Jazz this week: The Bad Plus, Nathaniel Bartlett plays Stockhausen, Lina Koutrakos, and more

As St. Louis continues to dig out from the big storm, it looks like this week's jazz and creative music performances around town should go on as scheduled.

Should the weather turns nasty again, however, we encourage you to call ahead before heading out to your venue of choice, and this site will be updated with any cancellation info received at StLJN HQ. Hoping for warmer temperatures soon, let's go to the highlights...

Tonight, The Bad Plus returns to St. Louis for the eighth consecutive year in January to open a four-night engagement at Jazz at the Bistro. At this point, most StLJN readers likely will be familiar with the critically acclaimed trio, but if you're not, you can check out our extensive previous coverage, including a couple of compilations of live performance video clips, here.

Since The Bad Plus have signed a new record deal with Sony, with their first album back on the label scheduled for release later this year, it seems likely the crowd at the Bistro will get a taste of some of that new material as well as selections from their back catalog. Given the possibility of new sounds in the offing, plus the group's extensive existing fan base here, advance reservations are strongly suggested.

Also tonight, percussionist Henry Claude and cellist Tracy Andreotti will bring their alternate identities The Steve and Jennifer Project to the Tavern of Fine Arts for an evening of improvised music.

Tomorrow night, Good 4 The Soul will make their monthly appearance at BB's Jazz, Blues and Soups; saxophonist "Blind" Willie Dineen will perform at the new south side venue The Engine Room; and Miss Jubilee plays swing, jump blues and more at Thaxton Speakeasy.

On Friday, the Knights of Swing will play for dancers at the Casa Loma Ballroom; Sarah Jane and the Blue Notes trio will perform at Thurman Grill; and bassist Darrell Mixon will lead a trio at Cigar Inn.

Then on Saturday, percussionist Nathaniel Bartlett, who also was here in St. Louis last weekend, will be coming back through town after playing several other shows in the interim for another performance at Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center. This time, Bartlett will perform two works from Stockhausen and an original piece by LNAC's Mark Sarich.

Elsewhere around town on Saturday night, singer Lina Koutrakos presents her cabaret show "Shades of Blue" at the Kranzberg Arts Center; singer Joe Mancuso and guitarist Dave Black return to Chaser's Lounge at the Chase Park Plaza Hotel; singer Chuck Flowers fronts a trio at Robbie's House of Jazz; and guitarist Brian Vaccaro and his trio will play at the house concert venue KindaBlue, 6101 1/2 Idaho.

On Sunday, the "Inner Jazz" series at Kirkwood United Church of Christ continues with a free concert by trumpeter/pianist Tim Osiek and his quartet.

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.)

Jazz this week: Funky Butt Brass Band, Nathaniel Bartlett, West End Stomp, St. Louis Guitar Fusion, and more

The first part of the New Year traditionally is a bit a slow for the live music business, but if you're willing to brave the cold and snow, there still are some noteworthy jazz and creative music performances happening around St. Louis in the next few days. Let's go to the highlights...

Tonight, trumpeter Jim Manley will be back for his ongoing Thursday evening gig at Joyia Tapas, 4501 Manchester Ave in the Grove neighborhood.

Tomorrow night, the Funky Butt Brass Band returns to Jazz at the Bistro for the first of two nights of what's being billed as a New Orleans-style New Year's Celebration. While the overall production may not be quite as elaborate as the FBBB's recent Holiday Brasstravaganza, no doubt they will have a least a few trickerations up their sleeves to entertain the assembled multitudes. 

Also on Friday, percussionist and composer Nathaniel Bartlett (pictured) will be in town to perform at Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center. Bartlett will perform trichotomic ecology, a composition for 5 octave marimba, viola, and percussion that uses a custom eight-channel speaker array he calls the "SSAL loudspeaker cube," which surrounds the audience and creates "an elaborate, kinetic, three-dimensional sound environment."

The piece also employs software that not only responds to the composer via foot pedal commands but also ‘listens’ via microphones to the performers and generates notation on a video screen based on composer-created computer algorithms.

Elsewhere around town on Friday, Lindy Hop St. Louis' monthly "West End Stomp" dance will feature music from Wack-A-Doo at the Mahler Ballroom; saxophonist Willie Akins leads a quartet at Cigar Inn; Sarah Jane and the Blue Notes make their debut at Backstreet Jazz and Blues club in Westport; and Wendy Gordon returns to DeLeo's Cafe & Deli.

Then on Saturday night, Robbie's House of Jazz has a double bill, with an early evening show by saxophonist Jay Hutson and Da Wolvez with singer Tamesha Foote, followed by a late set by the Robert Tucker Quartet. Also on Saturday, bassist Bob DeBoo's weekly trio performance at Kranzberg Arts Center has been held over into the new year.

On Sunday, the St. Louis Record Collector and CD Show will hold their first event of the year at the American Czech Hall, 4690 Lansdowne at Kingshighway.

UPDATE - 5:30 p.m., 1/3/13: Organizers of the St. Louis Record Collector and CD Show posted on Facebook that Sunday's show is canceled due to the expected bad weather. The next show will be held on Sunday, March 2 

That evening, guitarists Dave Black, Randy Bahr and Farshid Soltanshahi (from Farshid Etniko) will team up for their first-ever concert together, billed as "St. Louis Guitar Fusion," at The Chapel.

UPDATE - 9:30 a.m., 1/3/13: Dave Black has posted on Facebook that Sunday's concert is postponed, due to winter weather.

And if for some reason that's not enough guitar for you, there's more on Monday, as guitarist Tom Byrne will be back 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.)