon, the Northern Illinois University Jazz Ensemble, under the direction of saxophonist Ron Carter, will return with a special guest, veteran drummer Victor Lewis, to play at the Sheldon Concert Hall.

Also on Sunday, the Saint Louis Jazz Club will present pianist Pat Joyce and his All-Stars in a matinee performance at the DoubleTree Hotel Westport.

Looking beyond the weekend, on Monday the Sessions Big Band returns for their monthly performance at BB's Jazz Blues and Soups.

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.)

*Update - 4/11/12, 11:50 p.m.: As longtime reader (and stalwart fan of Russell Malone) Kandie Webster points out in the comments, this week's gig at the Bistro is not the first time Malone and Cyrus Chestnut have played together, as stated in the first version of this story. That statement was based on information supplied by Jazz St. Louis that may have been incorrect, or simply just misinterpreted by me. At any rate, this week's gig definitely is the first time they've played together here in St. Louis...

StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Spotlight on Craig Hultgren

This week, let's get reacquainted with cellist Craig Hultgren, who's returning to St. Louis next week to perform with members of the ensemble Luna Nova at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, April 14 at Christ Church Cathedral, 1210 Locust St. downtown.

The concert, which is sponsored by New Music Circle, will feature Hultgren, pianist Adam Bowles and flute player John McMurtery performing 20th and 21st century works by composers Elliot Carter, Olivier Messiaen, Robert G. Patterson, Toru Takemitsu, Monroe Golden, James Romig and Justin Merritt.

Hultgren, who's from Birmingham, AL, is known for his involvement in creating and commissioning new repertoire for his instrument, and for using and teaching various extended techniques for the cello. He has performed solo concerts and chamber music recitals all over the USA and in Europe, and appeared most recently in St. Louis in March 2011 in a solo concert at Focal Point.

Hultgren also is a member of the Alabama Symphony and a teacher at University of Alabama at Birmingham, the Alabama School of Fine Arts and Birmingham-Southern College, where he directs the BSC New Music Ensemble. He has recorded three solo CDs, the most recent of which, Music of the Next Moment, was released last December on the Innova label.

Though there's not much video of Hulgren online for someone who's been performing as long as he has,, we do have a few clips for you today that help demonstrate some of his talents and interests. The first clip up above is version of Elliott Carter's "Enchanted Preludes," which is scheduled to be on the program for Saturday's concert in St. Louis, recorded with John McMurtery in 2006 at Birmingham Southern College.

Down below, there's a clip in which Hultgren plays "Only Four?" by Charles Knox and discusses the goals of Birmingham's Scrollworks program, which offers free music lessons, sheet music and loaner instruments to children in the Birmingham area. Below that, there's a performance of "Off-White," an original piece by BSC student Josh Crowe, featuring Hultgren and percussionist Gene Fambrough.

Lastly, you can see both parts of "The Crab," described as "a diatribe for electric cello, computer-generated soundfile, and video" that was created in 2006 for the Hultgren/University of Alabama at Birmingham Computer Music Ensemble Commissioning Prize. Hultgren is on electric cello, accompanied by pre-recorded computer audio and a video; the piece was conceived as a modern silent film that tells "an allegorical tale of the danger of good ideas taken to their extreme conclusions."

If you'd like to hear more, although there's not much video documentation online of either Hultgren or the rest of the Memphis-based Luna Nova, the latter do offer an extensive selection of free downloadable audio files on their website.

New Music Circle previews 2011-12 season

New Music Circle has posted a preview of the lineup for their 2011-12 season on their website. At this point, it's just a list of artists - no dates or venues yet - but most notably, the proposed season would include the St. Louis debut of pianist Matthew Shipp (pictured).

The 51-year-old Shipp has been a noted figure in free jazz and improvised music for 20 years now, both for his own work and for his longtime membership in saxophonist David S. Ware's quartet. His piano playing has been compared variously to Cecil Taylor, Andrew Hill and Thelonious Monk, among others, but in recent years Shipp also has experimented with music that references contemporary classical, hip hop and electronica. His most recent recording, the two-disc set Art of the Improviser, was released in February 2011.

Other musicians slated for NMC's 2011-12 season include:

* Drummer John Hollenbeck's Claudia Quintet with Chris Speed (clarinet/tenor saxophone), Matt Moran (vibraphone/percussion), Ted Reichman (accordion) and Drew Gress (bass).

* Composer, improviser and multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee's Survival Unit, with percussionist Michael Zerang and cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm.

* Violinist Tony Conrad, who's also an experimental filmmaker and video artist. Conrad was an early member of the Theatre of Eternal Music, the famed 1960s group with John Cale, Angus MacLise and La Monte Young, and also has worked with composer Rhys Chatham.

* Percussionist Chris Corsano, who has toured with Icelandic singer Björk and recorded with Evan Parker, Kim Gordon, Thurston Moore, Nels Cline, Jim O'Rourke, and many others.

The NMC season also will include a video and electronic music performance by Keith Fullerton-Whitman; a concert of electro-acoustic and chamber music by James Mobberley and Paul Rudy; and a return appearance by cellist Craig Hultgren, who's known for his use of extended techniques in both composed and improvised music.

Rounding out the 2011-12 schedule will be a concert of original chamber music by Frank Stemper, who's a professor and composer in residence at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, and another "NMC Showcase," a multi-artist concert featuring new work from several different local musicians and ensembles.

Assuming they're able to pull it all off, this would be a very impressive season, balancing improvised music and free jazz, intermedia performances, and contemporary composed music. When NMC releases final information on their 2011-12 schedule, venues and ticket prices, we'll have it all for you right here.

(Edited 5/19/11 to fix a couple of typos.)

Jazz this week: Chris Potter Underground, Craig Hultgren, Jazz St. Louis' benefit gala, Mardi Gras music, and more

It's Mardi Gras week, and here in St. Louis there's a variety of jazz and creative music coming up on local stages (though not at the city's official Mardi Gras celebration; a bit more about that later.) Let's go the highlights...

The most highly anticipated performer of the week likely is saxophonist Chris Potter (pictured), who brings his electric group Underground to Jazz at the Bistro for the first time beginning tonight and continuing through Saturday. The 40-year-old Potter has been one of the more talked-about saxophonists on the scene for a decade now, and though he's played the Bistro before with his acoustic group, Jazz St. Louis tried for a couple of years to get Underground here before the proverbial stars finally aligned this season. Given both of those factors, expect good crowds for Potter all weekend, but at last word, there were tickets remaining for most sets.

For more about Potter, check out this StLJN video post from last Saturday; this short article by Calvin Wilson from last Friday's Post-Dispatch; this 2008 NPR broadcast featuring a set of Underground recorded live at NYC's Village Vanguard; and this 2010 interview with Potter conducted for the jazz studies program at NYU.

On Thursday, the Funky Butt Brass Band will get the weekend started with an early evening set at the Blues City Deli; and guitarist Eric Slaughter's trio will play a free concert for the Jazz at Holmes series at Washington University.

The FBBB will be back in action for an hour Friday night, performing from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. for the Mayor's Ball at City Hall before yielding to the band Groovethang, best known for their tribute shows to Earth Wind & Fire and Steely Dan. Alas, said hour-long set would appear to be the only jazz and/or blues-related sounds offered at any of this year's official St. Louis Mardi Gras events; all the music for Saturday's parade-related doings in Soulard is slated to come from DJs and a list of depressingly generic-seeming local rock cover bands. (Yr. humble StLJN editor has ranted about the lack of appropriate music at these events before; follow the links to learn all the reasons why I think the Mardi Gras powers-that-be continue to err in their music-booking reasoning. )

Fortunately, there's jazz to be found elsewhere throughout the weekend, starting on Friday as saxophonist Kendrick Smith's quartet plays at Robbie's House of Jazz; and guitarist Tom Byrne's trio, with Phil Graves on drums and Chris Watrous on bass, is at the Cigar Inn in Belleville.

On Saturday, the Funky Butt Brass Band will perform in late afternoon at the Old Rock House, along with the New Orleans R&B/funk cover band Gumbohead, with whom they share a couple of members.

That evening, cellist Craig Hultgren will employ his impressive array of extended techniques in a performance at Focal Point under the auspices of New Music Circle, and saxophonist Stan Coleman's University Jazz Big Band takes the stage at Robbie's.

Also on Saturday, guitarist William Lenihan's trio will play a Mardi Gras-themed fundraiser at Trinity Episcopal Church in St. Charles to benefit the church's choir program; and the eclectic roots music band Sins of the Pioneers will play jazz, blues, honky tonk and more at Iron Barley's basement room Fred's 6-Foot Under.

On Sunday, the St. Louis Record Collector and CD Show will hold their spring event, typically the largest and best attended of year, at the American Czech Hall on the south side.

That evening, Jazz St. Louis will hold their annual fundraising gala at the Hilton St. Louis at the Ballpark, featuring dinner, an auction, and music from the Jazz St. Louis All-Stars student group, saxophonist Ronald Carter and the East St. Louis High School Jazz Band, and the seemingly ubiquitous Funky Butt Brass Band. Tickets start at $250 per person, and proceeds benefit Jazz St. Louis' educational programs. For more information, call JSL's Melissa Jones at 314-289-4037 or email her at melissa @ jazzstl.org.

Also on Sunday is the March edition of the monthly jam session at Bossanova Restaurant and Lounge in Alton, featuring saxophonist Jason Swagler and Eric Slaughter's trio with Marty Morrison and bassist Nick Jost.

Looking beyond the weekend, on Fat Tuesday you can catch the Funky Butt/Gumbohead combination at the Broadway Oyster Bar, or take in the traditional jazz sounds of Bud Shultz and his "You Can't Beat Experience" Jazz Band as they perform for a Mardi Gras celebration at the Lewis & Clark Community College's Benjamin Godfrey Memorial Chapel in Godfrey, IL.

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.)

A sneak peek at New Music Circle's 2010-11 season schedule

If you've visited the New Music Circle website recently, you may have noticed what's labeled a "preview" of the presenting organization's 2010-11 season. While some of NMC's events for the coming year still are yet to be confirmed, NMC board member Jim Hegarty last week was able to provide a few additional details about the season for StLJN's readers.

For jazz fans, the biggest news probably is that NMC will present the Golden Quartet on Saturday, November 13 at the 560 Music Center in University City. Led by trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith (pictured), the Golden Quartet is a sort of avant-jazz supergroup featuring pianist Vijay Iyer, bassist John Lindberg, and drummer Pheeroan AkLaff. While Iyer performed here with his trio in January at Jazz at the Bistro and Lindberg has played St. Louis before with the New York String Trio, it appears that this show will be the first St. Louis appearance ever for Smith and AkLaff, both of whom have had long careers of some significance in jazz and improvised music.

Also on tap for the fall: "Visual Music Improv," a performance on Saturday, October 23 at the Mildred E. Bastian Performing Arts Center at St. Louis Community College - Forest Park featuring work from video artist Zlatko Cosic and musicians John Consiglio and Brad Decker; and
a "New Music Circle Showcase" (date and venue TBA) featuring Ron Coulter (percussion, electronics, voice, and self-built instruments), Lauri des Marais (sound designer and choreographer), BaBa Mike Nelson (percussion, vocals), and Eric Hall (electronics and processed instruments).

The new year will bring a concert from the Bloom Project, with pianist Thollem McDonas and saxophonist Rent Romus, on Saturday, January 22nd at the Kranzberg Arts Center. McDonas has has played a number of St. Louis gigs in recent years, including at least one show with the Bloom Project, which features "free improvisations as well as interpretations of numerous textual and graphical scores ...combining disparate and divergent stylistic histories with a sense of immediacy, intensity, and spontaneous inventiveness."

Also returning in 2011 are the duo of violist LaDonna Smith and guitarist Davey Williams, both veteran free-improvising musicians based in Birmingham, AL who have played here before under NMC's auspices. Smith and Williams will be in St. Louis in February, venue TBA, while cellist and fellow Birminghamian Craig Hultgren also will be back next year for a performance in April at the Kranzberg.

New to NMC next spring will be Trio Kinsella, a Kansas City–based ensemble featuring pianist Brendan Kinsella, cellist Ben Gitter and flute player Jonathan Borja. They'll perform original compositions on a date and at a venue TBA.

St. Louis-based pianist Peter Henderson, who's earned a reputation as a compelling interpreter of 20th century and contemporary composers, also will do a concert for NMC next spring, date and venue TBA, performing Frederic Rzewski's "The People United Will Never Be Defeated", and Fred Onovwerosuoke's "24 Studies In African Rhythm."

Also still awaiting a date and venue is Hegarty's own Laptop Orchestra Project, "a performance by a laptop computer ensemble consisting of originally composed works created by the participants and featuring soloists on acoustic instrument or voice in a large, open venue." The project also will include "an education component that provides interested participants and auditors instruction in the laptop orchestra software/hardware system, building of speaker systems, and the special considerations of composing for this ensemble."

Tickets for most New Music Circle shows are $15 regular admission, $7 for students/artists with a valid ID, and NMC also offers season memberships that include tickets to all concerts. StLJN will have more on New Music Circle's 2010-11 season as shows are confirmed and further announcements are made, and of course you also can visit NMC's website for more information.

Jazz this week: Joey DeFrancesco, Peter Martin & Jeremy Davenport, J.D. Parran, Craig Hultgren, and more

Warmer weather is in the forecast for St. Louis, but before you make plans to spend the whole weekend outdoors, you also may want to check out what's coming coming up in jazz and creative music over the next few days.

Tonight, organist Joey DeFrancesco begins a four-night engagement at Jazz at the Bistro. There's always been an enthusiastic audience for bluesy, organ-driven jazz in St. Louis, and in the past DeFrancesco has proven to be a good draw here, so advance reservations are recommended. For some video samples of DeFrancesco in action, see this post from last Saturday.

On Thursday, guitarist Vince Varvel will play a free concert for the Jazz at Holmes series on Washington University campus, and the Black Rep's production of the Louis Jordan musical Five Guys Named Moe resumes at the Grandel Theatre, where it will continue through April 25.

On Friday afternoon, guitarist Steve Schenkel and singer Ashley Mason are doing a short Good Friday matinee concert at Webster University's Thompson Music Building.

Then on Friday evening, pianist Peter Martin resumes his eponymous series at the Sheldon Concert Hall with a show featuring two fellow University City natives - trumpet player and singer Jeremy Davenport and bassist Chris Thomas - plus drummer Ulysses Owens, Jr. At this writing, word from Martin's Twitter feed is that the concert is approaching a sell-out, but if you can't get tickets, you still can check out the live, streaming webcast of the show.

Also on Friday evening, singer Jeanne Trevor will perform at Robbie's House of Jazz.

On Saturday afternoon, another St. Louis expat returns home, as multi-instrumentalist J.D. Parran (pictured) brings his saxophones, flutes, clarinets and assorted other woodwinds to the Metropolitan Gallery to play original compositions and the music of John Coltrane for this week's Nu-Art Series jazz composers concert.

On Saturday evening, New Music Circle is presenting cellist Craig Hultgren in concert at the Kranzberg Arts Center. Hultgren, who lives in Birmingham, AL, plays both improvised and composed music, including many pieces commissioned especially for him, and often employs extended techniques, amplification and electronic effects to expand his sonic pallette.

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 by becoming a "fan" of 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.)

New Music Circle announces 2009-10 season schedule

New Music Circle has announced its lineup of concerts for the 2009-10 season, which marks NMC's 51st year of presenting contemporary and experimental music in St. Louis. This year's schedule once again has a number of multimedia events, mixing music with film, dance and spoken word performance.

Pianist, composer and electronic musician James Hegarty kicks off the season with a concert on Saturday, October 3 at St. Louis Community College - Forest Park's Center Mildred E. Bastian Center for the Performing Arts. Hegarty's performance, called "eXscapement," is a collaboration with his artist daughter Anna inspired by their recent trip to Japan.

Saxophonist Larry Ochs, perhaps best known as a member of the Rova Saxophone Quartet, comes to St. Louis on Friday, Oct. 9 for a performance at the Sheldon Concert Hall with his group Sax & Drumming Core. Formed in 2000, the band includes Ochs on saxophone, plus drummers Donald Robinson and Scott Amendola, Natsuki Tamura on trumpet, and Satoko Fujii on synthesizer and piano.

Then on Sunday, November 8, NMC will present a local version of composer Rob Voisey’s 60x60 Dance project at Mad Art Gallery, featuring St. Louis dancers and choreographers performing to 60 different 60-second pieces written by 60 different composers and curated by Voisey.

Performance artist Kelsey LaPoint, who has been involved in several previous NMC events, closes out the year with a holiday-themed performance piece to be staged Wednesday, December 2 through Friday, December 4 at the Regional Arts Commission building, 6128 Delmar.

The new year starts with multi-instrumentalist Douglas Ewart (pictured), known as a key member of Chicago's Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), and St. Louis bassist and mbira player Zimbabwe Nkenya collaborating on a concert Saturday, January 30 at the Kranzberg Arts Center.

Next up, video artist Van McElwee returns again this year with a program called "Modular Mazes" on Saturday, February 27 at the Winifred Moore Auditorium on the Webster University campus. Dedicated to "exploring the ancient form of the labyrinth in new ways," the piece will combine video, 3D animation and music from Jim Hegarty, percussionist Rich O'Donnell and the Semi Acoustic Noise Ensemble (SANE).

On Saturday, March 13, Swedish sound artist John Tamm-Buckle will perform "Droning Maud Land" at the Kranzberg Arts Center. The piece is "an interactive sculpture made of ice frozen around a frame, contact microphones, and a digital thermometer. While the ice melts, pieces of the sculpture will be amplified and played like a percussion instrument. The signal sources will be run through a custom Max/MSP patch that performs various signal-processing and signal-routing functions. In addition to the sound of the sculpture, analyzed audio data will trigger and morph samples recorded in Antarctica."

The following month, cellist Craig Hultgren brings his repertoire of extended cello techniques back to St. Louis for a performance on Saturday, April 3 at the Kranzberg. Hultgren's peformance "Stains" is described as "an evocative set of solo cello pieces with strong narratives will be sampled and extended to run seamlessly, overlapping poems and stories. The works will include acoustic, electronic, and video pieces for solo cello played by Hultgren, as well as a variety of narrative pieces."

The season's penultimate concert features composer, software designer and granular synthesis pioneer Curtis Roads and video artist Brian O’Reilly, who will present a set of new electronic compositions with visual accompaniment on Saturday, May 1 at the Mildred E Bastian Performing Arts Center. Electronic musician and former St. Louisan Tom Hamilton closes out the 2009-10 season with a concert on Saturday, May 8 at the Kranzberg.

Season tickets are $80 for regular admission, or $40 for students and "starving artists". NMC also offers a "benefactor" membership for $110 that includes a total of 15 tickets that can be used for any performance. For more information, visit NMC's Web site, or download a copy of the season brochure in .pdf format here .

Craig Hultgren at Focal Point this Sunday, March 25

Cellist Craig Hultgren, who incorporates modern classical music, improvisation, electronics and extended sound-producing techniques into his work, is coming to St. Louis for a solo concert sponsored by New Music Circle at 7:30 p.m. this Sunday, March 25 at the Focal Point, 2720 Sutton in Maplewood. (That's roughly a block south of Manchester.)

Hultgren, who hails from Birmingham, AL, has been a champion of new work for the cello, commissioning and/or premiering more than 50 new new compositions for the instrument over the course of his career. According to NMC's email, "Sunday's program will include works by Mario Davidovsky, William Price, Orlando Jacinto García, Robert Scott Thompson, Mikel Kuehn, and Marc LeMay." The program will also include an improvised work with computer processing and a "video component".

Readers with longish memories may recall that this show was announced last fall as part of New Music Circle's season, but with the location TBA. Today's email from NMC was the first word StLJN has had of it since then - hence, the regrettably tardy nature of our coverage.

Had I been thinking/remembering a little harder when writing yesterday's weekly highlights post, I would have included Hultgren's show. His last St. Louis appearance was in the mid-Nineties when I was administering the NMC concert series, and I found him to be a mensch as well as a very interesting musician. Recommended.