Jazz this week: Tiempo Libre, Eric Person, Musica Slesa, and more

Once again, there's a varied selection of jazz and creative music on tap this weekend in St. Louis, and time is short, so let's go to the highlights:

Tonight, there's a memorial for Blake Travis at the Sheldon Concert Hall, the first of two events this week honoring the late percussionist, singer and storyteller.

Though Travis didn't usually work in the jazz idiom per se, he played with all sorts of St. Louis musicians over the course of his career, and many of them, including pianist Carolbeth True and multi-instrumentalist Sandy Weltman, will gather tonight to pay tribute to him. The roster of performers also will include Lydia Ruffin, Tom Hall, Lisa Campbell, Tim Albert, the Road Apples, January Kiefer, Barton and Sweeney, Charlie Pfeffer, John Higgins and Colleen Heine.

This evening also is the first preview performance for the Black Rep's production of the Louis Jordan musical Five Guys Named Moe, which runs at the Grandel Theatre through April 25. For more about the show, see this post.

On Thursday, pianist Kara Baldus and her group will play a free concert for the Jazz at Holmes series at Washington University.

Then on Friday, the weekend takes on a distinct Latin flavor as the Miami-based band Tiempo Libre (pictured) brings their mix of jazz and Cuban rhythms to Washington University's Edison Theatre. For more about Tiempo Libre and some video of them in action, see this post from Saturday.

Meanwhile, a few miles to the east, the St. Louis-based Latin jazz band Musica Slesa will open a weekend stand at Jazz at the Bistro. Jazz St. Louis' Bob Bennett tells me that Musica Slesa has proved to be a good draw at the Bistro, and you can hear samples of their music on their MySpace page.

Also on Friday, the performance space Open Lot has a triple bill of ambient/noise music, featuring electronic musician Kyle Parker a.k.a. Infinite Body, the tape loops and guitar of Earn, and music and 8mm film from Ghost Ice.

On Saturday afternoon, drummer Jerome "Scrooge" Harris and his band will play the music of Miles Davis and Wayne Shorter at the Metropolitan Gallery as part of the Nu-Art Series' jazz composers shows. Saturday evening will provide a double dose of swinging vocals, as Jeanne Trevor performs at Robbie's House of Jazz and Denise Thimes takes the stage at Harris-Stowe State University in a benefit concert for the Delta Child Development Center.

On Sunday, saxophonist Eric Person is back in town to headline a show paying tribute to (and raising funds for) his father Thomas Person, who's recovering from a stroke. The event at the Ambassador, 9800 Halls Ferry Rd., will get started at 4:00 p.m. with a jam session, followed by sets featuring Philip Gomez, Ed Nicholson, Person and pianist Ptah Williams, and Willem Von Hombracht's X-tet.

Also on Sunday, there will be a "jazz funeral" for Blake Travis at the Schlafly Tap Room, with music from the Funky Butt Brass Band and others.

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 by becoming a "fan" of 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.)

Edison Theatre offering online presale of tickets for Ovations series

Washington University's Edison Theatre is offering a special online pre-sale of single tickets for shows in its 2009-10 Ovations series. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Monday, August 17, but can be purchased online now by going here and entering the promotion code OVATIONS9.

In addition to theatre and dance, the Edison's 2009-10 season will include concerts by percussion ensemble ScrapArtsMusic, Latin/jazz group Tiempo Libre, and Abraham Inc., a funk/jazz/hip-hop/klezmer group featuring clarinetist David Krakauer, trombonist Fred Wesley, and DJ Josh Dolgin (aka SOCALLED).

Notes from the Net: "Miles From India" in NYC and Montreal; Elling, Bridgewater pay tribute to jazz classics, plus news, reviews, interviews & more

Here's the latest compilation of assorted news briefs and links related to jazz, improvisation, and creative music in St. Louis, including news of musicians originally from the Gateway City, recent visitors, and coming attractions, plus assorted other items of interest:

* Let's start, as we often do, with some Miles Davis-related items. The Montreal Jazz Festival has announced that the ensemble for the "Miles From India" concert on July 4 at the Theatre Maisonneuve, Place des Arts will include bassist Darryl Jones, whose first big-time gig was with Miles and who now plays with the Rolling Stones, and the Indian percussionist Selvaganesh, a member of the group Remember Shakti.

On a related note, here a review done for AllAboutJazz.com by Martin Longley of a "Miles From India" performance in late May at NYC's Iridium. Also, via Miles Davis Online, we learn that drummer Jimmy Cobb and an edition of his So What band featuring Wallace Roney on trumpet did a Kind of Blue tribute at last weekend's Playboy Jazz Festival in Los Angeles.

* Turning to news of coming attractions, singer Kurt Elling is performing songs from his new CD Dedicated to You this week at NYC's Birdland, and the news Web site/cable channel NY1 has a feature story with accompanying video. Elling will be in St. Louis in December at Jazz at the Bistro to perform material from the CD, which re-imagines songs from the famous collaboration of singer Johnny Hartman and saxophone legend John Coltrane.

* Here's a review for AAJ.com by Chris M. Slawecki of Bach in Havana, the new CD from Tiempo Libre. The band will perform in St. Louis next year at Washington University's Edison Theatre.

* Singer DeeDee Bridgewater (pictured) is performing material from her new Billie Holiday tribute CD during a week-long gig at the Jazz Showcase in Chicago. Bridgewater will do her Holiday tribute in St. Louis this October at the Sheldon Concert Hall.

* Speaking of the Sheldon, here's a review, written by Jerry D'Souza for AllABoutJazz.com, of guitarist Frank Vignola's Live at the Sheldon DVD from Mel Bay Records. Vignola's most recent St. Louis appearance was in May at Jazz at the Bistro.

* The funky organ trio Medeski, Martin & Wood, who were in St. Louis in April to play the Loyal Earth Festival, will play the music of John Zorn during a concert at the Barbican in London.

* Banjo player Bela Fleck, who brought his Africa Project tour to the Sheldon in April, also is doing some duo concerts with Toumani Diabate. Fleck and Diabate were just in Tuscon, AZ, and were featured in the Tucson Weekly.

* Lastly, a few items from the "general interest" files, starting with the unfortunate news that Jazz Times magazine has suspended publication. The mag hopes to find new owners and get back to publishing soon, but given the current economic climate, it's far from a done deal. Howard Mandel has details at his Jazz Beyond Jazz blog here.

* Meanwhile, the once very popular smooth jazz radio format continues to take a beating around the U.S.A, with more stations changing formats to rock music or talk in recent weeks. There's an interesting piece here from the Contra Costa Times (which covers communities near the Bay Area in California) that looks at this trend, noting that the whole notion of "smooth jazz" as a category of music was largely a creation of radio programmers.

* In happier news, the always interesting online jazz magazine Point of Departure has a new issue online.

* The Jazz Journalists Association Awards for this year were announced last Tuesday, and the list of winners includes several musicians who have performed in St. Louis in the past year, such as trumpeter Terence Blanchard, organist Dr. Lonnie Smith and electric bassist Steve Swallow. See the entire list of 2009 award recipients here.

* And in my favorite quirky-story-with-a-happy-ending of the week, drums and other music gear that had belonged to the late Max Roach and were stolen after his death turned up last week in an unlikely place: a barn in Byrdstown, TN. The gear is now on its way back to Roach's heirs; read the whole "lost and found" story here.

Notes from the Net: Miles on MySpace; Zorn bio analyzed; the wages of swing; plus news, reviews and more

Here's the latest compilation of assorted news briefs and links related to jazz, improvisation, and creative music in St. Louis, including news of musicians originally from the Gateway City, recent visitors, and coming attractions, plus assorted other items of interest:

* In keeping with this feature's tradition of starting with a Miles Davis-related item or two, it seems there's now a page for the trumpeter on MySpace. This in itself is no big deal - lots of celebs, dead and alive, seem to be represented by pages they didn't personally put up - but the interesting part is that since it apparently is authorized by Sony, visitors with sufficient bandwidth can stream dozens of Miles' albums and compilations directly from the page.

For as long as it lasts, it would seem to be a very handy, low-cost way to investigate Davis' extensive catalog, or to turn a new fan on to some of your favorite Miles moments.

Also, Marc Myers' JazzWax blog also recently had a Miles-related entry in his new Photo Story series. (For more frequently updated Miles-related content, StLJN heartily recommends Jeffrey Hyatt's fine site Miles Davis Online.)

* Here's a review by Tom Greenland for AllAboutJazz.com of John Brackett's new book John Zorn: Tradition and Transgression. (Zorn studied at our town's Webster University in the 1970s.)

* Zorn also will be one of the featured performers at this year's Warsaw Summer Jazz Days in July, along with the World Saxophone Quartet, featuring St. Louis' own Hamiet Bluiett and former St. Louisan Oliver Lake (pictured).

* Turning to news of coming attractions, here's a feature from Pittsburgh City Paper on saxophonist Peter Brötzmann, who will be in St. Louis this Friday to perform at Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center.

* And here's a review for AAJ.com by Andrew Velez of Pizzarelli Party, a new CD release featuring the whole Pizzarelli clan, including guitarist and singer John Pizzarelli; his dad Bucky on guitar, brother Martin on bass, and his wife Jessica Molasky on vocals, plus pianist Larry Fuller and others. John Pizzarelli has been a frequent visitor to St. Louis in recent years, and the online tour information service Pollstar currently shows him returning again in 2010 to play Jazz at the Bistro.

* Latin/jazz group Tiempo Libre, who will perform next year at the Edison Theatre in St. Louis, this week are playing Dizzy's at Lincoln Center in NYC.

* The Chicago Afrobeat Project, who played The Gramophone at the end of May, will be touring extensively from the end of June through September. (There's no return St. Louis date on the schedule, but there are some spaces in the tour into which one conceivably could fit.)

* A look at the "recent visitors" file shows that guitarist John Jorgenson, who wrapped up the Sheldon Concert Hall's jazz series this year, is back home in California for a concert at a community college in Riverside.

* Lastly, a couple of items of general interest: National Public Radio's Web site is sporting a brand new jazz blog and it's a good one, with daily entries plus centralized, convenient access to NPR's various jazz programs, online streams, etc. Check out the modestly named A Blog Supreme here.

* Canadian jazz journalist Peter Ham asked the working musicians among his readers how much they make for a gig. The results - while somewhat depressing overall, as they show working musicians' wages generally remaining flat for years or even decades - reveal that St. Louis seems about on a par with cities of similar size. Read the whole thing here.

Edison Theatre announces 2009-10 season

Washington University's Edison Theatre has announced its 2009-10 season, and among the venue's offerings of theater, dance and music next year will be three performances that may be of interest to St. Louis fans of jazz and creative music:

On Saturday, January 23, 2010, the "action percussion" ensemble ScrapArtsMusic will take the Edison stage, using "kinetic, one-of-a-kind instruments built from recycled and salvaged materials such as sewage pipe and artillery shells."

Then on Saturday, February 27, the Edison will feature Abraham Inc., described as "an all-star ensemble fusing funk, jazz, hip-hop and klezmer...led by virtuoso clarinetist David Krakauer, trombonist Fred Wesley (pictured) and "beat architect" Josh Dolgin, aka SOCALLED."

The Edison's season concludes on Friday, March 26 with Tiempo Libre, a Grammy-nominated group that performs timba, a Cuban version of salsa that's "an irresistible mix of high-voltage Latin jazz and seductive rhythms."

Single tickets are are priced at $32, $28 for seniors and Washington University faculty and staff, and $20 for students and children. Subscriptions are available at two levels: three, four or five events at $28 per ticket, and six or more events at $24 per ticket.

The Edison Theatre is located in the Mallinckrodt Student Center, 6445 Forsyth Blvd, on the Washington University campus. For more information or to order tickets, call the box office at 314-935-6543 or email edison@wustl.edu.