So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* Bassist Jimmy Blanton, who began his professional career in St. Louis before being hired Dike Ellington, is one of three inductees this year to Jazz at Lincoln Center's Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame. Nina Simone and Nat King Cole are the other 2018 inductees, chosen via an online vote of jazz fans.

* Drummer Dave Weckl (pictured) last week was interviewed (in English) by the Colombian newspaper El Tiempo's video channel.

* Pianist Peter Martin talked about his gigs this weekend at Jazz at the Bistro with the Post-Dispatch's Calvin Wilson.

* Speaking of the Post-Dispatch, the paper has published its annual "Go List" issue, which identifies reader and staff favorites in local attractions and festivals, music and the arts, bars and restaurants, and more.

In the "Readers' picks - Music & clubs" category, the Greater St. Louis Jazz Festival took second place in "Best concert series" (which seems odd, considering that there's also a "Best music festival" category, in which the GSLJF did not place); the Sheldon Concert Hall was fourth in "Best concert venue"; and Jazz at the Bistro (Ferring Jazz Bistro) won first place in "Best place to hear jazz," followed by the Sheldon, Thurman's in Shaw, and The Stage at KDHX.

In addition, Erin Bode won first place in "Best singer" and second place in "Best original band," with Joe Mancuso scoring second place in "Best singer."

As for the critic's picks in music and clubs, the winners included New Music Circle, for "Favorite music series that presents jazz but doesn’t have ‘jazz’ in its title"; the Arcadia Dance Orchestra, for "Favorite band playing 1920s music"; and the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, for "Favorite potential jazz venue." You can see the entire "Go List" for this year here. 

* Meanwhile, as part of the run-up to this year's ShowcaseSTL festival, the Riverfront Times this week began publishing a series of brief articles about the "STL 77," their "list of 77 acts who did big things in the last twelve months" which so far has included profiles of multi-instrumentalist Lamar "DJ Nune" Harris and keyboardist Mo Egeston.

* Photographer Madison Thorn has posted to Facebook an album of pictures from the recent performances by Kevin Bowers and NOVA at the Bistro

* Saxophonist David Sanborn will be one of the headliners and pianist Lawrence Fields one of the featured performers on the 2019 "Blue Note at Sea" cruise, which will take place from January 26 through February 2 and is presented by St. Louis-based Entertainment Cruise Productions.

* Bassist and U City native Neal Caine recently was interviewed by Bass Player magazine and also gets name-checked in a New Orleans Times-Picayune story about NOLA-based musicians performing in this  year's Jazz and Heritage Festival, aka JazzFest.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* More reviews of the just-released box set Miles Davis and John Coltrane: The Final Tour - Bootleg Series, Vol 6 are surfacing online, including one from AllAboutJazz.com's Doug Collette,
one from Slate's Fred Kaplan, and one by Jeff Tamarkin for Relix.

* The St. Louis Post-Dispatch/STLtoday.com has put online an "iParty" gallery of photos from Ken Page's performance Wednesday night at Jazz at the Bistro, shot by the P-D's Jon Gitchoff. 

* Trumpeter Russell Gunn (pictured) this week announced the release date for his next album. Get It How You Live, the debut recording of Gunn's Royal Krunk Jazz Orkestra, will be out on Ropeadope Records on Friday, July 13.

* Drummer Allison Miller talked about her gigs this weekend at Jazz at the Bistro with the Post-Dispatch's Calvin Wilson.

* Organizers of the Nevermore Jazz Ball have announced the event's dates for 2018. The annual celebration of swing dancing and music will take place from Thursday, November 1 through Sunday, November 4 at various venues around town, with tickets going on sale on a date this summer TBA.

* North County is getting a new musical instrument store in a familiar location, as Low Key Music will open next Monday, April 9 at 6235 N. Lindbergh, the former site of Dale's Music. The store's Facebook page also has announced an "open house" for musicians and band directors from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. tomorrow (Saturday, April 7).

* The St. Louis American's inimitable Delores Shante offered her impressions of one of last week's performances by The Baylor Project at the Bistro.

* St. Louis will be represented at this year's North Sea Jazz Festival, as saxophonist David Sanborn and trumpeter Keyon Harrold are among the musicians announced this week who will be heading to Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in July for the three-day event.

* Voting is now open for the next group of prospective inductees to Jazz at Lincoln Center's Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame, and one of this year's 10 nominees has a local connection. That would be the innovative bassist Jimmy Blanton, who gained fame playing with Duke Ellington's orchestra before his tragic death from tuberculosis at age 23. Blanton's very first professional job was in St. Louis, playing with the Jeter-Pillars Orchestra for a year before joining Ellington.

You can see the whole list of nominated musicians and cast your vote here. Voting ends at 11:59 p.m. EDT on Saturday, April 28, and the three nominees who receive the most votes will be inducted in 2018.

* Keyboardist and Metro East native David Garfield, best known for his work with guitarist and singer George Benson, has a new tune on, of all places, the country charts. According to a press release,  “I Lied,” a "power pop" ballad written by Garfield with Motown's Smokey Robinson and sung by vocalist J. Paris, has reached No. 60 on the Music Row singles chart this week and gained New & Active status on the Billboard Indicator chart. The song will appear on Garfield’s upcoming album Vox Outside the Box, release date TBA.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* The 10th annual Record Store Day celebration will be held this year on Saturday, April 22, and yr. StLJN editor once again will be playing a small part in the festivities at Vintage Vinyl in University City, serving as a "guest DJ" spinning tunes on the in-house sound system for an hour starting at 4:00 p.m.

In addition to this year's special RSD releases, VV's all-day event will feature live bands outside, guest DJs inside, and free Schlafly beer. Other St. Louis stores participating in RSD 2017 include Euclid Records, Planet Score Records, Music Record Shop, and Kismet Creative Center.

* Saxophonist David Sanborn talked about his friendship with the late drummer and fellow former St. Louisan Phillip Wilson for an interview published on Do The Math, the blog of The Bad Plus pianist Ethan Iverson.

* Trumpeter and vibraphonist Joe Bozzi was profiled on KSDK's Show Me St. Louis in a segment by reporter Heidi Glaus highlighting his decades of service as a music teacher for schools in the St. Louis Archdiocese.

* Drummer Kimberly Thompson, back home this week for an educational residency at Jazz St. Louis and gigs this weekend at Jazz at the Bistro, is also back online in animated form, as the second episode of her children's program "Music Time with Kimberly Thompson" has been posted to YouTube. As part of that educational residency, Thompson returned to her alma mater Pattonville High School for a clinic with the school's jazz band. 

* Bassist, Washington University faculty member, and now, author Paul Steinbeck went to Chicago last month for a concert and book signing to promote Message To Our Folks, his new history of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and DownBeat magazine was there to cover the event.

* The weekly Wednesday night jam sessions at @Nesby's are the subject of a brief feature in St. Louis County Arts, a new blog started by Valerie Tichacek and writer/photographer Bill Motchan.

* Drummer and St. Louis native Andre Boyd, now living in New Orleans after leaving Cirque du Soleil's road show Quidam last year, was profiled by the New Zealand magazine elocal..

* Pioneering bassist Jimmy Blanton, who played his first professional gigs in the late 1930s with the Jeter-Pillars Orchestra in St. Louis before going on to fame with Duke Ellington's band, is one of 10 musicians eligible this year for election to Jazz at Lincoln Center's Jazz Hall of Fame. You can see a list of all the candidates and cast your vote by April 30 here.

* The 2017 Chesterfield Jazz Festival has announced this year's date and musical lineup. The free concert will be held Saturday, June 24 at the Chesterfield Amphitheater and will feature music from the Wooten Brothers, with bassist Victor Wooten, drummer Roy "Futureman" Wooton and siblings, along with Bach to the Future with Tracy Silverman, Anita Jackson, Soul Cafe, and Kim Fuller & Maurice Carnes.

Jazz at Lincoln Center's Jazz Hall of Fame opens voting to fans; St. Louis native Clark Terry eligible for election this year

Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame is asking jazz fans to help select its next set of inductees through online voting, and legendary trumpeter and St. Louis native Clark Terry (pictured) is one of this year's nominees.

Started in 2004, the Hall currently has 34 members, including former St. Louisan Miles Davis. If elected, Terry, who's now 92, would be only the third musician (along with Sonny Rollins and Ornette Coleman) to be honored with induction while still living.

Fans can cast their votes between now and March 31 on JALC's website. Each person who registers an e-mail address can vote for up to four nominees. Only those nominees who get at least three-quarters of the vote will be honored, up to a maximum of four inductees this year. If no one gets 75 percent of the vote, the top vote-getter will be inducted.

Interestingly, Terry isn't the only musician with St. Louis ties who is eligible for election this year. Also on the ballot is bassist Jimmy Blanton, who worked here in the late 1930s with the Jeter-Pillars Orchestra and gained fame for his innovative bass playing with Duke Ellington from 1939 to 1941. Blanton died of tuberculosis at age 23 in 1942.

There's also one other living nominee this year, the great bebop drummer Roy Haynes, who's just turned 88. Other nominees include James P. Johnson, Lionel Hampton, Teddy Wilson, Kenny Clarke, Art Blakey, Don Redman, and Ben Webster.

With a storied career spanning nearly eight decades, Terry certainly meets the Hall's criteria for election. He's made hundreds of records, played thousands of gigs all over the world, and his tune "Mumbles" is familiar to jazz fans everywhere as a humorous demonstration of the art of scat singing. Among his many noteworthy accomplishments, Terry also is one of a select group of jazz musicians to have performed with the orchestras of both Duke Ellington and Count Basie, and he was one of the first African-American musicians hired by a orchestra on network TV when he joined the band for NBC's Tonight Show in the early 1960s.

Equally important is that Clark Terry is, simply put, an exemplary human being and a great ambassador for jazz. Terry has taught and mentored hundreds of musicians who have gone on to have professional careers, and his positive attitude about life and continued good humor, even in the face of serious health issues in recent years, have served as inspiration to countless other musicians and fans alike.

If you need further convincing, just consult the biography on Terry's website or his Wikipedia page, which shows that he's already the recipient of more than 250 awards and honors, including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, The National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master Award, and numerous honorary doctorates from colleges and universities.

So, St. Louis jazz fans, the ball's in your court. To help elect Clark Terry to the Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame, please go here before March 31 and cast your vote.

(Edited 3/13/13 to correct Roy Haynes' age and the spelling of "Nesuhi")

Notes from the Net: Blanton remembered, Waverly Seven featured, New Orleans musicians recovering, and more

For your Monday reading pleasure, it's StLJN's weekly compendium of brief items of interest from around the Web:

* Bassist Jimmy Blanton (pictured), who lived and worked in St. Louis for a couple of years just before he joined Duke Ellington's orchestra, was remembered on the anniversary of his death in a brief article at AllAboutJazz.com.

* Performers at the fifth annual Festival of New Trumpet Music (FONT) will include Jeremy Pelt, who has recorded for the St. Louis label MAXJAZZ and played Jazz at the Bistro last season.

* Speaking of the Bistro, the new band Waverly Seven will play there from November 28 - December 1, and the NYC news station NY1 has a feature story about them and their first CD, an appreciation of the music of Bobby Darin.

* Pianist Jason Moran, who's playing the Bistro next year from January 30 through February 2, will be among the many participants in the "Following Monk" festival to be held this fall at Duke University.

* Guitarist John Scofield, a frequent visitor to St. Louis in recent years, has a new CD, This Meets That, on a new label, EmArcy.

* Last but certainly not least, an article from the New York Times examines how working musicians in New Orleans are trying to rebuild their lives and careers. Meanwhile, the Musicians Village project, built by Habitat for Humanity and championed by Branford Marsalis and Harry Connick Jr., is getting its first residents.