So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* Cool It If You Can, the most recent recording from Miss Jubilee and the Yas-Yas Boys, was reviewed by Michael Steinman for his Jazz Lives blog.

* Drummer Marcus Baylor was interviewed on local CBS affiliate KMOV for a story about his group The Baylor Project being nominated again this year for a Grammy.

* Euclid Records owner Joe Schwab appeared this past Sunday on NBC's Sunday Today program, being interviewed for a story about why vinyl record sales have boomed over the past year.

* Drummer Emanuel Harrold (pictured) is now an endorser for percussion accessories maker DrumDial, and has recorded a new promotional video for the company.

* One of St. Louis' most famous expatriates of the 20th century plays a major role in a new LitHub essay from writer Harmony Holiday, "A Dinner in France, 1973: Josephine Baker, James Baldwin, and a Very Young Henry Louis Gates, Jr."

* Bassist Darin Gray has a new recording, The Reduction (music for dance), set for release on April 2 in digital formats and as a limited-edition vinyl LP.

* Also with a new release this month is keyboardist and vocalist Jesse Gannon, whose recording Live at the Dark Room is out now as a digital-only album on Bandcamp.

* Trumpeter Josiah Burton, a former member of Jazz St. Louis' All-Stars student ensemble, was the subject of a feature story in the Greenville University campus paper The Papyrus.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* The Red and Black Brass Band (pictured) was featured Wednesday night on a segment of the PBS NewsHour, produced by the local PBS affiliate Nine Network.

* Drummer Emmanuel Harrold was the guest on this past Tuesday's episode of the Mike Dolbear drum podcast.

* "The Enduring Cultural Legacy of Miles Davis" was the subject of an online discussion that took place this past Monday with participants including multi-instrumentalist and producer Marcus Miller, Davis' nephew Vince Wilburn Jr. and his son Erin Davis, and producers of the recent documentary Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool. You can see the entire program archived on YouTube.

* Also on the Miles Davis beat, the trumpeter's historic performance at the 1970 Isle of Wight Music Festival is the subject of an article in the UK magazine Jazzwise.

* Drummer Dave Weckl will teach another master class online via Zoom on Saturday, September 12. Get more information and sign up to reserve one of the 15 spots in the class at http://thegroovemasters.com/.

* As music venues in St. Louis (and everywhere) try to figure out how and when to reopen, stories this past week from St. Louis Public Radio's Jeremy Goodwin and KMOV's Alexis Zotos examined some of the issues involved and potential solutions.

* Meanwhile, in a related story, a number of local venues on Tuesday night lit up their exteriors with red lights, hoping to draw attention to the Restart Act, a bill being considered by Congress that would provide financial help to the music and performing arts industries. The campaign to pass the bill has been branded on social media with the hashtag "#SaveOurStages," and you can read more about it and the Restart Act here.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* Nine Network has released a promotional video for "Such Sweet Thunder," the collaboration among Shakespeare Festival St. Louis, Big Muddy Dance Company, and Jazz St. Louis that will be presented Thursday, October 3 through Saturday, October 5 outdoors at the Public Media Commons in Grand Center.

* Singer and impressionist Dean Christopher appeared Thursday on KMOV's Great Day St. Louis, promoting his performance on Saturday at the Belleville Oktoberfest. 

* There's more news this week about the newly released "lost" Miles Davis album Rubberband, including feature stories from DownBeat and Jazz Times, and a review from Jazz Journal.

* Meanwhile, Rhino Records, which released Rubberband, has posted online a "mini-documentary" video about the album.

* Elsewhere on the Miles Davis beat, Craft Recordings is releasing a deluxe 6-LP box set edition of Davis' The Legendary Prestige Quintet Sessions, which goes on sale on Friday, November 8.

* Last but not least, reviews of the new documentary film Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool are still appearing, including one from AllAboutJazz.com's Victor L. Schermer and one from the alt-weekly Georgia Straight.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* Pianists Peter Martin and Adam Maness have teamed up for a new podcast for aspiring musicians called "You'll Hear It," offering "a combo of actionable advice and occasional humor in just 10 minutes a day" via Martin's Open Studio Productions.

* Bassist Jim Widner, who heads the jazz studies program at the University of Missouri St. Louis and directs the Greater St. Louis Jazz Festival, has been named the Missouri Association for Jazz Education’s Outstanding Jazz Educator for 2018.  Widner, who previously won the award back in 1990, has announced that he plans to retire from UMSL next year.

* Metro Theater Company's production of "Bud, Not Buddy," the "concert play" with a score by trumpeter Terence Bradford, was spotlighted on the HEC-TV arts program Scope.

* Bassist Bob DeBoo and trumpeter Kasimu Taylor (pictured) promoted the weekly "Grand Center Jazz Crawl" in a segment on KMOV's Great Day St. Louis.

* The bossa nova and jazz trio The Bonbon Plot was featured in a story in the Alton RiverBender.

* St. Louis native Josephine Baker's trip back to her hometown in 1953 after decades living overseas was the subject of an archival St. Louis Post-Dispatch article posted this week on STLToday.com.

* Singer and Webster University alumna Alyssa Hegwood was featured in Webster U's campus paper The Journal.

* 80-year-old saxophonist Lee Trapp, who frequently practices outdoors on the Lindenwood University campus ala Sonny Rollins on the Williamsburg Bridge, was profiled in Lindenwood's online student publication The LindenLink.

* Keyboardist Jim Hegarty has posted to Bandcamp as a "name your price" download another of his "Secret Sessions" recordings, featuring percussionist Henry Claude, pianist Greg Mills, cornetist George Sams, guitarist Steven Thomas, and flute player Fred Tompkins, plus Hegarty on Moog Voyager.

He's also posted to Bandcamp a live album called Sky Water Smokestack, recorded just last week at St. Louis Community College - Forest Park. The performance was improvised to non-narrative films of scenes of the Mississippi River by an ensemble including Hegarty on piano and synthesizer, cellist Tracy Andreotti, clarinetist Eric Paul Mandat, and mallet percussionist Thomas Zirkle.

* CarolBrass representative Jim Bohm will be in St. Louis from 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. next Tuesday, February 13 at UMSL, showing off the company's line of Bb, C, and piccolo trumpets, flugelhorns, and cornets and offering demonstration models for brass players to try.

* The weekly jazz performances at Thurman's in Shaw are briefly mentioned in a Riverfront Times food blog post about the bar's new menu.  

Fire destroys Halls Ferry Inn Jazz Cafe

STLtoday and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch are reporting that a fire early on Sunday morning has destroyed the Halls Ferry Inn Jazz Cafe.

"No one was injured in the fire, which started in the Halls Ferry Inn Jazz Cafe, 3425 North Highway 67, about 1:30 a.m.," the story said. Known for years as simply the Halls Ferry Inn, the restaurant and bar reopened under new ownership last fall with a new menu, new look, and live music policy, featuring musicians such as saxophonists Rod Tate and Michael Fitzgerald.

Firefighters are investigating the cause of the fire, the Post story said. Local CBS affiliate KMOV also has a brief story and a photo of the Cafe's burned-out storefront here. No word yet on whether the owner, Florissant businessman Lozell Stiles, plans to rebuild, but if/when there's more information released, we'll have it for you here.

UPDATE - 4:45 p.m., 2/20/12: The other local TV news operations also covered this story; you can see the report from NBC affiliate KSDK here, and the one from Fox affiliate KTVI here.

Erin Bode to appear on KMOV's "Great Day St. Louis" this Wednesday, November 12

Via Bob Bennett's blog on the Jazz St. Louis Web site:

"Don't miss Erin Bode on KMOV's "Great Day St. Louis" tomorrow morning, November 12, 2008 at 10:00 A.M. Bode will discuss her new Christmas album prior to her CD release party at the Bistro that evening."

"Great Day St. Louis" is a relatively new local morning magazine show hosted by Carol Daniel (who many St. Louisans know from her work on KMOX radio) and Stephanie Simmons. It airs at 10:00 a.m., Monday through Friday on local CBS affiliate KMOV (Channel 4), and looks to have a format similar to KSDK's long-running "Show Me St. Louis," with interviews, light features about local entertainment and attractions, segments on cooking and health, and so on.

The show's Web site offers clips of at least some of each day's segments, so you may be able to catch Bode's appearance online as well.

Jazz St. Louis education programs featured on KMOV Web site

Via Jazz St. Louis marketing director Adam Roach's blog: JSL's educational programs were the subject of a recent article on KMOV's Web site. You can read it here.

At the risk of setting off some sort of endless-loop conflagration of crosslinks that could potentially break the Internet, or possibly even rupture the entire space-time continuum, it should be noted that said blog entry also linked to my recent story for the RFT about singer/bassist Esperanza Spalding and her work with JSL's education efforts during her recent visit to St. Louis. Not only that, but Adam also added a link to StLJN and some nice words about this site, for which I say, "Thanks!"