So What: Local News, Notes & Links

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

* Record megalabel Columbia/Legacy last week announced the release of a sixth volume in their "Bootleg Series" of Miles Davis live recordings.

Miles Davis & John Coltrane - The Final Tour is a four-CD set (pictured) documenting five shows from Davis' 1960 tour of Europe, and is set for release on Friday, March 23, 2018.

* A story in UMSL Daily details the upcoming travels of the UMSL Big Band directed by Jim Widner, including a trip next week to Chicago for the annual Midwest Clinic and appearances in January at the Jazz Education Network convention in Dallas and the Missouri Music Educators Association conference at the Lake of the Ozarks.

* Singer, actor and Belleville native Lea DeLaria was the subject of a feature story on the website OutInStL.com. DeLaria, who's starred on Broadway and in cabaret, TV, and film, will make her debut at Jazz at the Bistro with shows on Wednesday, December 27 and Thursday, December 28 that also will feature singer Janis Siegel of Manhattan Transfer as a guest performer.

* The STL Free Jazz Collective has posted to YouTube a video of their complete performance with multi-instrumentalist Douglas Ewart earlier this month at the 14th St. Artist Community. 

* Also on YouTube, saxophonist Eric Person has posted a video from his show with fellow saxophonist Houston Person in March of this year at Dizzy's Club in NYC.

* The Sheldon has posted to Facebook a photo album from the Spanish Harlem Orchestra's performance there last week.

* Guitarist Dave Black's upcoming album, a collaboration with blues guitarists Tom Hall and Brian Curran, is previewed in a Riverfront Times story by Thomas Crone.

* Also in the RFT, the Funky Butt Brass Band's "Holiday Brasstravaganza" and their new Christmas album are the subjects of a brief feature story by Christian Schaeffer.

* Right Up On, saxophonist/composer Oliver Lake's recent recording in collaboration with the FLUX Quartet, made the New York Times' recently published list of "The 25 Best Classical Music Recordings of 2017."

* Singer Debby Lennon's latest theatrical role, as tone-deaf diva Florence Foster Jenkins in Max and Louis Productions' upcoming staging of the musical Souvenir, is the subject of a short feature by St. Louis Post-Dispatch theater critic Judith Newmark.

* Percussionist Moacyr Marchini of Samba Bom will lead a series of eight Brazilian percussion workshops for adult students beginning Wednesday, January 10 at Lucha in Grand Center. For more info about the workshops and how to sign up, go here.

* The venerable Edwardsville drinking spot Laurie's Place, which in recent months has featured a jazz jam session on Tuesday nights, will close at the end of this year.

Jazz this week: Stooges Brass Band, free outdoor concerts, and more

Things are fairly quiet again this week for touring jazz acts coming through St. Louis, with tonight the notable exception as the Stooges Brass Band will be in town to perform at the Broadway Oyster Bar.

They're not as well known outside New Orleans as the Dirty Dozen, Rebirth or Hot 8, in part because until recently, they haven't toured as much, and in part because they've released only one recording, back in 2003. But the Stooges have been around since 1996, with former members including notables such as Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews and Big Sam Williams of Big Sam's Funky Nation.

Like most of the contemporary NOLA brass bands, the Stooges incorporate a variety of influences, and their version of the tradition highlights beats in a hip-hop style. Their Facebook page describes them as "Genre Funk, Hip Hop, Brass & all the things that make you GET DOWN," and you can see and hear exactly what that means by checking out the video and audio samples there.

Elsewhere around town tonight, guitarists Tom Byrne and William Lenihan will duet at Remy's Kitchen & Wine Bar; and Miss Jubilee will be back at Thaxton Speakeasy.

Tomorrow night, the Ambassadors of Swing will play for dancers at the Casa Loma Ballroom; Sarah Jane and the Blue Notes will perform at Nathalie's; bassist Darrell Mixon leads a trio at Cigar Inn; and the Broadway Oyster Bar will have more brass band music, this time in the form of St. Louis' own Funky Butt Brass Band.

Looking ahead to Saturday, Samba Bom will bring a bit of Brazil to a free outdoor concert at Kirkwood Park; Wack-A-Doo performs at Evangeline's; singer Joe Mancuso, pianist Kim Portnoy and bassist Glenn Smith will play at Tavern of Fine Arts; and singer Erin Bode and her band will return to Nathalie's.

On Sunday, in addition to a recently proliferating variety of jazz brunch options too numerous to list here (but tallied in detail on the StLJN calendar) the St. Charles Municipal Big Band will play a free outdoor concert at Frontier Park .

Then on Monday, the Sessions Big Band will be back for one of their every-other-month gigs at BB's Jazz, Blues & Soups; and guitarist John Farrar and the Park Avenue Trio will hold forth for what's now a regular weekly gig at Evangeline's.

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: New Year's Eve and more

The week between Christmas and New Year's usually is fairly quiet for live jazz in St. Louis, and New Year's Eve, contrary to what you might think, hasn't been an especially busy night either in recent years. Nevertheless, there are a few noteworthy shows coming up, and a handful of NYE jazz performances as well. Let's go to the highlights...

Tonight, Robbie's House of Jazz continues its policy of periodically presenting little-known young musicians with the debut of the Andrew Williams/Tim Aubuchon Quartet, featuring up-and-coming saxophonists Williams and Aubuchon with Chris Turnbaugh on bass and Brian Steever on drums.

On Friday, Wack-A-Doo plays at the Map Room in Soulard; drummer Paul Shaw's trio with Daryl Mixon (bass) and Ptah Williams (piano) will be at Cigar Inn; and Robbie's will feature guitarist Stan Stapleton and his band in a tribute to Santana. Also on Friday, singer Dean Christopher, pianist Carolbeth True and bassist Dave Troncoso will perform at the Frontenac Grill.

New Year's Eve offerings on Saturday night include singer Erin Bode (pictured) and her band at Cyrano's; saxophonist Tim Cunningham , singer Anita Jackson and keyboard player/singer Jeremiah Allen at Jazz on Broadway; and guitarist Eric Slaughter's trio with singer Erika Johnson at Robbie's.

Meanwhile, Jazz at the Bistro once again will be dark on New Year's Eve this year, as the club's location in the Grand Center neighborhood puts it near the center of the annual First Night celebration, which runs from 6 p.m. to midnight on Saturday. The alcohol-free event features a variety of live entertainment and "family friendly" activities, and includes a number of performers who may be of interest to jazz fans, including singers Wendy Gordon and Jeanne Trevor and the husband-and-wife piano/vocal duo Joe Dryer and Rosemary Watts at the Kranzberg Arts Center; Le Jazz Hot at St. Francis Xavier College Church; Samba Bom and Kim Massie at the Sheldon; and Funky Butt Brass Band at the Third Baptist Church.

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.)

(Edited 12/29/11 to fix a typo and add the Dean Christopher/Carolbeth True gig.)

Jazz this week: Peter Martin, Tim Cunningham, Peter Schlamb and more

It's a relatively light week for jazz performances in St. Louis, but there are at least a handful of shows worth noting around town. Here's a quick look:

Tonight, pianist Peter Martin leads his trio in a free concert for the Whitaker Music Festival at Missouri Botanical Garden. For more on Martin, see StLJN's previous coverage here.

Tomorrow, the Latin/jazz group Samba Bom does a free outdoor concert at St. Louis Place Park.

On Friday and Saturday, smooth jazz saxophonist Tim Cunningham (pictured) will perform at Jazz at the Bistro.

Meanwhile, Robbie's House of Jazz features singer Wendy Gordon and her trio on Friday night, and vibraphonist Peter Schlamb and his band on Saturday.

For more jazz-related events in St. Louis this weekend and beyond, 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.)

Two spring/summer concert series announce schedules

The schedules have been announced for the Missouri History Museum's spring Twilight Tuesdays and for the fourth annual Whitaker Urban Evenings series, and while neither has much in the way of straight-ahead jazz, both will offer some concerts of potential interest to jazz fans in the St. Louis area.

The Twilight Tuesdays series starts next Tuesday, April 27 with R&B vocal group L.L.C., and will include shows from the Latin band El Caribe Tropical (May 4), singer Anita Rosamond (May 18, pictured), and the Sinatra Songbook featuring the Steve Schankman Orchestra (May 25). The free concerts take place starting at 6:30 p.m. each Tuesday through June 8 on the front lawn of the History Museum in Forest Park. For more information and a complete schedule, visit the History Museum's website.

Meanwhile, the Whitaker Urban Evening Series, which happens at St. Louis Place Park, Rauschenbach Avenue and St. Louis Avenue, has a lineup that will include singer Kim Massie (June 10), Brazilian music group Samba Bom (June 17) and the Funky Butt Brass Band (July 8). Performances will begin at 7:00 p.m. Thursdays starting with Massie's June 10 show and continuing through July 15. Admission is free; for more information and a complete schedule, visit the website of series co-sponsors Grace Hill.