So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* This weekend's Wine, Dine and Jazz Festival was previewed by the Belleville News-Democrat.

* The Post-Dispatch's Sarah Bryan Miller wrote about how this weekend's closing of the Tavern of Fine Arts will affect local performers.

* Meanwhile, Thurman Grill and Provisions, another eating-and-drinking spot that frequently features live jazz, has been sold and will close temporarily for renovations at the end of June. The story quotes soon-to-be-former-owner Larry Weinles as saying the new regime plans a "continuation of live music," but there are no further details.

* KDHX has posted to their Flickr page a photo set from piano prodigy Joey Alexander's performance last Saturday at Jazz at the Bistro, and Kenya Vaughn of the St. Louis American reviewed the show.

* The Gaslight Squares posted to Facebook some photos from their recent gig for the St. Louis Jazz Club.

* The Riverfront Times this week announced the winners of the 2016 RFT Music Awards, with Tommy Halloran's Guerrilla Swing finishing first in the "Jazz" category and the Funky Butt Brass Band taking home the trophy in "Soul/Funk." You can see the complete list here.

* Speaking of Hallorans, Tommy's trombone-playing brother Charlie Halloran, who now lives in New Orleans, was the subject of a brief St. Louis magazine feature by Thomas Crone. Halloran the trombonist will be back in St. Louis next month with the New Orleans Jazz Vipers for gigs at Foam, Joe's Cafe, Focal Point, and Blues City Deli.

* And speaking of the RFT, electronic musician Eric Hall has put on BandCamp a recording of his set at Handlebar from last Saturday's RFT Music Showcase.

* Also now on BandCamp for streaming and/or downloading: The 442s' latest album RELAY, which was released on CD earlier this month.

* Richard "Groove" Holmes (pictured), the renowned jazz organist who lived in St. Louis for the last years of his life, is the subject of a tribute on radio station WKCR, which broadcasts from Columbia University in NYC.

So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* The Miles Davis Memorial Project's benefit dinner and auction on March 22 at Lewis and Clark Community College raised more than $21,000 for the effort to put a statue of Davis in downtown Alton, IL, the trumpeter's birthplace.

According to a story about the event in the Alton Telegraph, that puts the project two-thirds of the way toward having enough money for sculptor Preston Jackson to begin working.

* Saxophonist and St. Louis expat Greg Osby is down under in Australia this week for a series of shows.

* A performance by vibraphonist Peter Schlamb at Kansas City's Take Five Coffee + Bar was reviewed by Bill Brownlee of the KC jazz blog Plastic Sax.

* Happy birthday to saxophonist and former St. Louisan Eric Person (pictured), who turns 51 today.

* Today, we also remember the late organist Richard "Groove" Holmes, who was born on this date in 1931 in Camden, NJ, but spent his last years before his death in 1991 based here in St. Louis.

* Keep On Keepin' On, a new documentary about trumpeter and St. Louis native Clark Terry, premiered last month during NYC's Tribeca Film Festival.

* Saxophonist Dave Stone's trio recently visited the studios of KDHX to record some music, and you can see and hear the sessions here.

* Pianist and Jazz St. Louis education director Phil Dunlap is a recipient of one of the new artist support grants from Regional Arts Commission, which he'll use to help produce his first album as a leader. Recording of his band, including trumpeter Danny Campbell, saxophonist Ben Reece and drummer Montez Coleman, is set to begin in July, with the release date TBD.

* New Music Circle has posted to Facebook an album of photos from Joshua Abrams and Natural Information Society's concert back in February at Joe's Cafe.

* KDHX's Chuck Lavazzi has written about several performances from the Gaslight Cabaret Festival, reviewing last Saturday's festival-closing performance by Lara Teeter for the station's website and covering earlier shows featuring Ken Page, Tim Schall and Connie Fairchild for Cabaret Scenes magazine.

* Jazz radio update: On this Saturday's episode of "Somethin' Else" on Radio Arts Foundation-St. Louis, host Calvin Wilson investigates the compositions of saxophonist John Coltrane, as performed his son Ravi Coltrane, saxophonist David Murray, Medeski Martin & Wood, and others.

Right after that, Jason Church's "The Jazz Collective"  will feature an assortment of cover songs as interpreted by Jeff Golub, Jumaane Smith, Jeff Lorber, Miles Davis, Pat Metheny, Ella Fitzgerald, the Classical Jazz Quartet, Kim Massie, Jim Manley, Hugh "Peanuts" Whalum, and more.

Wilson's program airs at 8:00 p.m. Saturdays, followed by Church at 9:00 p.m., on 107.3 FM, 96.3 HD-2, and online at http://www.rafstl.org/listen.