For you big-band fans

Jerry Swanberg, host of KBEM's "Big Band Scene," puts together monthly lists of live big-band music in the Twin Cities during the summer because there's so darned much of it. I just today received July's list. Rather than spend the rest of my natural life entering all of these dates on the live jazz calendar, I'll drop it in below.

On Jazz Day (April 13), I invited Jerry (among others) to reflect on our local jazz scene for MinnPost, and this is what he wrote:

Big-band jazz is quite popular in the Twin Cities, where it has its own niche. We’re probably the fifth most active place in the U.S. for big-band jazz, behind New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and San Francisco. There are about 35 big bands in the Twin Cities, and 25 have recorded CDs. Many are semi-pro and some are nonprofit, but most are rehearsal/kicks big bands. This summer, there will be 84 concerts by 32 big bands in 38 city parks. You can catch big bands for dancing every week. Of the 700 high schools in the state, about 300 have jazz ensembles. All our universities and colleges have jazz ensembles. Regrettably, the young jazz musicians do not appear to continue as jazz fans, because very few attend the big-band events in town — except those at the Wabasha Caves, which attract the young swing dancers. 

UPCOMING JULY BIG BAND EVENTS

Jerry O’Hagan & his Orchestra – Ballroom Dance

            Sun, 7/01, 8, 15, 22 – Cinema Ballroom, 1560 Clair Ave. St Paul – 7 PM

Beasley’s Big Band – Big Band Jazz

            Tues, 7/03 – O’Gara’s Bar & Grill. 163 N. Snelling, St. Paul – 7:30 PM
Big Band Tuesday  - Jazz Central, 407 Central Ave, SE Mpls – 8:30 PM / FREE

            7/03 – Bill Simonsen Big Band

            7/10 – Cedar Avenue Big Band

            7/24 - Adam Meckler Orchestra

July 4^th BIG BAND BANG! with Fireworks / FREE

            St. Croix Jazz Orchestra, Pioneer Park, Stillwater – 7 PM

            Roseville Big Band - Roseville’s Central Park Amphitheater – 7:30 PM

            Jazz on the Prairie Big Band – Round Lake, Eden Prairie – 5:30 PM

Wabasha Street Caves – Big Band Swing Night every Thursday – 7 PM

            7/05 - Moonlight Serenaders; 7/12 -MN Jazz Orchestra;

             7/19 – Beasley’s Big Band; 7/26 - Swingbeat Big Band

Tim Patrick and his Blue Eyes Band – Swing Dance

            Fri, 7/13 – Eagles Club, 2507 E. 25^th St,  Mpls – 8 PM

Classic Big Band & the Nostalgics Vocal Quartet – Swing to the Real Thing     

             Fri, 7/13 – Bloomington KC Hall, 1114 American Blvd – 8 PM / 952-888-1492

River City Jazz Orchestra – Swing Dance

            Tues 7/17  – South St. Paul VFW, 111 S. Concord, S, St, Paul  – 7 PM / FREE

Jerry O’Hagan and his Jazz Orchestra – Ordway Summer Dance Series

            Thur, 7/19 – Landmark Plaza, DT St. Paul – 7:15 PM / FREE

                        Free Dance Lessons at 6 PM

Medina Ballroom – Ballroom Dancing - 500 Hwy 55 – 8 PM

            Fri, 7/20 – Jerry O’Hagan & his Orchestra

            Sat, 8/04 – Tim Patrick & his Blue Eyes Band

Moonlight Serenaders Big Band with vocalist Lee Engele - Outdoor Concert

            Tues, 7/24 – Minnesota History Center, DT St. Paul – 6:30 PM / FREE

Pete Whitman’s X-Tet – Big Band Jazz

            Thurs, 7/26 – Artist Quarter, 408 St. Peter St,  DT St. Paul – 8 PM

BIG BAND SUMMER CONCERTS IN THE PARKS

Sun, 7/01 – Jin tenBensel’s Trombone Ensemble – Como Park Pavilion – 3 PM

Sun, 7/01– Beasley’s Big Band - Como Park Lakeside Pavilion – 7 PM

Tue, 7/03–Pizzazz Jazz (11 pc. BB)–Ballroom Dance-Ojibway Park,Woodbury-7 PM

Fri, 7/06 - Brio Brass – History Cruzer Car Show, North St. Paul – 7 PM

Mon, 7/09 - Jazz on the Prairie Big Band - Lake Harriet Bandshell, Mpls – 7:30 PM

Tues, 7/10 – Bend in the River Big Band - Excelsior Commons – 7 PM

Tues, 7/10 – Brio Brass - Roseville’s Central Park Amphitheater – 7:30 PM

Wed, 7/11 – Jazz Hounds Big Band – Delano Central Park – 6:30 PM

Wed, 7/11 - Brio Brass – White Bear Ave. Parade, St. Paul to Maple Grove – 7 PM

Sat, 7/14 - Maple Grove Jazz Ensemble - Town Green Amphitheater, MG – 7 PM

Sun, 7/15 – Stan Bann’s Big Bone Band - Como Park Pavilion, St. Paul – 7 PM

Mon, 7/16 - Jazz on the Prairie Big Band - Centennial Lakes Park, Edina – 7 PM

Tues, 7/17 – Capri Big Band – Bryant Square Park, Mpls – 6:30 PM

Tues, 7/17 – Tim Patrick & his Blue Eyes Band – Ojibway Park, Woodbury – 7 PM

Tues, 7/24 - Bend in the River Big Band – Como Park Pavilion, St. Paul – 7 PM

Tues, 7/24 - Tim Patrick & his Blue Eyes Band – Excelsior Commons – 7 PM

Thur, 7/26 - Jazz on the Prairie Big Band - Hopkins Downtown Park – 7 PM

Sun, 7/29 - Jazz on the Prairie Big Band - Staring Lake Park, Eden Prairie – 7 PM

Tues, 7/31 - Roseville Big Band - Roseville’s Central Park Amphitheater – 7:30 PM

Tues, 7/31 - Red Rock Swing Band - Ojibway Park, Woodbury – 7 PM 

Tues, 7/31 - Bend in the River Big Band – Minnetonka Amphitheater – 7 PM

Tues, 7/31 – Zuhrah Shrine Flames Big Band - Como Park Pavilion, St. Paul – 7 PM

Thur, 7/31 - Classic Big Band & the Nostalgics – Boerboom Park, Osseo – 7 PM

CD review: e.s.t.'s (Esbjörn Svensson Trio's) "301"

Magnus Öström, Esbjörn Svensson, Dan Berglund
Photo by Jim Rakete courtesy ACT 

If anyone suggests that e.s.t.’s final studio album, “301,” suffers from the absence of pianist/composer Esbjörn Svensson at the mixing and mastering stage, they’re wrong. “301” might sound different had Svensson not died in 2008 in a diving accident, leaving behind two albums' worth of newly recorded material, but it's hard to imagine that it could sound better.

Like "Leukocyte" (2009), which Svensson was around to finalize, and which came out of the same series of recordings made in a Sydney studio when the band was on a brief break from touring, "301" is not a collection of scraps or outtakes. This is the e.s.t. we know and love, the trio that makes us think and feel, groove and raise our fists in the air.

“301” begins with Svensson solo on “Behind the Stars,” a single note alternating with, then overlapping simple chords. Bach-ish and chiming, it blossoms into a meditation. We’re reminded that Svensson sang when he played, and that he was a master of the soft touch and soft pedal. We hear a bit of bassist Dan Berglund, a few arco notes that open the door so “Behind the Stars” can merge smoothly into “Inner City, City Lights,” a lengthy jam of fuzz, squeaks, drones, feedback, a continuous, choir-like looping ahhh, and rumbling bass that settles into a groove on which Svensson’s piano can dance. Where “Behind the Stars” was pensive, “Inner City, City Lights” is dark, the ahhh shifting from the sound of surprise to the sound of despair.

“The Left Lane,” the second-longest piece on the album (clocking in at 13:36), is straight-ahead piano jazz as e.s.t. played it, spotlighting Svensson the improviser, quick-fingered and full of ideas, ending with a lengthy solo by Berglund (is there anyone who sounds like Berglund?) and drummer Magnus Öström’s airy brushes. Play this for the person who says, “I thought e.s.t. was a rock band.” They started as a jazz band and stayed a jazz band as they added other music to their repertoire.

“Houston, The 5th” is a work of machine dreams, pure electronicity, sound without rhythm or melody. Especially following “The Left Lane,” it’s e.s.t. being e.s.t. And then, without a break, we’re back with Svensson’s poetic piano on “Three Falling Free Part 1.” Like “Behind the Stars,” this track is a thing of beauty, Svensson’s delicate keyboard work exquisitely accompanied by the two friends with whom he collaborated, recorded, played, and traveled for much of his life. Like The Bad Plus, with whom they have often been compared, e.s.t. was a band and an entity. Lacking Svensson, Berglund, or Öström, it wasn’t e.s.t., which is why the band was over when Svensson died.

“Three Falling Free Part 1” gives way, after a brief pause, to “Three Falling Free Part 2,” and here, for the first time on “301,” we hear the power, endurance, and heat of Öström’s drums. Until now, Öström has been in the background or in trio; for more than 14 glorious minutes, he leads a furious charge of signature e.s.t., never letting up or slowing down, joined by Svensson and Berglund at their biggest and baddest, fuzzed and buzzed by maestro Ake Linton, the sound engineer with whom the band always worked and who returned to mix and master “301.” All that’s missing from this track is the stadium and the lightshow.

The skippy, static-filled fade of “Three Falling Free Part 2” precedes the final track, the hushed and wistful “The Childhood Dream.” Berglund’s bass steps softly, Svensson’s piano enters like a gentleman caller, and Öström adds hand drums in this poignant and tender ballad. Truly, “301” is framed in tenderness. It packs a lot of bang into the middle, but begins and ends with a whisper. I like that. It helps me remember Svensson’s kind, intelligent face, and his smile, and the way he leaned into the piano, getting close to the keys.

Is “301” e.s.t.'s best record ever, as some critics are saying? I don’t know and I don’t really care. Honestly, I like all of their albums. Starting in 1993 with “When Everyone Has Gone,” there are 14, including two live recordings. “301” is a logical next step in the evolution of a great band. That it’s the last step should not color how we hear or respond to it, except to regret there won’t be more.

Related:

New e.s.t. studio album, "301," due out May 8 on ACT

Catching up with Nancy Harms

When vocalist Nancy Harms moved from Minneapolis to New York in 2010, she left us with her remarkable debut CD, "In the Indigo," and a collective longing for more of her unique sound and way with time. Hearing Nancy sing is like watching a flying trapeze artist sail from bar to bar, doing aerial tricks along the way. She has returned since for the "Blue" concert at the Capri Theatre in north Minneapolis; for a series of studio recordings for Arne Fogel's radio program "Minnesota Voices: Certain Standards"; for a night at the Artists' Quarter in St. Paul with guitarist Zacc Harris, bassist James Buckley, and drummer Jay Epstein. But we don't see and hear nearly enough of her.

She's a complicated girl, full of seeming contradictions: so cool, yet her songs ache with emotion; so relaxed and calm, yet her mind must be moving at stratospheric speeds to improvise and play with time as she does. Wistful, yet wise. An old soul in a young and classy package. She's originally from Clara City, pop. 1,297, but don't think you'll put anything past her. She's also a straight-shooter, and someone you instinctively trust. Not long after meeting her, I was handing her the keys to our house.

Tuesday at Maude

Tuesday, April 24. While the sun poured through Cafe Maude's big front windows overlooking Penn Ave., Patrick Harison and Kip Jones played their own unique brand of "folk music from countries that don't exist," and HH and I made shadow puppets on the menu. We arrived at 7 and stayed to the end of the music at 10. By then, the crowd noise had subsided and the listeners were there. Bassist Jeremy Boettcher stopped by, and we met a couple who had come for dinner and stayed, dumbfounded and delighted by the sounds of accordion and violin. We talked briefly with them afterward. They keep bees.

An abundance of jazz awards

Lately it seems that every time I open an email or visit a website or page through a magazine, I read about another jazz award or gift.

On May 24, drummer and bandleader Roy Haynes will take home a Peabody Medal for Outstanding Contributions to Music in America.

Last Thursday, April 19, the first class of Doris Duke Artists--21 performing artists in the fields of jazz, dance, and theater--was awarded a total of $5.775 million. Life-changing cash grants of $225,000 each (second in size only to the MacArthur Foundation's "genius" grants of $500,000) were given to Don Byron, Bill Frisell, John Hollenbeck, Vijay Iyer, and Nicole Mitchell.

Earlier that week, on April 17, jazz historian Dan Morgenstern received the Rutgers University Award in recognition of his "exceptional contributions to preserving, promoting, and advancing our understanding of jazz." Morgenstern served as Director of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers-Newark from 1976 until his retirement in January 2012.

On or near that date, jazz vocalist Kurt Elling won the 2012 ECHO Jazz Prize (Germany's Grammy) for International Male Singer of the Year.

On April 13, the 2012 Guggenheim Fellows were announced. Among them were Terry Teachout, Louis Armstrong's biographer (and blogger, and writer for the Wall Street Journal) and drummer-composer Bobby Previte.

On April 11, Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music Jazz Studies Department received a $1.9 million gift from the estate of Anne and Paul Plummer. Paul Plummer was a tenor saxophonist and friend of the University's Distinguished Professor David N. Baker.

CD review: Forward Energy's "The Awakening"

Many jazz musicians, fans, and members of the press know Tim Orr as the hard-working, Scotch-appreciating marketing associate/media relations dude for the Monterey Jazz Festival. More should know him as a drummer. Orr studied with Ed Blackwell at Wesleyan in the '80s, then worked variously for Virgin Records, MCA, Arkadia, at the Brubeck Institute, and as a freelance journalist ("Traps," "Drum") before signing on with Monterey in 2006. He has been performing since 1976 ("1500 gigs and counting," his words), playing in rock bands, musical theater, Cajun and zydeco bands, jazz and blues bands, and improvising/avant-garde/experimental/free jazz groups.

Orr is a member of the current formation of Jim Ryan's Forward Energy quintet. Their latest CD, "The Awakening," came out in March on Edgetone Records. 

I prefer my free jazz live, when I can observe the musicians interacting and feel the physical energy of the room. (I don't mean that in a woo-woo way. Live music is a physical thing. Wood and brass, strings and reeds and skins vibrate. People breathe and sigh and sweat. Depending on the room, you may sense the music in the air, your chair, and the floor beneath your feet. Dubious? Google Evelyn Glennie.) On the other hand, live music is ephemeral. You can't wonder, "What was that?" and back up to hear it again. Lacking a choice--I'm in Minnesota, not in California, where Forward Energy mostly performs--I listened to the CD.

It will sweet-talk you and knock the fillings out of your teeth.

New e.s.t. studio album, "301," due out May 8 on ACT

It can seem a bit ghoulish to release an artist's music posthumously. You wonder--how do we know he or she wanted it out there? Does it have something new and important to say, or are the survivors simply profiting or unable to let go and move on?

And yet, if we love the artist, we long for more, especially after a sudden, tragic, much-too-soon death.

When jazz pianist and composer Esbjörn Svensson died in a scuba-diving accident on June 14, 2008, he was only 44. His eponymous band e.s.t. (Esbjörn Svensson Trio) had achieved international stardom and was still on the rise. It was the first European group to be featured on DownBeat's cover (in 2006, the same year e.s.t. won the European Jazz Award and the BBC Jazz Award). Although much of the US had not yet hipped to e.s.t.'s exciting, genre-defying brand of jazz and the group played to ridiculously small audiences here (at the Dakota in Minneapolis, for example, back when the Dakota would risk such a thing), Svensson, drummer Magnus Öström, and bassist Dan Berglund filled stadiums elsewhere in the world, as if they were a rock band. (For their big gigs, they added light shows and fog machines.)

Craig Taborn wins Paul Acket Award 2012

Craig Taborn was born in Golden Valley, Minn., and grew up with the likes of Reid Anderson and Dave King. He left Minnesota years ago for New York and the world at large, but we still claim his as our own. Many of us were pleased to learn that earlier this week he received the Paul Acket Award. 


The press release:


Every year, the North Sea Jazz Festival hands out the Paul Acket Award to an artist deserving wider recognition for their extraordinary musicianship. The winner of the Paul Acket Award 2012 is the American composer and pianist, Craig Taborn.