Music Education Monday: A master class with trombonist Bill Watrous

This week for Music Education Monday, it's a master class from trombonist Bill Watrous.

Beginning his career in the early 1960s, Watrous has played and recorded with musicians such as Maynard Ferguson, Woody Herman, Kai Winding, and Quincy Jones, as well as leading his own big band, originally known as the Manhattan Wildlife Refuge, and later renamed Refuge West when Watrous relocated to Los Angeles.

Acclaimed among fellow trombonists for his range, tone, and fluid technique, Watrous (pictured) also is a veteran of many studio sessions for TV and film, and is on the faculty of the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music.

The video embedded below features his presentation on "Jazz Style and Phrasing" for the 2015 Jazz Education Network conference last January in San Diego.

Music Education Monday: Master classes with saxophonist Ernie Watts

For this week's Music Education Monday, you can take in a couple of master classes on video from the veteran saxophonist Ernie Watts.

In addition to his own recordings as a leader, Watts (pictured) has played with an exceptional range of jazz, rock and soul musicians and groups, including Buddy Rich, Bobby Hutcherson, Doc Severinsen and the Tonight Show band, bassist Charlie Haden's Quartet West, Marvin Gaye, the Rolling Stones, and many more.

He last performed in St. Louis with Severinsen and the Tonight Show alumni band in 2013 at the Touhill, and also was heard here in 2012 with pianist Laurence Hobgood's quartet at Jazz at the Bistro.

In today's first master class video, recorded in 2012 at the Jazz Education Network conference in Louisville, KY, the saxophonist offers his thoughts on "A Melodic Approach to Improvisation." The second video also was recorded in 2012, at the Mariachi Sax Boutique in Moscow, which seems to be the Russian equivalent of St. Louis' Saxquest.

You can see both videos after the jump...

More coverage of the JEN Conference

Jazz Times has just posted a story by St. Louisan Terry Perkins recapping the Jazz Education Network Conference held here last month at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. You can read the article online here.

DownBeat reports on JEN Conference

The inaugural Jazz Education Network Conference held last week at the University of Missouri-St. Louis attracted more than 1150 educators, students and musicians from around the country, and - fittingly for an event of national significance - DownBeat publisher Frank Alkyer was there to cover it for the magazine. You can read his report online here.

Jazz educators featured; Radio Arts Foundation suspends efforts

As the weekend winds down and the work week winds up, here are a couple of links related to stories we've been following:

A number of the musicians and teachers in St. Louis this weekend for the first Jazz Education Network conference also visited area schools to spread the word about jazz, and the Post-Dispatch's Sara Lenz wrote a feature story about it, which you can read online here.

Meanwhile, the Radio Arts Foundation, the local group of classical music enthusiasts who had hoped to purchase radio station KFUO, have put on hold their search for another local frequency to buy and convert to a classical format. The P-D's Sarah Bryan Miller has details in a Culture Club blog post here.

Jazz this week: Jazz Education Network Conference, Jeff Hall, Monika Herzig, Legacy Jazz Quintet, and more

The big jazz and creative music event this week in St. Louis is the first-ever Jazz Education Network conference at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, a three-day extravaganza with hundreds of attendees from around the country that will be highlighted by a series of public concerts Thursday through Saturday evenings at the Touhill Performing Arts Center

Thursday's concert includes the Brubeck Institute Quintet; the Caswell Sisters; the JEN All-Stars, hosted by bassist John Clayton; and the Army Blues “Pershing’s Own.” On Friday, it's vocal group Sixth Wave; bassist Rufus Reid's Out Front Trio; and the University of Missouri - St. Louis Big Band with special guests percussionist Ruben Alvarez, vibraphonist Stefon Harris (pictured) and trumpeter Wayne Bergeron.

The final concert on Saturday will feature the Hannes Sigfridsson Trio; trumpeter Marvin Stamm with pianist Bill Mays; singer Rosana Eckert with pianist Shelly Berg, bassist Lou Fischer, drummer Ndugu Chancler and percussionist Gary Eckert; and the Clayton Brothers Quintet, featuring bassist John Clayton, his brother Jeff Clayton on alto sax and his son Gerald Clayton on piano, plus trumpeter Terell Stafford and drummer Obed Calvaire.

Elsewhere around town, on Thursday the Unity Theatre Ensemble opens the revival of their critically acclaimed musical The Cotton Club Revue, which runs through Sunday at the Ivory Theatre on the south side.

Also on Thursday, singer Jeff Hall, who makes his home in Nashville, will make his St. Louis debut at Lone Wolf Coffee Company, 15480 Clayton Road in Ballwin. Hall is a protege of the well-known Kansas City jazz vocalist Kevin Mahogany, and has just released his first recordings on the Mahogany Digital label.

He'll be backed by the German-born, Indiana-based pianist Monika Herzig, who will stick around St. Louis to headline her own gig on Saturday at Robbie's House of Jazz, joined by drummer Steve Davis, bassist Peter Kienle, singer Janiece Jaffee, and "possibly other surprise guests."

Also this weekend: the Legacy Jazz Quintet returns to Jazz at the Bistro on Friday and Saturday night, performing the music of Miles Davis in a tribute timed to coincide with the anniversary of the late trumpeter's birth (May 26); and the new Encore! series presented by Steve Schankman at the Jewish Community Center debuts, presenting The Sinatra Songbook featuring Tom Heitman and Schankman's own Orchestra on Friday and Schankman's other personal musical project, the Fabulous Motown Review, on Saturday.

UPDATE - 1:30 p.m., 5/20/10: There's late word from Jazz St. Louis that trumpeter Terell Stafford, who's in town for the JEN Conference, will sit in with the Legacy Jazz Quintet for both sets on Friday night, lending a bit of star power to their Miles Davis tribute.

On Sunday afternoon, singer and St. Louis native Lynne Fiddmont will be back home from Los Angeles for a performance at the Sheldon Concert Hall celebrating the release of her new CD Lady, a tribute to Billie Holiday. Fiddmont also will do a brief in-store performance and CD signing at 6:00 p.m. Friday at Vintage Vinyl.

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.)

(Edited after posting to fix typos. Edited again on 5/20 to add info on the Lynne Fiddmont show.)

Ozomatli reviewed, Jazz Education Network Conference previewed

For your Sunday night/Monday morning perusal, some links from over the weekend:

Ozomatli was in St. Louis on Friday night, performing at Blueberry Hill in place of their canceled date at Powell Symphony Hall. Ben McMahon was there to cover the show for the Riverfront Times, and you can read his review online here.

Meanwhile, on Thursday the Jazz Education Network will open its first-ever national conference at the University of Missouri St. Louis. The event runs through Saturday and will feature public concerts each night at the Touhill Performing Arts Center.

The Post-Dispatch's Calvin Wilson has a preview of the conference here, and Jon Poses, who runs the We Always Swing jazz series just down the road in Columbia, MO, writes about his plans to attend the JEN conference in a piece for the Columbia Tribune, available online here.

Tickets now on sale for JEN Conference concerts

Single tickets are now on sale for the three evening concerts that will be presented as part of the first-ever Jazz Education Network Conference, which takes place Thursday, May 20 through Saturday, May 22 in St. Louis.

All three concerts, as well various other conference events, will be presented at the Touhill Performing Arts Center. The show on the evening of Thursday, May 20 will feature the Brubeck Institute Quintet; the Caswell Sisters; the JEN All-Stars, hosted by bassist John Clayton; and the Army Blues “Pershing’s Own,” directed by CW5 Charles Vollherbst.

Then on Friday, May 21, it's the acappella vocal sextet Sixth Wave; bassist Rufus Reid (pictured) and his Out Front Trio; and the University of Missouri - St. Louis Big Band, directed by Jim Widner with special guests percussionist Ruben Alvarez, vibraphonist Stefon Harris and trumpeter Wayne Bergeron.

The concert on Saturday, May 22 features the Hannes Sigfridsson Trio, a group of young musicians from Sweden; a duo set from trumpeter Marvin Stamm and pianist Bill Mays; singer Rosana Eckert & Friends, with pianist Shelly Berg, bassist Lou Fischer, drummer Ndugu Chancler and percussionist Gary Eckert; and the Clayton Brothers Quintet, featuring bassist John Clayton, his brother Jeff Clayton on alto sax and his son Gerald Clayton on piano, plus trumpeter Terell Stafford and drummer Obed Calvaire.

Tickets (or in the conference's parlance, "registrations") for each evening concert are $30, and can be purchased online here (Thursday), here (Friday) and here (Saturday). Those who register for the entire conference or purchase a one-day pass get their tickets as part of the package; for more information on conference registrations, go here.

Jazz Education Network announces hotel, vendor information for first annual conference in St. Louis

The Jazz Education Network has announced hotel and vendor information for its first annual conference, which will be held Thursday, May 20 through Saturday, May 22 on the campus of the University of Missouri - St. Louis.

The official hotel for the conference will be the Hilton St. Louis Airport, located just a few minutes from the UMSL campus. For information on rates and reservation for the JEN conference, go here, and for information on how to become an exhibitor at the conference, go here.

The Jazz Education Network was formed in 2008 and "is dedicated to building the jazz arts community by advancing education, promoting performance and developing new audiences."

Performers at the first annual JEN conference will include The Army Blues/Pershing's Own, Ruben Alvarez, Shelly Berg, Phil Brown and the New Arts Jazztet, The Capitol Bones, The Capital Focus Trad Jazz Band, The Caswell Sisters, The Clayton Brothers Quintet, Rosana Eckert, Lou Fischer, Christian Howes, Inventions Trio, The Adam Larson Quintet, Tom "Bones" Malone, Bill Mays, Bob Mintzer, the Oslan/Dailey Jazztet, Gene Perla's GO Trio, Rufus Reid Trio, Bobby Shew, Sixth Wave, Terrell Stafford, Marvin Stamm, Jerry Tolson Quintet, Chris Merz' Equilateral and the John Wojciechowski Jazz Quartet.

Jazz Education Network to hold first conference next May in St. Louis

The Jazz Education Network (JEN) has announced that the organization will hold its first-ever conference from May 20 - 22, 2010 at the University of Missouri - St. Louis (UMSL).

JEN is a not-for-profit organization of music teachers, musicians, students and others formed in 2008 not long after the collapse of the International Association of Jazz Educators (IAJE). Their Web site says the group is "dedicated to building the jazz arts community by advancing education, promoting performance and developing new audiences." St. Louisan Jim Widner, the bassist, bandleader and noted jazz educator who directs the jazz studies program at UMSL, was elected to JEN's first board of directors this past summer.

Registration is now open for the conference in St. Louis, and JEN also is soliciting suggestions and ideas for conference programming on its online member forum. For more information about membership in JEN or to register for the conference, you can visit their Web site.

Bassist/educator Jim Widner elected to Jazz Education Network board of directors

Bassist and educator Jim Widner has been elected to the board of directors of the Jazz Education Network (JEN), a relatively new organization formed in 2008 not long after the collapse of the International Association of Jazz Educators. JEN's Web site says the group is "dedicated to building the jazz arts community by advancing education, promoting performance and developing new audiences."

The newly elected board has seventeen members who took office on July 1 and will have their first official meeting this week in Columbus, OH. The JEN board of directors includes both full-time educators like Widner (who directs the jazz studies program at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and runs several summer jazz camps) and working players with a strong interest in jazz ed, such as bassist John Clayton and trumpeter Terrell Stafford.