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“LADY, BE GOOD”: DAVID BOEDDINGHAUS, MENNO DAAMS, TORSTEIN KUBBAN, LARS FRANK, MARTIN WHEATLEY, PHIL RUTHERFORD, ANDY SCHUMM (The Victory Pub, The Village Hotel, Newcastle, UK, November 2016) | JAZZ LIVES
Improvisations on a well-known theme by George and Ira Gershwin, now LADY BE GOOD, but originally, OH, LADY BE GOOD!. Here is Cliff Edwards in 1925, who begins with the sweet verse: https://youtu.be/1ughJYxojok?si=iEPdHdcSh_ThNo9Q Generations of jazz players and singers have taken the LADY for various rides around the park. I begin this post with the…
“WOULD YOU LIKE BUTTER OR SOUR CREAM ON YOUR POTATO?”: JAZZ, STEAK, AND SUBURBIA | JAZZ LIVES
Some experiential sociology follows, subjective, hardly comprehensive. In the Twenties, hot music, dancing, and illicit liquor were happily linked. Speakeasies may have served food as a cover, just as restaurants may have offered liquor sub rosa during Prohibition. But the only evidence of music accompanied by food I have is Louis, thirty years after the…
EVEN BETTER IN PERSON: CEMRE NECEFBAS, JOSH HOLCOMB, JOSH DUNN, JARED ENGEL (Temple Court, Beekman Hotel, New York City, Sunday, September 7, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
Edgar Allen Poe enjoyed the sounds, as did the audience at Temple Court. and and a wide-angle shot of the room (photos courtesy of RSG Studios): I don't recall precisely when I heard the wonderful singer Cemre Necefbas on YouTube, but it was before the pandemic. I was thrilled to know she is back in…
TWO DEUCES: MARC CAPARONE and JEFF HAMILTON at BIRD AND BECKETT (653 Chenery Street, San Francisco, California, August 30, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
Just perfect. And I am particularly delighted by this duo-performance because Marc and Jeff have not only been musical heroes but good friends of mine and of JAZZ LIVES for fifteen years. Thanks to Eric Whittington of Bird & Beckett Books & Records, even people at some distance from San Francisco (like myself) and otherwise…
COMING SOON! or “IF YOU CAN, YOU SHOULD”: THE REDWOOD COAST MUSIC FESTIVAL (Eureka, California, October 2-5, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
I know my title is unsubtle. Not everyone can (which is why I bring a video camera, to spread the joy). But it occurred to me this afternoon, Thursday, October 4, 2025, that in four weeks from now, Thursday, October 2, the OAO and I will be on a plane to Eureka, California, to dip…
BORN SINGING: CEMRE NECEFBAS / JOSH DUNN | JAZZ LIVES
On her YouTube channel, the marvelous singer Cemre Necefbaş has a one-sentence biography: "She was born in Istanbul in 1994, singing." As Johnny Keats was fond of saying, that is all you need to know. I will add that her work is a marvelous blend of passion and exactitude (she takes risks but sticks the…
HOT TIMES at the HOT CLUB OF NEW YORK (The First Set): COLIN HANCOCK, JON THOMAS, and MIKE DAVIS (“Sittin’ In,” 20 West 20th Street, Room 307, Sunday, August 31, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
https://jazzlives.wordpress.com/2025/06/06/its-hot-its-here-tthe-hot-club-of-new-york-has-a-home-20-west-20th-street-room-307-new-york-city/?preview_id=75452&preview_nonce=96bb27b61a&preview=true&_thumbnail_id=75471 On Monday nights (7:30-10:30 PM) The Hot Club of New York warmly embraces the past while bringing it to the present, by sharing music recorded on 78 rpm records. It's sweetly and unaffectedly educational, with none of the dusty strictures of the classroom. This is due to the gently witty personality of its founder,…
“THERE’LL BE SOME CHANGES MADE”: JON-ERIK KELLSO, JOE WILDER, MARTY GROSZ, JOHN SHERIDAN, HAL SMITH, JAY LEONHART, DAN BARRETT, BOB REITMEIER, SCOTT HAMILTON. (Jazz at Chautauqua, September 19, 1999) | JAZZ LIVES
Joe Boughton's triumphant jazz weekend, Jazz at Chautauqua, opened and closed with as many musicians as possible on stage to play a series of one-chorus ballad solos, and then one or two riotous jam session extravaganzas, often dividing twenty musicians into two bands alternating choruses and solos. They took as their model the Eddie Condon…
PAUL BACON and his BLUE-BLOWERS (JON-ERIK KELLSO, BOBBY GORDON, MARTY GROSZ, JOHN SHERIDAN, VINCE GIORDANO, WAYNE JONES: Conneaut Lake Jazz Festival, August 26, 1994) | JAZZ LIVES
If you look up "Paul Bacon" online and find the right one, you will be facing perhaps hundreds of memorable designs -- from early Blue Note lp jackets to MONK'S MUSIC -- and book jackets completely recognizable (Joseph Heller's CATCH-22) even as their creator remains anonymous. I doubt that he got royalties for his art,…
SOUNDTRACK FOR AN IMAGINED FILM ROMANCE: “CURVE VELOCI,” MARISA BALISTRERI QUARTET | JAZZ LIVES
Something different, but totally charming. A friend told me about this music, and although everyone was new to me, I found myself playing the track -- a swinging 12-bar blues with a marvelous singer -- several times. That was all the encouragement I needed to tell you about it. FAST CURVES for sure. Marisa Balistreri,…
SWEET, THEN SAVORY: KEN PEPLOWSKI, HOWARD ALDEN, JAY LEONHART, JOHN VON OHLEN (Jazz at Chautauqua, Sunday, September 19,1999) | JAZZ LIVES
Few of us are fortunate enough to have live music performed at Sunday brunch. But thanks to Joe Boughton and Jazz at Chautauqua, we had the most uplifting sounds along with eggs, fruit, coffee, and toast. Joe also wanted the music he love to be documented, so we can recapture experiences of more than a…
THE GOLDEN AGE IS NOW! (The Second Set): THE DANNY TOBIAS SEPTET with JON-ERIK KELLSO, DAN BLOCK, STEVE ASH, FELIX LEMERLE, PAT O’LEARY, and KEVIN DORN (Winnie’s Jazz Bar, 66 West 38th Street, New York, July 25, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
For Part One of this delicious Musical Offering, click here. You won't be sorry. The band and I will wait. and and! And now to music. Always welcome, Donaldson's YOU'RE DRIVING ME CRAZY: https://youtu.be/2MBqw07qceo A standard that's much-loved but not frequently played, DON'T BLAME ME: https://youtu.be/z4Rl5K1vaCQ THE SHEIK OF ARABY, echoing Hot Lips Page on…
“HOTTER THAN THE DEPOT STOVE”: MARTY GROSZ, TOM BAKER, BOB HAVENS, BOBBY GORDON, JOHN SHERIDAN, BOB HAGGART, HAL SMITH (Conneaut Lake Jazz Party, Sunday brunch, August 30, 1992) | JAZZ LIVES
I don't think many railroad depots have waiting rooms with stoves like this anymore, but the music counts more than the vintage expression. I wanted to call this post THE VERY DEFINITION OF HOT JAZZ or APPLY HEAT TO THE AFFLICTED AREA, but the stove caught my eye. The music catches the ear and never…
“EV’RY DREAM GONE”: BARBARA LEA, DAVE McKENNA, BOB BARNARD, LARRY CONLEY, WILLARD ROBISON (Conneaut Lake Jazz Festival, August 30, 1992) | JAZZ LIVES
Ford Madox Ford's novel THE GOOD SOLDIER begins with "This is the saddest story I have ever heard." Perhaps the most melancholy interlude in American popular song is the 1929 A COTTAGE FOR SALE, music by Willard Robison, lyrics by Larry Conleym although I hear Robison's particular kind of midwestern melancholy in the lyrics as…
THE GOLDEN AGE IS NOW (Part Three): “SITTIN’ IN” at the HOT CLUB OF NEW YORK with EVAN ARNTZEN, JOEL WENHARDT, JAY RATTMAN, SAM CHESS, ANDREW MILLAR (Room 307, 20 West 20th Street, Sunday, July 13, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
You can experience the first half of this delicious musical-communal interlude here. The quick version is that this was the first jam session gathering sponsored by the Hot Club of New York, and the happy participants were Evan Arntzen, clarinet and tenor saxophone; Joel Wenhardt, piano; Andrew Millar, drums; Sam Chess, trombone; Jay Rattman, clarinet.…
WHEN JAZZ CAME UP THE RIVER TO LINLITHGOW: THE SWEDISH JAZZ KINGS TAKE SCOTLAND (Part One: Saturday, August 21, 2010) | JAZZ LIVES
The music that follows -- the exuberant hot music, I should say -- is shared here thanks to the generosity of Irene Biermans, who managed the Swedish Jazz Kings and was also the wife of its spectacular reedman Tomas Ornberg. She is very much on the planet, so her generosity is in the present tense,…
“WHAT’S THE MAGIC WORD?”: MENNO DAAMS, TORSTEIN KUBBAN, LARS FRANK, DAVID BOEDDINGHAUS, MARTIN WHEATLEY, PHIL RUTHERFORD, ANDY SCHUMM (Whitley Bay Jazz Party, Newcastle, England, November 5, 2016) | JAZZ LIVES
If you spend any time with pre-pubescent children, this word, part admonition, part entreaty, might come to your mind. It's mechanical, in the same way one hopes to train better behavior by repetition and reward. Perhaps you grew up with the even less subtle, "Say please!" as part of your training to be courteous. But…
THE GOLDEN AGE IS NOW (Part Two): ‘WAY DOWN YONDER IN BUSHWICK: JON-ERIK KELLSO, DAVE BLENKHORN, DAN WEISSELBERG, MARK SHANE, KEVIN DORN (Cafe Ornithology, 1037 Broadway, Bushwick, Brooklyn, February 16 and June 25, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
I think of these five musicians as Anointed Guardians of Medium-Tempo Swing. It's fashionable to play fast, and occasionally take time for a ballad, but the Groove: "music to pat your foot by," as William Basie, the Saint of Red Bank, described it, is to be treasured. Here are selections -- more good news! --…
IN THE MAIN STREAM: SCOTT HAMILTON, HOWARD ALDEN, DAN BARRETT, JOE WILDER, ROSS TOMPKINS, MICHAEL MOORE, JOHN VON OHLEN (Allegheny Jazz Society, August 22, 1986) | JAZZ LIVES
Mainstream jazz nirvana, utterly personal voices blending into a marvelous unity. This wonderful session came about because of jazz enthusiast and entrepreneur Joe Boughton, whose enterprises included the Conneaut Lake Jazz Festival, Jazz at Chautauqua, the Allegheny Jazz Society, JUMP Records, and more. Joe left for another neighborhood in 2010, but his legacy lives on…
THE GOLDEN AGE IS NOW (Part One): THE DANNY TOBIAS SEPTET with JON-ERIK KELLSO, DAN BLOCK, STEVE ASH, FELIX LEMERLE, PAT O’LEARY, and KEVIN DORN (Winnie’s Jazz Bar, 66 West 38th Street, New York, July 25, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
My title isn't hyperbole. I know, among jazz fans of a certain orientation, that the Past is the hallowed place. "X is great, but have you heard Y on this song?" I admire Y without limit, but Y is dead and no longer gigging. X and Company can be seen in person in the rapidly-receding…
A FEW MINUTES, NEVER ENOUGH, WITH JIM DAPOGNY (Jazz at Chautauqua, September 30, 2007) | JAZZ LIVES
Here but not here. I can delight in the music and energy of Jim Dapogny (James or Prof, take your pick) but I can no longer send him an email or sit down to a meal with him. Everything and everyone is finite, but I don't expect to stop feeling his absence while I am…
“COME AND GET IT!”: THE 2025 REDWOOD COAST MUSIC FESTIVAL IS ON THE WAY, WITH A CAST OF THOUSANDS (Valerie Kirchhoff, Ethan Leinwand, Jonathan Doyle, T.J. Muller, Andy Schumm; Carl Sonny Leyland, Dan Barrett, Nate Ketner, Sam Rocha, Josh Collazo, Hal Smith, Dave Kosmyna, Dave Bennett, Kris Tokarski, Katie Cavera, Steve Pikal, Alice Spencer, Marc Caparone, Jacob Zimmerman,Brian Holland, Danny Coots, Ray Skjelbred, Riley Baker, Jessica King, Ryan Calloway, Clint Baker, Jon-Erik Kellso, Andy Schumm, Matt Weiner.) | JAZZ LIVES
October is not that far away. For some, it is the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. For me, it's time for the Redwood Coast Music Festival. I don't know a place more full of fruitfulness -- the musical and personal kind -- than the Redwood Coast Music Festival in Eureka, California. You can look…
MAKE TIME FOR BEAUTY | JAZZ LIVES
We might not know that we are starved for beauty, but when we encounter it, the force of recognition tells us everything. Here is a very casual and very moving performance: an interlude from the world of 2025. Bud Freeman, tenor saxophone, then 82, and Bucky PIzzarelli, guitar, playing Rodgers and Hart's BEWITCHED. I offer…
WELCOME, SHARONE CARMONA! “RHYMES WITH TROMBONE.” | JAZZ LIVES
I don't pretend to be an authority on the field of what's called "writing about jazz," even though I began reading it at my local library when I was buying records at department stores for three or four dollars. Yes, Xerxes I was Pharoah then. I'm no authority because my interests are narrow. By choice,…
THE BEST IDEAS (August 1992) | JAZZ LIVES
Relaxing on the porch of the Athenaeum Hotel during a "Jazz at Chautauqua" weekend, Bob Barnard, cornet (left) and John Sheridan, piano (right). Two lyrical melodists who loved to create lyricism together. Both have moved to other neighborhoods, but their reassuring sounds remain. Here they are, passionately playing I GET IDEAS (or ADIOS MUCHACHOS) during…
SUCH MAGICAL SOUNDS: DAN BARRETT, JOE WILDER, CHUCK WILSON, LARRY EANET, BOB REITMEIER, FRANK TATE, JOHN VON OHLEN (Jazz at Chautauqua, September 17, 2005) | JAZZ LIVES
I attended Joe Boughton's Jazz at Chautauqua from 2004-2010, and then followed it as it morphed into the Allegheny Jazz Party and the Cleveland Classic Jazz Party, thanks to Nancy Hancock Griffith and Kathy Hancock, until it expired of natural economic causes in 2017. Thanks to the immeasurable kindness of Sarah Boughton Holt and Bill…
TWO GOOD REASONS TO BE IN NEW YORK IN AUGUST, BOTH NAMED “KEN PEPLOWSKI” | JAZZ LIVES
Traditionally, New Yorkers who can, flee the city at the end of summer, looking for less humid escapes. But I would urge those who feel the music deeply to stay off of Expedia for a few moments more to read this, since a jazz hero -- a fellow who goes by the alias "Ken Peplowski"…
WHAT WE LOVE LIVES ON | JAZZ LIVES
I never met Dr. David A. Wasserman, of Fort Lee, New Jersey, who died earlier this year. But in a way more spiritual than logical, I feel as if I heard him on Sunday night, June 1, 2025. Exhibit A, as they say in courtroom dramas, is an identification tag affixed to a clarinet case.…
BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!! MIDTOWN MAINSTREAM MAGIC WITH THE DANNY TOBIAS SEPTET: SCOTT ROBINSON, DAN BLOCK, STEVE ASH, FELIX LEMERLE, JEN HODGE, ALEX RADERMAN (Winnie’s Jazz Bar, 66 West 38th Street, June 13, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
Photograph by Lynn Redmile Here's Part One: https://jazzlives.wordpress.com/2025/07/09/midtown-mainstream-magic-with-the-danny-tobias-septet-scott-robinson-dan-block-steve-ash-felix-lemerle-jen-hodge-alex-raderman-winnies-jazz-bar-66-west-38th-street-june-13-2025/?preview_id=75881&preview_nonce=29887069a0&preview=true&_thumbnail_id=75058 THE JEEP IS JUMPIN': https://youtu.be/FPiVLRMbJkw BLACK VELVET (by Jimmy Mundy, made famous by Illinois Jacquet): https://youtu.be/_DBub9Ktoqc?si=vzKiu1ZSvIOVc9jL THE SHEIK OF ARABY: https://youtu.be/6W10qP99i34?si=CL16umeiBAOHiGI9 IT'S THE TALK OF THE TOWN: https://youtu.be/v26iW1PVsaU?si=Yr_myGIOstcB_eWn Berlin's social commentary, PUTTIN' ON THE RITZ: https://youtu.be/4o55cu-vxdE?si=XxWIkjrCSCeXQN1o And the swinging perennial that never ages, JUST YOU, JUST ME:…
“SITTIN’ IN” at the HOT CLUB OF NEW YORK with EVAN ARNTZEN, JOEL WENHARDT, JAY RATTMAN, SAM CHESS, ANDREW MILLAR (Room 307, 20 West 20th Street, Sunday, July 13, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
The Hot Club of New York inaugurated its series of live performances on Sunday, July 13. "Memorable" would be an understatement. If you were there, you know. But if you didn't make this one, I did, and can share the magic. Evan Arntzen, clarinet and tenor, and Joel Wenhardt, piano, began the casual session (with…
THREE SHADES OF ELLINGTONIA: JON-ERIK KELLSO, MARK SHANE, KEVIN DORN (Cafe Ornithology, June 25, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
The bright lights of Ellingtonia will never be dimmed. Here are three adventures in luminescence, created for us by Jon-Erik Kellso, Puje trumpet; Mark Shane, piano; Kevin Dorn, drums, at Cafe Ornithology, 1037 Broadway (at Suydam Street), Bushwick, Brooklyn, New York, on a lovely June night. First, Mark Shane, beautifully ruminative, on IN A SENTIMENTAL…
PROFESSOR MARTIN OLIVER GROSZ PRESENTS A POST-DOCTORAL SEMINAR IN CHICAGO HEAT (Jazz at Chautauqua, September 16, 2000) | JAZZ LIVES
Marty Grosz is a remarkable musician and entertainer, and "remarkable" is a pallid understatement. A scholar of the chordal acoustic guitar -- solo, rhythm, and accompaniment; a singer combining early Crosby, Red McKenzie, and Fats Waller, and (something often ignored, perhaps because of Marty's sometimes acidic world-view) a peerless romantic balladeer. His friend Frank Chace,…
A ROMANTIC CATASTROPHE IN TWO ACTS, SOUNDTRACK BY COLE PORTER and WALTER DONALDSON. | JAZZ LIVES
A whole-hearted attempt that did not land well. Asking a philosophical question, shaking one's head at what happens. Performed on Sunday, September 19, 2004. Song titles and musicians announced within the performance. Original recording made possible and captured by Joe Boughton; this offering is thanks to Sarah Boughton Holt and Bill Boughton. Note: the catastrophe…
IMPASSIONED COOL: THE DAN BLOCK QUARTET (DANNY TOBIAS, SEAN SMITH, BEN ZWEIG) at BIRDLAND, July 27, 2025. | JAZZ LIVES
Some marvelous music was created yesterday, late afternoon into evening, at Birdland in New York City by the Dan Block Quartet. That's Dan, tenor saxophone, bass clarinet, compositions; Danny Tobias, trumpet; Eb alto horn, Sean Smith, double bass; Ben Zweig, drums. I've written about this group before, here, and perhaps some of the people who…
GOOD AND HOT: DUKE HEITGER, BOB HAVENS, SCOTT ROBINSON, BOB REITMEIER, JAMES DAPOGNY, MARTY GROSZ, VINCE GIORDANO, EDDIE METZ (Jazz at Chautauqua, Saturday, September 18, 2004) | JAZZ LIVES
"Michael, tell us a story." All right, I will. When my wife and I are at some gathering and she introduces me to (let us say) relatives or old friends of hers I have not yet met, she might say, "Michael is a retired English professor, but his real passion is jazz." Sometimes I can…
TWO GREAT PIANOS: HANK JONES and JOHN LEWIS with GEORGE MRAZ and LEWIS NASH (Bern, 1999) | JAZZ LIVES
The title of this concert falls midway between Understatement and Truth in Advertising, because it presents Hank Jones and John Lewis, piano; George Mraz, double bass; Lewis Nash, drums. Subtle glories from four masters of the art. John Lewis Hank Jones at Monterey Jazz Festival 9/22/85 © Brian McMillen Quartet: PERDIDO / STOMPIN' AT THE…
HE’S THE HOTTEST MAN IN TOWN! THE CHICAGO CELLAR BOYS at the SCOTT JOPLIN INTERNATIONAL RAGTIME FESTIVAL: ANDY SCHUMM, JOHN OTTO, NATALIE SCHARF, PAUL ASARO, JIMMY BARRETT, DAN ANDERSON (May 31, 2024) | JAZZ LIVES
On July 12, 2025, Andy Schumm turns forty. (He said so himself, on that most trustworthy of oracles, Facebook.) We celebrate him as an artist of deep musical integrity, a scholar who performs brilliantly what he knows so well, a wonderful cornetist, arranger, reedman, pianist, plectrist, percussionist, composer, bandleader, and possibly more that I have…
MIDTOWN MAINSTREAM MAGIC WITH THE DANNY TOBIAS SEPTET: SCOTT ROBINSON, DAN BLOCK, STEVE ASH, FELIX LEMERLE, JEN HODGE, ALEX RADERMAN (Winnie’s Jazz Bar, 66 West 38th Street, June 13, 2025) | JAZZ LIVES
One of the most rewarding musical events of this or any other year is the series of performances that Danny Tobias and friends have been creating -- quartet or septet -- at Winnie's Jazz Bar, beginning in mid-March and continuing. The Quartet has been Jay Rattman, reeds; Jen Hodge, double bass; Felix Lemerle; the Septet…
DICK HYMAN AT THE PIANO (Conneaut Lake Jazz Festival, August 24, 1984) | JAZZ LIVES
As someone entranced by the possibilities of jazz piano, I consider myself fortunate to live in the era of Dick Hyman. I've seen him live here and in California; he allowed me to video-record him, and spoke a few sentences to me. But more than those close encounters, I treasure his gentle audacities: his limitless…
EAST + WEST = BLISS: JON-ERIK KELLSO, MATT MUNISTERI, DAN BARRETT, RAY SKJELBRED, JONATHAN DOYLE, MATT WEINER (Redwood Coast Music Festival, October 4, 2024) | JAZZ LIVES
The EarRegulars, heroic denizens of 326 Spring Street for eighteen years of Sunday nights (that's nine hundred effusions of joy and musical wisdom, more or less) have been known to travel elsewhere in the US and Europe. New Yorkers Jon-Erik Kellso, Puje trumpet; Matt Munisteri, guitar, and [for a later set] Dennis Lichtman, clarinet, mandolin,…