Shinnyo Floating Lanterns for Peace – Lincoln Center – September 21, 2014
Shinnyo is a branch of Buddhism, and one of the ceremonies involves floating lanterns; since there was a variety of musical acts accompanying the occasion, I gave it a go. Unfortunately, it seemed like the sets were about 15 minutes long, so not very productive for me. Huang is a member of one of the performance groups, DECODA.
Shelley Monroe Huang
White Plains Jazz Festival – September 7, 2014
This gig was out in the street in front of the ArtsWestchester building. I caught the final two acts, Mike Morganelli’s Brazil Project and Bobby Sanabria/Ascension. Since I had already previously sketched both band leaders, I focused instead on others in the combos. Oliveira was MMBP’s featured singer, just the right amount of perk for Morganelli’s Brazilian sounds (these are the black & whites). Sanabria jacked up the energy level, as he usually does (the sketches are in color), and at one point the band members paraded through the crowd with various hand percussions. Remon, new to me, has an extensive track record in the mambo jazz idiom.
Monika Oliveira
Paul Meyers
Eddie Monteiro
Oreste Abrantes Jr.
Hiram "El Pavo" Remon
Duende Project – White Plains Public Library – September 3, 2014
This event was part of the White Plains Jazz Festival, though it was more of a poetry happening. First there was a series of open mic poetry readings (talk about some really short sketch windows – maybe 5 minutes tops), then the featured Duende Project, only partially represented by Brown and Lanning-Cafaro, and finally a poetry slam. Some of the poets didn’t stick around even to the end of Duende (way to support your fellow artists, guys!); oh well, no signatures there, and I’m leaving them off. Duende was really smoove, Brown reciting, backed by Lanning-Cafaro on bass or guitar. Simpkins is a bit chameleonic, and signed as AJ Poet; it’s hard for me to grasp what about her I captured – sometimes in the right illumination it (at least the original) seems to parse the light into counterintuitive suggestions of refracted colors. No, I don’t understand.
Tony Brown
Steven Lanning-Cafaro
AJ Simpkins
Eugene T. Holmes
Godforsaken String Band – Bread Alone Farmer’s Market, Boiceville – August 29, 2014
Whenever I enter the Bread Alone bakery, I want to eat every single thing there. Turns out they sponsor a farmer’s market in the parking lot next door during summer Fridays. So on the way to camping out, I stop off for provisions, and on this day I could spare the extra 20 minutes. The Godforsakens are an old-timey group that make the rounds providing atmosphere at various events in the mid-Hudson Valley. Michelotti is apparently not the regular drummer.
Godforsaken String Band
Jimmy Owens – Grant’s Tomb – August 27, 2014
Owens is the latest NEA Jazz Master notch in my belt, and I’m contemplating a print series of ’em. His main instrument was the flugelhorn, and he was surrounded by additional heavy hitters who have been jazzing it up for decades.
Jimmy Owens
Danny Mixon
Michael Howell
Max Baca & Los Texmaniacs – Ballard Park – August 26, 2014
Baca is a Grammy Award winner, and he interspersed explanatory patter into his set to get the Ridgefield vanilla crowd properly oriented. His music is Tex-Mex, tejano, norteno, terms that, if there are differences, they are too subtle for me to discern; Baca also used them interchangeably. His instrument, resembling a 12-string guitar, is actually known as a “bajo sexto”. The accordion player is his nephew, but there is no downside to this nepotism.
Max Baca
Noel Hernandez
Josh Baca
Danny Martinez
Jimmy Heath Band – Grant’s Tomb – August 20, 2014
Well I’ve finally gotten to the point where I’m sketching sidemen instead of the leader (I have sketched Heath four times already over the years), and I don’t know the best way to create the heading. So I’m going with Jimmy Heath for this, it was his gig, even though I didn’t capture him this nite. There was one passage with Heath soloing on a slow number that was so gorgeous I had actual tears and had to pause my work. What a sap! Purrone has not been on my radar screen, but then I realized that he was in the Heath Brothers band that me and Toots saw way back in 1980!
Tony Purrone
Jeremy Pelt
Ruthie Foster – Ballard Park – August 19, 2014
Foster works at the intersection of blues and gospel. She got there from her strong gospel background – I don’t suppose that too many of the blues/gospel artists will arrive there from a strict blues origin, or even if there is such a thing. The backing band is just bass & drums, but the light faded before I could capture the drummer. Her fingerpickin’ licks are really fine. I was hoping she would just rip in for some searing lead riffs, but that’s not her style, at least not in this context. There are sections of her songs, especially at the grand finales, where all instruments fall away to allow her (and us) to relish in her powerful pipes.
Ruthie Foster
Larry Fulcher
Jazz on Great Hill – Central Park – August 9, 2014
This is an annual Jazzmobile event, and this year there were (at least) four acts. Well, sitting on the lawn in the brutal sunlight for the entire event was just not happening with me; I got the minimalist-est versions of two players in Alison Williams’s band, and then a bit more chromatic for three in the Wycliffe Gordon combo. Gordon really brings the goods (including his vocal work), playing in that overlap sweet spot of entertainment, erudition, and technique. Since I’d already previously sketched him, I decided to focus more on his lesser-known sidemen.
Nathan Lucas
Reggie Woods
Ehud Asherie
Adrian Cunningham
Yasushi Nakamura
Steve Earle – Pete Seeger Tribute, Central Park Summerstage – July 21, 2014
“New Songs of Justice” was the name of this segment of the Seeger-palooza that his death earlier this year unleashed on the summer programming. The acts kept a-coming, many not announced in the programming for the event. I got into position for only one sketch, of Earle; one of his two songs was a personal musical tribute, “Steve’s Hammer (For Pete)”.
Steve Earle
