While we're still trying to wrap our heads around Heath Ledger's tremendous, epic, posthumous hijacking of a $200 million summer "comic book movie" (yeah, right. The Dark Knight was like watching two and a half hours of 9/11 footage...utterly brutal), we've got a bit of mopping up to do with some news nuggets that have accrued. Don't let anyone tell you the world of jazz and "out" music is dead and boring: we go away for a two week vacation and so much has happened -- an obscure jazz singer alters the lyrics to the National Anthem and causes a kerfluffle; David Byrne turns the Battery Maritime Building into a enormous musical instrument -- sheesh! So we'll just get right to it:
UNO
Our axe man in the field Nels Cline, robbed of a chance to play with Tom Verlaine when both of them worked (separately) on the I'm Not There soundtrack, will finally get to mount a stage with one of his heroes when he gets to play a tribute show at the Knitting Factory in New York commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Fender Jazzmaster, long and unfairly derided as the "gay cousin of the Stratocaster and Telecaster." No more, peeps. No more.
DOS
Todd Sickafoose's Tiny Resistors is still racking up rave reviews (well, DUH): check out the newest from The New York Times and Pop Matters.
TRES
Jeff Gauthier's House of Return continues to burn up the charts. Check out Greg Burk's review of the CD release party here and a new CD review from AAJ's Glenn Astarita here.
CUATRO
Sad news: Pianist Gerald Wiggins passed away on July 13. We have a special guest blogger who will contribute a personal remembrance of the gentleman everyone called "Wig" sometime this week, so stay tuned...
CINCO
Jeffery "Win" Winston, our friend from the World Stage in Leimert Park let us know of some cool shows coming up this week: on Thursday night, bassist Henry "The Skipper" Franklin will lead his ensemble at the Crowne Plaza LAX Hotel in Westchester. Since The Skip is based in Riverside, it is a rare treat to see this SoCal stalwart in LA environs. (And he still plays like a dream, too.) On Friday, saxman
George Harper and his Quintet (including the genius pianist Nate Morgan) will host a free afternoon of jazz at the Angelus Plaza 4th Floor Auditorium in downtown L.A. The address is 255 S Hill St. For more info, call (213) 623-4352, ext. 308. And if that ain't enuff 4 u, check out the 13th Annual Central Avenue Jazz Festival this weekend. Never a dull moment there! The lineup this year includes Ernie Andrews, Justo Almario, Clora Bryant, Gerald Wilson, Barbara Morrison (Sat.) and Phyllis Battle, Michael Session, Nedra Wheeler, Poncho Sanchez and -- who else? -- Mr. Nate Morgan (Sun.), who will be playing with the formidable woodwindist Jesse Sharps. (And get this, Jesse told me they wold be doing a couple of Bennie Maupin songs. Holla!)
SEIS
Speaking of Central Avenue, the terrific site for the Indiana Public Radio show "NightLights" ("Where The Birth of the Cool Comes Out of the Past") did a show about the heydeys of L.A.'s own "jazz avenue," which you can access here. But there's more LA-related veins to be mined on this site: Dolphy ’64 and One More You Wrote Through Us: Horace Tapscott.
SIETE
And, to circle back to The Dark Knight, The New Yorker's Ben Greenman has an interesting post that attempts to, well, "close the circle between Batman and jazz." You heard us, homeskillet. It ain't THAT much of a stetch!
TA-DAHHH! (Now, where did I leave that pencil?)
