Jazz this week: Shawn Maxwell's New Tomorrow, The People's Key, and more

This week's calendar of live jazz and creative music in St. Louis features a couple of multi-artist performances of experimental music, an up-and-coming new contemporary jazz quintet from Chicago, plus some local favorites. Let's go to the highlights...

Wednesday, August 2
This week's "Grand Center Jazz Crawl" has trumpeter T.J Müller at KDHX's Magnolia Cafe; the jam session with bassist Bob Deboo and friends at Kranzberg Arts Center; and trumpeter Kasimu Taylor at The Dark Room.

Also on Wednesday, The Luminary has a quadruple bill of experimental music, with the sampler/turntable duo Colin Andrew Sheffield & James Eck Rippie; Alex Keller & Sean O’Neill, who combine modified field recordings with vintage electronics; and St. Louis' own electronic musicians Raglani and NNN Cook.

Thursday, August 3
Drummer Marty Morrison leads a trio at The Dark Room, and there's another interesting experimental music bill, this time at the combination live music venue/recording studio Gaslight, featuring the Andrew Weathers Ensemble, Tree branch Twig, Eric Hall, and NNN Cook.

Friday, August 4
The "sleeper" show of the week involves Chicago-based saxophonist, flutist and composer Shawn Maxwell's quintet New Tomorrow (pictured, top left), who will be in town Friday to perform at the Webster Groves Concert Hall.

In a review last year, the Chicago Tribune's Howard Reich praised Maxwell's "intricately detailed scores bristling with surprises" and called him "a composer not content to settle into predictable musical patterns," and based on a sampling of the group's performances on YouTube, they're definitely worth checking out.

Elsewhere around town, The People's Key (pictured, bottom left) will bring their contemporary spin on the jazz organ combo sound to Jazz at the Bistro for the first of two nights; and the St. Louis Philharmonic Orchestra pays tribute to the big band era with a program called "Swing, Swing, Swing" at Queeny Park.

Saturday, August 5
If you're looking for some live jazz during the day on Saturday, the Liberation Organ Trio is playing for brunch at Evangeline's.

Then on Saturday evening, keyboardist Marvin Cockrell is promoting a new music video release called St. Louis Bounce with a show at the Grandel Theatre; singer Danita Mumphard will interpret songs associated with the late Whitney Houston at the Jacoby Arts Center; and singer Joe Mancuso and guitarist Dave Black will head to West County to perform at Benedetto's On Main.

Sunday, August 6
Jazz brunch opportunities proliferate on Sunday, as the Jazz Troubadours play at The Dark Room, Miss Jubilee performs at Evangeline's, and trumpeter Jim Manley and pianist Dave Venn return to Scarlett's Wine Bar.

Later that afternoon, the Friends of Scott Joplin will present their monthly "Ragtime Rendezvous" at the Scott Joplin House State Historic Site's Rosebud Cafe.

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.)

Riverfront Times announces 2011 Music Award nominees

The Riverfront Times today announced the nominees for the 2011 RFT Music Awards. This year's contenders for "Best Jazz Artist" are guitarist Dave Black, saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett, pianist Peter Martin, singer Denise Thimes and pianist Reggie Thomas.

In addition, several jazz and creative musicians and groups also showed up as nominees in other categories. Multi-instrumentalist Lamar Harris is nominated in the "Best Soul/R&B (Solo Artist)" category, and both Good 4 the Soul and the Funky Butt Brass Band are nominated in "Best Jam/Funk Group." Also, electronic musicians Raglani and Eric Hall both earned nods in the "Best One-Person Project" category, and guitarist Teddy Presberg scored a nomination as "Best Solo Artist."

The 2011 nominees for "Best Blues Artist" include Big George Brock, Roland Johnson and the Voodoo Blues Band, the Ground Floor Band, Rough Grooves, and Rockin' Jake, who recently decamped back to his hometown of New Orleans.

Ballots will be available soon online and in upcoming print issues of the RFT, and nominees from all the various categories will perform during the annual RFT Music Showcase, which will be held Saturday, June 4 at various locations along Washington Ave. downtown.

Mad Art Gallery to host "BioSonar" this Sunday, November 18

Echolocation Recordings, a new venture from musicians Eric Hall and Jeremy Brantlinger, has organized an event called "BioSonar" that will take place from 4 p.m. to 11 p.m. this Sunday, November 18, at Mad Art Gallery.

Billed as both a festival and an "indoor picnic," the event will feature music and sound art from a variety of performers, including Hall and Brantlinger's group Peanuts, Ghost Ice, Mike Pitts, Y Toros, Andrew Hefner, Raglani, Ajay Khanna and Chris Smentkowski, Mark Sarich, Worm Hands, Dave Stone, Joseph Potthoff, Tony Renner, James Weber Jr., Catholic Guilt, and more to be announced.

As for the picnic, it's potluck; the event description encourages audience members to "bring a blanket or pillow to lay out on the floor as you enjoy the various approaches to non-traditional musics, food provided by the organizers and audience, video/film projections, books from local writers and publishers, and a mini-shop set up by Cherokee St.'s Apop Records (offering a hand picked selection of music to compliment the event). The cover will be $7, or totally free if you bring any dish that can serve 10 or more people."