Gigs This Weekend

I have two fun gigs this weekend. The music will be drastically different, but should be enjoyable.

Up first is my Friday night gig in Glenside, PA. It’s a fundraiser for Glenside Youth Athletic Club (GYAC). The event is billed as Comedy Night: three NYC comics and a warm-up band called the Weekend Squires. I am the “special guest” with the Weekend Squires. The schtick with this gig is that the band picks a pop artist/band to cover and then they do instrumental versions of the tunes. I joined the Weekend Squires for last year’s GYAC Comedy Night and we played all Black Crowes tunes (a bit rough cuz the Crowes singer basically sings the same thing on almost every tune – blues scale notes). This year the band that we are covering is The Clash. I’m playing on about 70% of the tunes – playing the original horn lines as well as lead and back up vocal lines. Sometimes I’m playing all these parts at once. How is that possible, you ask? Well, I’ll tell you; thanks for asking. I have a new toy which lets me play multiple notes at once.

For my birthday (March 14^th in case you want to make a reminder for next year!), my wife and mom bought me a Boss PS-6 Harmonist pedal. This thing has been so much fun! Using Boss’ words, here’s what it does:
“Meet the new BOSS harmonist, with four intelligent pitch-shift effects and three-voice harmony in one convenient unit. Among the effect modes are Harmony, Pitch Shifter, and Detune, plus the all-new Super Bend for authentic pedal-bending effects and wild three- and four-octave pitch sweeps. You can even control pitch with an optional expression pedal. The harmony function is fast and simple to use, and supports a variety of interval patterns. It’s easy to create rich, three-voice harmony: choose a major or minor key, and set SHIFT to 3-VOICE—that’s it! The PS-6 Harmonist is an unbeatable combination of superior sound quality, ease of use, and powerful pitch effects, all under one hood.”

I’ve been fooling around with this pedal for the last month and because of the nature of this Weekend Squires gig, I think it’s a perfect time to debut the Harmonist. Some tunes I’ll use the three-part harmony, some tunes I’ll add to my pitch an octave above and an octave below, and some tunes I’ll use the Detune function which is basically a chorus effect. To further treat my sound, for some tunes I’m also going to play through a Boss DS-1 Distortion pedal – the idea is to make the trumpet sound less like a trumpet. I’ll probably mainly use the distortion on my solos.

So all in all, I’m looking forward to this gig. Though I won’t be getting paid (it’s a fundraiser and I’m donating my time), it will be fun to test out this new gear. Plus, I’ve grown a new appreciation for The Clash. Their drummer, especially, was pretty darn good. And transcribing some of their tunes has confirmed in my mind that I need to start a ska band in the near future. More on that later….

So, the next gig is Saturday’s big concert at Montgomery County Community College. Courtesy of the Ars Nova Workshop website, here’s the deal:

On April 28 at Montgomery County Community College, Bobby Zankel’s big band the Warriors of the Wonderful Sound will premiere a new piece written for the ensemble by legendary pianist/composer Muhal Richard Abrams. Recently named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master and a member of Downbeat Magazine’s Hall of Fame, Abrams is a co-founder of the hugely influential Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) and a composer whose work and influence spans the diverse history of classic, modern and avant-garde jazz. At 81, he continues to wield an enormous influence through his recordings and teachings, not least through some of modern jazz’s most important musicians.

Ars Nova Workshop has also hosted a four part blog about this concert by writer Shaun Brady – you can see the posts at http://arsnovaworkshop.org/

I wrote about this concert a few weeks back – check out the videos. There is a new video with pianist Vijay Iyer:

and also an interview with Muhal himself:

My favorite Muhal quote from this video is a real gem: “I don’t really advise people, but I would say be honest and true about music and practice and study. Forever.” Love it!

The Warriors and Muhal have been rehearsing for a couple of months and the music is ready. It’s one very long epic composition entitled “Soundpath.” In short, it’s badass! Muhal is a true master. And he has been such a joy to work with. He stands in front of us, a real maestro, but very humble and very accessible. He laughs, cracks jokes, and dances along with music – he’s 81 but with his energy and enthusiasm, you would think that he’s half that age. And he’s really encouraging us, pushing us to really get into the sound, to really explore. The whole process has been a blast and I’m excited for the culmination – our concert at MCCC.

Oh, I almost forgot - a special bonus for the Warriors for this concert is that we will also be welcoming into the band two master improvisers: the great trumpet (and a favorite of mine) Herb Robertson and the master trombone player Steve Swell. It’s been great hearing these guys with the band. And it’s been a real treat sitting next to, and getting to know Herb. This show is gonna be awesome!




A new development: since this concert location is kinda out-there for some folks, Ars Nova Workshop has organized a bus trip to and from the Clef Club in center city Philadelphia to make things easier for you.

Upcoming Gigs

Just a quick post about a couple of gigs this week.

On Thursday, April 19th I’ll be playing with Matt Davis’ Aerial Photograph at Time. Start time is 8:30pm. Aerial Photograph has been around for seven or eight years or so, I believe. The genesis of the group came out of Matt’s undergrad experience of writing for a guitar trio plus a string quartet. The band soon added a saxophone and then a five piece wind section  The music is all Matt’s. Kind of a chamber jazz vibe. Beautiful, quiet, moody, elegant, sometimes simple, sometimes complex music. It’s a really special ensemble.

And on Friday, April 20th at World Café Live (downstairs) – I’ll be playing with Philly Bloco, a 22-piece Brazilian Carnival band. This band is a blast to play with. Crazy high energy party band. All covers – about half Brazilian tunes and half a mix of New Orleans tunes (Dirty Dozen, Dr. John, Meters, etc.) and American pop/R&B tunes (some Stevie Wonder and some Otis Redding) that get a samba treatment.  If you like to dance this would be a good show to come to!

Hope to see some of you at these shows!

Upcoming Gig

I forgot to mention this earlier, but if you find yourself in South Philly this evening, please stop by Cianfrani Park at 8^th and Fitzwater. As long as the weather is clear, I’ll be playing from 7-9:30pm with reedsman/composer/bandleader Daniel Peterson and his band Truth and Consequence. It’s free and there’s some great musicians playing. The line-up:

Daniel Peterson – reeds
Larry Toft – trombone

Bart Miltenberger – trumpet
Anam Owili-Eger – piano

Mike Lorenz – guitar

Chris Pryzbelowski – bass

Wayne Smith, Jr. – drums

Hope you can make it.

Guess The Trumpet Player

Before we get to today's post - just a reminder about two gigs. I played my duo show last night with Tim Motzer. Awesome!
On Friday, May 20^th, I will be back at Philly’s newest jazz spot, Little Bar (8^th and Fitzwater), this time with Matt Davis’s Aerial Photograph. Our set starts at 9:30pm.

On Saturday, May 21^st, I will be playing in Wilmington, DE at the brand new World Café Live at the Queen venue down there with PhillyBloco. The new venue is supposed to be amazing. If you are in that neck of the woods, please come out and dance. Show starts at 8pm.
______________________________________________________________

Hello Readers, it’s time for the eighteenth installment of “Guess The Trumpet Player.” And this week’s installment really just isn’t fair. No one is going to guess this one unless you are a real hardcore fan of 50’s-60’s era Chicago jazz. If you aren’t then it’s pretty doubtful that you will have ever even heard about this trumpet player. I hadn’t. I found him on a total fluke because I was looking for recordings by the alto sax player who’s featured on this track (this record BTW is one of the alto player’s first. He went on to be, and continues to be, one of the real innovators of the alto – even if his name is practically unknown). So yeah, maybe not cool picking such an obscure player, but listen to this blues. Sounds like this guy should be more well known, don’t you think?

Click the link (it’s safe), click play, listen, guess the trumpet player. The first person to leave the correct name of this trumpet player in the comments section of this post wins a CD – your choice of Outside Pants Vol. 1 – Old School Players or Outside Pants Vol. 2 – Ron Miles Mix or Outside Pants Vol. 3 – Brownie Mix or Outside Pants Vol.4 – Dave Douglas Mix. The contest ends with Monday’s post.

Here’s the tune: http://www.box.net/shared/ijgd0rsfdq

Random Gigs: Beauty in the Rain and a Heart Attack in Church

My apologies for the lack of posts last week (I know you were crushed); it was a really hectic week. All that needed to be accomplished was accomplished. I met my writing deadlines and managed to balance a crazy work week with a super busy family schedule (including almost six hours of Little League on Saturday). The rehearsals were made and the gigs were played. And speaking of gigs played, I had two really interesting ones this weekend.

Saturday night’s gig was at the RUBA Club in Philly with my friend Matt Davis’ band, Aerial Photograph. Like elsewhere in the country, Saturday dumped some crazy weather on the Philadelphia area. It rained and rained, and rained, and rained, and rained. And then it rained some more, because, hey, maybe we needed more rain. The radio told me on the drive down to my gig that we were going to get one to two inches total of rain. What?! We got at least two inches of rain during my drive alone. Turns out the totals were more like five to eight inches of rain in my area which tends to get more than in the city (some minor flooding in my basement while I was at the gig – fun). It was a pretty crappy night to have to leave the house. But Matt is my buddy and his band plays beautiful music. When I got to the gig (pretty soaked because I couldn’t find an umbrella at home) I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was actually an audience there to watch us and a fabulous band called The Blue Cranes from Portland, OR play our sets.

Aerial Photograph has been around for six or seven years or so, I believe. The genesis of the group came out of Matt’s undergrad experience of writing for a guitar trio plus a string quartet. The band soon added a saxophone and then a five piece wind section (Saturday we played without trombone). The music is all Matt’s. Kind of a chamber jazz vibe. Beautiful, quiet, moody, elegant, sometimes simple, sometimes complex music. It’s a really special ensemble. I’ve never heard another band quite like this one. And the juxtaposition between pouring, violent rain and Matt’s peaceful and calm music could not have been more stark. The band played beautifully on Saturday night, especially on Matt’s new one, Sol Soul, which is built off of the chord changes to Miles Davis’ Solar. Yours truly got to solo through the progression with just a pointillistic string quartet backdrop. It was a challenge and a lot of fun. We also had a special guest on cello. A fabulous Swedish player (I can’t remember his first name, but his last name is Kramer) who had just auditioned that morning for the New York Philharmonic. He was pretty good :) Gorgeous tone and obviously a good reader. He comes from a family of accomplished string players. I think he made us all step up our game, whether we realized it or not. And our audience seemed to notice. We had a real nice reception. All in all, it was a nice night of music and one of the better recent Aerial Photograph shows. Not bad for a really crappy night.

I had to get up pretty early on Sunday for my next gig – a Palm Sunday service at a Lutheran Church in the Northeast section of Philadelphia. I was told to arrive really early so that I could rehearse the music (almost all of which I was seeing for the first time that morning) with the organist and the choir. I had about 35 seconds to warm up before we ran through all the music, plus some of more difficult music we’ll be performing at next Sunday’s Easter service. I generally don’t play all that well first thing in the morning, but my chops seemed to be handing all of that playing ok, although by the end of the service my lips were pretty much shot. Maybe not a great idea to rehearse for a solid hour before the Easter Service. Especially if I’m supposed to hit all those notes in that Handel piece. But whatever, this isn’t what I’m writing about. I’m writing about the incident that took place about halfway through the service.

Right after the sermon I was starting to get ready for the next choir piece that I was going to play. Just mentally going over the music, making note of key changes, and any passages with weird rhythms or fingering. Then I heard the pastor say “And now we’ll sing some hymns while the paramedics take care of Phyllis.” WTF?! I looked up, through the huge palms, and over the altar. There were about four paramedics attending to an elderly African American woman, giving her oxygen, and getting her onto a stretcher. Apparently, Phyllis had just had a heart attack while sitting in the pew. Her husband, Alex had quickly and discretely called 911. To keep things moving along, but in a manner respectful of the paramedics and their responsibilities, the pastor and the organist just kept the hymns coming and I just kept playing along, transposing and coming up with harmony parts on the spot. I’m not sure, but the congregation seemed to be singing louder and more passionately than normal. Maybe to sing Phyllis back into a stable condition. It was kind of emotional and really surreal. Then the paramedics took her away and the service went back to normal – just extended by about 25 minutes. That was a weird church service and a weird gig. Life is precious and you never know what’s coming next. So sing louder. Put your heart into it. Good luck, Phyllis. And Alex.

Upcoming Gigs

Two gigs of note this week. Thursday night I’ll be back at Tritone with Bobby Zankel and the Warriors of the Wonderful Sound. It’s been almost ten years that the band has had our once a month gig at Tritone. I’m not sure what’s on tap this month. We might play Bobby’s music like we always do or we might also include some music by the great alto saxophonist, Steve Coleman. Why? Because the Warriors have a big concert on Saturday at Montgomery County Community College with Steve.

Like last year’s amazing concert (you can watch it HERE) with alto giant Rudresh Mahanthappa, Bobby has invited (with some serious grant funding, of course) a guest composer to come in and write a whole new suite of music for the band and perform it with us. Rudresh wrote “Dasha” for us. Steve has written “Stasis and Change“ for us. Steve’s music is really hard. Really intricate interlocking lines and melodies, very rhythmic, very exact. Some of the guys in the band prefer a looser aesthetic so this is going to be a bit of a challenge. But because Steve’s language is so singular he is bringing down from NYC a few of his students/bandmates to flesh out our band and lend some support. It’s already been a great learning experience. A few more rehearsals should tighten things up and we’ll be ready to roll.

Here is some more info on Steve Coleman if you are interested:
http://www.m-base.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Coleman

Upcoming Gigs

Things have been busy for me musically so far this year and March appears like it will continue that trend. Here are a few open-to-the-public shows coming up that I wanted to let you know about:

Thursday, March 3^rd – Back at Tritone with Bobby Zankel and the Warriors of the Wonderful Sound. The band is just a few months away from celebrating our tenth anniversary and things have really been heating up lately. This week the Warriors are rehearsing with alto saxophonist/composer/band leader/force of Nature Steve Coleman. We have a big concert coming up next month (Saturday, April 9^th at Montgomery County Community College) featuring a program of Coleman’s (complex, but really cool) compositions. More on that show later. But catch us at Tritone this week. Good, cheap food and booze. Great, loud music starts at 9:30pm.

Sunday, March 6^th – I will be playing a 1K Recordings live web broadcast with guitarist Tim Motzer. Tim and I have had a duo thing going for a few months now and it really is a lot fun. Tim plays some amazing things on the guitar and I get to use a lot of extended techniques on the trumpet. We’ll be making some pretty cool soundscapes improvisations. Our session is part of a series that Tim has been doing – live audio and video recording broadcast live on the web. You don’t even need to put on your outside pants for this one! Here’s the link to watch us – we start at 3pm: www.webillishus.com/watch/1k-sessions.

Wednesday, March 16^th – Bobby Zankel and the Warriors of the Wonderful Sound hit the NJ Turnpike heading north. We will be performing at the Iridium in NYC with saxophonist and composer Rudresh Mahanthappa. Sets at 8pm and 10pm. Last May the Warriors played a concert with Rudresh world premiering a new suite of his, “Dasha.” The band sounded great and had a blast playing Rudresh’s music and we are excited to reprise that endeavor again – this time in NYC.

Friday, March 18^th – I’ll be playing at the Blockley with PhillyBloco. Last weekend PhillyBloco played a smoking show in NYC and on March 19^th we’ll be celebrating in Philly with a CD Release Party. I’ve got a copy of the new CD and it sounds wonderful. It’s a live recording but so much time was spent with the mixing and mastering that it sounds studio-quality. If you like Brazilian music, if you like to dance, if you like getting sweaty, this will be a great night for you!

I hope that some of you, dear readers, will be able to come to some of these shows.