All in Musicians
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A capacity crowd at the University of Chicago's Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts heard Vijay Iyer, one of Eicher's artists, perform last night with a sextet. At the end of the concert, one enthusiastic listener told trumpeter Graham Hayes that he heard Sketches of Spain in some parts of the music.
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Having said all that, it is hard for me to imagine any of today's rock and pop musicians staging an exhibit like this in 40 or 50 years. Given the web, social media, video games, and all the entertainment and expressive options available to people today, music just doesn't play quite the central role it once did in the culture.
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Kevin Mahogany opened his four-night engagement at Joe Segal's Jazz Showcase last night to an unjustly small audience that included four people from Iceland. I last saw Mahogany 23 years ago at the Denver Botanic Gardens on a rainy summer night. As I told Kevin after the second set, I should probably pay him for the blue rain slicker that I found on the ground that night. I have traveled the world with it.
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Woke up at 12:30PM today, worked on photographs, and then headed back to Joe Segal's Jazz Showcase for seconds. Dr. Lonnie Smith and Company were still in the house.
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I have always been a huge fan of Jimmy Smith, Brother Jack McDuff, and Jimmy McGriff, who I saw in a bar when I sixteen--the owner bought me a drink. Dr. Lonnie Smith pushes the boundaries established by those luminaries, getting a lot of varied and interesting sounds out of his Hammond B3 organ. Gotta love the spinning horn.
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I love seeing our jazz treasures. The years of performing and experimenting are often on display, as they were during Cole's set. Accompanied by a bass player, drummer, and guitarist, Cole lead a very subtle, but powerful quartet, playing a number of selections from the American Songbook, as well as a tune by Sonny Boy Williamson, which reflects the influence of the blues that pervades the entire effort.
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Jazz guitarist Kurt Rosewinkel brought his six-piece band to the Jazz Showcase this weekend for the premiere of his new album, Caipi. In a review of the Thursday night opening, Tribune reviewer Howard Reich was highly complimentary of Rosenwinkel, but he seemed skeptical about what he heard,
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It's a love hate thing. Joe Segal, the 90 year-old proprietor of Chicago's Jazz Showcase, loves Charlie Parker, which is why the photograph of Parker adorns the wall behind the stage. Joe has been in the jazz impresario business for 70+ years. Everybody who is anybody has been through that club. Joe is an institution in the world of jazz, receiving all sorts of accolades, including the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master honor.
