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.

Whitaker Music Festival announces 2011 schedule

The Whitaker Music Festival at the Missouri Botanical Garden has announced the schedule of performers for its 2011 season. The annual summer series of Wednesday night concerts kicks off on June 1, and though this year's schedule doesn't feature any straightahead jazz shows, there are a few performers who may be of interest to jazz fans.

Of particular note is Irish singer-guitarist Nigel Mooney (pictured), who's being touted as "the first international act to take the Whitaker Music Festival stage" and "widely regarded as Ireland’s leading jazz singer and guitarist." Mooney will perform on Wednesday, June 29, and you can see him singing "Hard Times" in the video embedded at the bottom of this post. He sounds pretty good, though bringing an Irish guy to St. Louis to play blues and jazz definitely could be thought of as a musical "coals-to-Newcastle" kind of deal.

At any rate, here's the complete 2011 Whitaker Music Festival schedule:

June 1: Gumbohead
June 8: Teddy Presberg
June 15: Hudson and the Hoodoo Cats
June 22: Jenny Kavanaugh Band
June 29: Nigel Mooney
July 6: Marquise Knox
July 13: Western Satellites
July 20: Billy Peek
July 27: Erin Bode
August 3: Pokey LaFarge and the South City Three

The Whitaker Music Festival concerts are held outdoors on the lawn of the Cohen Amphitheater, just west of the Climatron dome. Concertgoers are encouraged to bring lawn chairs or blankets, and are welcome to bring their own picnic baskets or coolers or to purchase food and beverages on site. Admission to the Garden is free on Wednesdays after 5:00 p.m., with music beginning at 7:30 p.m.

For more information, visit the Garden's website or call the recorded hotline at 314-577-9400. In the event of inclement weather, In the event of inclement weather, check the Garden’s website, Twitter feed or Facebook page for immediate concert updates.

Jazz this week: Poncho Sanchez, Paula West, Morton Subotnick, and more

There's lots going on this week with jazz and creative music in St. Louis, so let's get right to the highlights, starting with three touring performers who are playing in the Gateway City over the next few days.

Tonight, Latin-jazz percussionist Poncho Sanchez begins a four-night stand at Jazz at the Bistro. You can see a couple of videos featuring Sanchez and his band in this post from last Saturday, and Jazz St. Louis also has a podcast interview with Sanchez here.

On Saturday, singer Paula West performs at the Sheldon Concert Hall. You can see and hear West in a couple of video clips here; also, note that the Sheldon is offering online buyers a $10 discount on tickets to West's concert.

Also on Saturday, New Music Circle and St. Louis Community College-Forest Park will present pioneering electronic musician and composer Morton Subotnick (pictured) in concert at the college's Mildred E. Bastian Performing Arts Center. Subotnick will perform "Until Spring Revisited," a remaking of an electronic music/video composition originally created for solo synthesizer in 1975.

In addition to these three headliners, there are a number of other noteworthy shows this week. On Thursday, the mysterious FO(U)R PEACE BAND does a free show for the Jazz at Holmes series at Washington University. I call them "mysterious" because I haven't been able to find out anything about them on the 'Net, nor have Wash U or the Jazz at Holmes series released anything about who they are or what sort of music they play. Still, given the series' deserved reputation for presenting good stuff, the show seemed worth a mention here, but caveat lector.

Also on Thursday, world music fans may want to check out the UMSL University Percussion Ensemble and Afro-Cuban Ensemble and their special guest Adam Rugo, who will perform percussion music from Africa, Cuba, Japan and the United States in a free concert at the Touhill Performing Arts Center.

Moving on to Saturday, the Kemper Museum presents a free concert by guitarist Teddy Presberg and his band the Red Note Revivalists as part of the series of live performances accompanying the museum's current "Birth of the Cool" exhibit.

On Sunday, the Nu Art Series presents the Tayammum Falah Art Orchestra in concert at the Metropolitan Gallery, 2936 Locust St. The group features the leader on drums and percussion, plus bassist Raymond Eldridge, pianist Christopher Evans, and an intriguing front line of veterans Floyd LeFlore on trumpet and Willie Akins on saxophones.

That same afternoon, the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra presents its annual "Explosions" percussion concert at the TouPAC. And that evening, BAG II sponsors a free performance at the Scott Joplin House State Historic Site featuring poets Marsha Cann, Joyce Blue and Deborah Mashibini and music from bassist/mbira player Zimbabwe Nkenya.

Looking beyond the weekend, the first part of next week offers a couple of shows of particular interest to big band fans. On Monday, the Sessions Big Band continues its ongoing series of gigs at BB's Jazz Blues and Soups, and on Tuesday, the Genesis Jazz Project does one of its semi-annual free concerts at the TouPAC.

You can find more jazz-related events in St. Louis this weekend and beyond by visiting the St. Louis Jazz Notes Calendar.

(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.)

Kemper Museum announces fall concert series

As mentioned here back in June, this fall the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum is presenting an exhibition entitled Birth of the Cool: California Art, Design, and Culture at Midcentury, accompanied by a series of free jazz concerts.

Now the Kemper Museum has announced the lineup for the concert series, which will begin on Saturday, September 27 with the BAG Trio, led by bassist Zimbabwe Nkenya (pictured). Guitarist William Lenihan and his Quartet will perform on Saturday, October 25, followed by singer/guitarist Teddy Presberg and the Red Note Revivalists on Saturday, November 22. The series concludess with trumpeter Randy Holmes' Trio on Saturday, December 27.

Each of the participating groups will present a program ostensibly inspired by a musician from the era of "cool jazz," with the BAG Trio drawing on the work of Miles Davis, Lenihan looking to Wes Montgomery, and Holmes basing his show on Chet Baker. However, the concept seems to break down a bit with Presberg's show, which supposedly will be inspired by "the Birth of the Cool era" rather than by a specific musician. (This sounds like a rather awkward attempt to shoehorn Presberg into the pre-existing concept. Will his guitar-bass-drums trio be offering compressed arrangements of the harmonically complex scores of, say, "Jeru" or "Darn That Dream"? I think not; a 15-minute funk vamp on the two chords of "So What" seems much more likely...)

All the concerts are free and open to the public, and will take place from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. at the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, located on the Washington University main campus near the northwest corner of the intersection of Forsyth and Skinker.

Beacon shines on Teddy Presberg

Singer-guitarist Teddy Presberg, who's appearing at this weekend's St. Louis Jazz and Heritage Festival, is the subject of a story by veteran local music writer Dan Durchholz that's now online over at the St. Louis Beacon, the local news Web site recently founded by former Post-Dispatch employees. Read it here.

Washington University launching free concert series at Kemper Museum

Washington University's Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum has announced a new series of free Friday night concerts featuring St. Louis musicians, and several of the shows may be of potential interest to jazz listeners.

The group Mmmelt, described as a fusion of "ambient, punk, world beat, jazz, electronics, avant-garde and spoken word" will kick off the series at 6 p.m., Friday, February 22, followed by jazz bassist and composer Zimbabwe Nkenya (pictured) on Friday, February 29. Other upcoming performances will include Teddy Presberg and the Red Note Revivalists performing "improvisational acid jazz" on March 21, and guitarist Tony Renner's experimental trio learn, artist! on Friday, March 28.

All the concerts are free and open to the public, and will be held at the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, which is located on the Wash U. campus at the intersection of Forsyth and Skinker in the spot formerly occupied by the Steinberg Gallery. For a complete schedule of performances, visit the museum's Web site, or for more information, you can call 314-935-5490 or email kemperartmuseum@wustl.edu.

(Edited after posting to add more tags.)