Now That’s Jazz…

• Festival Finale: Haynes, Jordan, Iyer – June 10

It’s always nice to welcome back Bay Area artists who took off for New York and actually made it there. Vijay Iyer, who juggled academia and performance in  the East Bay – he earned  a Ph.D from U.C.  Berkeley with a dissertation titled Macrostructures of Sound: Embodied Cognition in West African and African-American Musics while  playing jazz piano in dives around town –  moved to New York in 1998 and gradually established himself as one of the leading lights of creative improvised music. He’s a prolific recording artist whose every release has garnered more praise than the previous, culminating with a Grammy nomination for his last album Historicity. Now, Vijay’s just-released Accelerando is already attracting raves for his radical yet sensual trio interpretations of tunes like Michael Jackson’s “Human Nature” and Herbie Nichols’ “Wildflower.”

Vijay is an original. With influences ranging from Steve Coleman’s M-Base rhythmic experiments in the 1980s to Indian ragas and  African dance and drumming, he’s created a music that moves  horizontally, much like an ocean current, ebbing and flowing, propelled by the interlocking rhythms of his band and his brooding, rumbling piano playing. Traditional jazz trio roles are abandoned or exchanged; sometimes Vijay’s piano drives the rhythm, while the drummer supplies embellishment. The music doesn’t swing, it pulses, and it’s crazily buoyant. Familiar songs Vijay tackles are swept up by the forward motion of his sound, digested, flattened, stretched  and ultimately served up in thrilling ways. It’s  as if he’s created an entirely new genre of music, and he may well have done so. Each album brings a new advance, a new twist to the concept.

In New York Vijay has collaborated with hip-hop MC Mike Ladd for a couple of song cycles about language and identity.  He’s had an orchestral work performed by the American Composer’s Orchestra, and has received several grants and fellowships. He  is on the faculties of the Manhattan School of Music, New York University and the New School.

Vijay’s trio is an intriguing choice to start off the final Roy-alty day  at the festival. Though his usual drummer, Marcus Gilmore – Roy Haynes’ grandson – couldn’t make the gig, another Haynes, son Graham,  will be sitting in.  Graham is a virtuoso cornetist and electronic music maven who’s been part of the New York experimental scene since the 1980s.   The drummer for the gig, Tyshawn Sorey, has a symphonic sweep to his playing that will undoubtedly  mesh perfectly with Vijay’s ideas. Bassist Stephan Crump has been supplying the intuitive pulse Vijay needs for years.

Is there anything Roy-al about this band, besides the presence of an actual Haynes? Absolutely! The pulse that Roy Haynes supplies to all his musical settings, the volition  to push, to excite, is here, only in a different shape and direction. Call it  a continuum  – and Sheila Jordan is right in the middle with her vocal enchantments and sharp listening ears – that connects the  past with the present and shows the way to the future that Vijay is hinting at.

That’s jazz.

She Doesn’t Sound Like Anybody Else…

• Sheila Jordan Master Vocal Class – June 9

• Festival Finale: Haynes, Jordan, Iyer – June 10

Something that can’t be said about many singers is true of Sheila Jordan: She doesn’t sound like anybody else. Emerging in Detroit in the late 1940s, Jordan fell under the sway of Charlie Parker. That wasn’t  unusual for singers.  But Sheila found a  way into bebop that was unique. Instead of merely singing the horn solos or the melody, she treated the tunes much as  a great visual artist uses a block of clay, cutting tantalizing aural sculptures with precision vocal strikes that swoop, shock and delight. The result? Joy.

Reinvention is  what she is  about, and while her life hasn’t been easy – she worked in day jobs for years while raising a child alone – reinvention proved the formula that kept her going. Every musical moment Sheila tackles is new beginning. Jazz is supposed to be like that, of course. But it’s easy for musicians to fall into familiar patterns. It’s not easy to pour your soul into something as if it’s a door just opened for the first time, every time.

Sheila first showed up on record courtesy of George Russell’s 1962 The Outer View, on which she stole the show with a 10-minute vocal tour de force on “You Are My Sunshine.” The same year came her debut as a leader, Blue Note’s “Portrait of Sheila,” which remains one jazz’s great statements by a singer. On interesting choices like “Falling in Love With Love,” “If You Could See Me Now” and “Laugh! Clown! Laugh!” she wrote her own rules about singing. It’s impossible to listen to this record without getting goosebumps. Try it

The final Sunday at this year’s festival is a Roy-al family affair featuring NEA Jazz Masters Roy Haynes and Sheila Jordan. Sheila just got her Masters designation; Roy was awarded  his in 1995. Though they haven’t performed together, because Roy rarely plays with singers (although he had a long stint backing Sarah Vaughan), there are deep ties. The two first met in a Detroit jazz club in the early ’50s. “We were both kids,” Sheila says. “He told me I dressed great. He said I like the way you dress because I like to dress up, too.

When they took separate paths to New York a few years later, Sheila became close friends with Roy’s girlfriend, Lee. Shelia was at the time married to Duke Jordan, who was Charlie Parker’s pianist.  Roy and Lee married, and Sheila and Lee had babies within a week of each other, in 1955. Lee and Roy’s first child, Craig, is now a percussionist and will be sitting in with the Roy-alty band at the festival’s climax. Sheila’s daughter Tracey works in marketing

At Sunday’s concert, Sheila will perform in duet with the towering bassist Cameron Brown. Singing with bass is her preferred mode of performing, and she’s been doing it since the ’50s. “I started the bass and voice,” she says. “I feel very free with bass. It’s open – the silence, the space. I work off that.”  Her first bass partner was Steve Swallow, who played on Portrait of Sheila. Next came Harvie Swartz, with whom she duetted for 20 years, traveling the world  and recording several albums (the most recent, Yesterdays, is a stunning 1990 date  just released on High Tone). 

When Swartz left to pursue a separate career, Sheila contacted Cameron, and now the two have been performing for about as long. Interestingly, Cameron was Sheila’s choice for a bass partner before she started up with Swartz. “I asked Cameron, but he said he was too busy working with George Adams and Danny Richmond. So after Harvey quit, I flashed back to Cameron. We are close friends; I’m the godmother to his oldest daughter. So I asked him and he said, ‘Yeah, I’d love to.’” Sheila says that on Sunday the pair will perform numbers by Charlie Parker, Fats Waller, Miles Davis, Lester Young, Billy Holiday and Duke Ellington, among other tunes. Better strap in, people, because Sheila doesn’t just sing the words, she sings the instrumental solos, and sometimes makes up her own words on the spot

As passionate as she is about singing, Sheila’s thrown herself with equal force into teaching. (See article on Sheila’s Master Vocal Class on the final Saturday of Healdsburg.)  Why? “Because I’m not a diva!” Sheila says. “I want to keep this music alive. I’m gonna die one day. Is the music gonna die with me? No!  …  I want to give singers the jazz fever. Once they get the jazz fever, they don’t want to sing anything else.” It’s sure worked for her.

Jazz Roy-alty Fits the Bill

• Festival Finale: Haynes, Jordan, Iyer – June 10

• Roy-al Family Panel Discussion – June 9

Roy Haynes, at 87, is no doubt jazz Roy-alty. He’s one of the greatest drummers of all time, he’s an NEA Jazz Master with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Grammys, he’s played with practically every significant jazz artist of note going back to Louis Armstrong, he’s produced two sons and a grandson who each are great musicians, and his name even means “king.”  But if you asked Roy what he’s most proud of, he’d probably say being picked by Esquire magazine in 1960 as one of the best dressed men in America. Because, you know, all these accolades and honors…. what are they to a guy who just wants to bring it? Get him behind the drums so he can shake up the world, as he’s been doing for 70 years.

That’s one thing  the Healdsburg audience can count on to happen when Roy takes the stage for the final festival blowout, backed by his Fountain of Youth  band of youngsters, plus an offspring or two and special guests. Fellow Jazz Master Sheila Jordan, who’s sharing the bill Sunday, is certainly royal in her own right, but she’s also close to being  Roy-alty, as she’s known Roy since they were getting started in the business and was tight with Roy’s late wife Lee, mother of Craig and Graham Haynes. Vijay Iyer, the sizzling pianist who’s starting off the proceedings Sunday, also must be counted among the Roy-al clan by dint of his years playing with drummer Marcus Gilmore, who happens to be Roy’s grandson.

It’s a long reach Roy has, and it goes much much farther than the people mentioned here. It truly has to extend to anybody Roy has played with – hundreds  of top-level musicians –  thanks to the magic that Roy brings every time he sits behind the drum kit. Because Roy isn’t just the drummer; he’s the guy steering the wheel.  As the great bassist and frequent Roy collaborator Dave  Holland once said, “You have to be ready to play when you perform with Roy. You have to be ready to have a conversation.”

Roy isn’t known for a specific style or pinned to a specific era. Max Roach  shifted the time-keeping functions of the drums to make room for bebop, Elvin Jones took the freedom further with his poly-rhythms, but Roy came up with  a system that could work equally well with swing, bop, funk, soft ballads, Latin or free jazz. It’s a dancing full-body system, utilizing precision  drum tuning,  that allows him to play rhythm, melody and even harmony all at once. Call him a one-man band inside a band. And sidemen, take note! If you don’t have it going on, Roy will  go there for you. As he’s said in the past, he doesn’t have any beats to waste. When musicians get with the Roy-al program, though, they are pushed to places they’ve never been before. This system of Roy’s is not just a gold standard of drumming, it’s a modus operandi applicable to any musician who values assertiveness, intense listening and the need to push and then push harder. As such, it’s been an influence on all of jazz, and even beyond music. Yes, we all can learn from Roy

In recent years Roy has been leading his own band of young post-bop warriors:  Martin Bejerano on piano, David Wong on bass and Jaleel Shaw on alto sax.   On Roy’s latest album, Royalty, they were augmented by Chick Corea, Roy Hargrove and son Roy’s son Craig, who will be sitting in with Dad at Healdsburg. Craig has lent his skills to Sun Ra, George Benson, Geri Allen, Marcus Miller and others. 

Will there be any surprises for the grand finale? Impossible to say, but with all the jazz royalty occupying Healdsburg this year, it wouldn’t be wise to count anything out.

featuring Dave Ellis

A benefit concert for the Healdsburg Jazz Festival

Date: Saturday, April 28, 2012
Time: two sets starting at 7:30  
Cost: $25.00
Location: Healdsburg Center for the Arts,
130 Plaza St  | Phone: 707-431-1970
Tickets: For sale online on this page or at the Healdsburg Center for the Arts during business hours (daily 11am – 5pm).
Advance purchase recommended due to limited seating.

On Saturday, April 28, the Healdsburg Jazz Festival will present the Dmitri Matheny Group with special guest Dave Ellis at the Healdsburg Center for the Arts gallery. This is the second in the 2012 concert series “Jazz in the Gallery”  co-sponsored by Healdsburg Center for the Arts to support and benefit the Healdsburg Jazz Festival. Dmitri will have performing with him an outstanding group with Dave Ellis on tenor sax; Matt Clark on piano; Seward McCain on bass; and Deszon Claiborne on drums.

Celebrated for his warm tone, soaring lyricism and masterful technique, Dmitri Matheny has been lauded as “the first breakthrough flugelhornist since Chuck Mangione” (San Jose Mercury News). First introduced to jazz audiences in the 1990s as the protégé of Art Farmer, Matheny has matured into “one of the jazz world’s most talented horn players” (SF Chronicle). Matheny leads an all-star quintet in a performance of material from his nine critically acclaimed CDs, possibly including selections from his conceptual film noir-influenced “Crime Scenes,”a  program inspired by espionage and underworld movie music.

The Saturday night show at HCA will be torqued up a notch by the presence of Dave Ellis, the tenor  saxophonist whose emphatic attack has earned him California Music Awards and Jazziz Best New Talent status (along with Diana Krall, 1997). As legendary record producer Orrin Keepnews writes in his liner notes to “State of Mind,” the first new Ellis recording in five years, “even on the shifting and difficult terrain of early 21st century jazz, a talent as formidable as his should and will be recognized.”

Wine and desserts will be available for purchase before the performance and during the break. Showtime is 7:30; tickets available online on this page

• Roy Haynes & Fountain of Youth with guest Craig Haynes

• Sheila Jordan & Cameron Brown Duo

• Vijay Iyer Trio with guest Graham Haynes

@RODNEY STRONG VINEYARDS
11455 Old Redwood Hwy, Healdsburg
2pm gates open 1pm
$45 | $35 student/senior children 10 and under free
Lawn seating | no umbrellas

Wine Sponsor: Rodney Strong

The grand finale for the 14th Healdsburg Jazz Festival is a truly special affair. It’s a day to celebrate Roy-alty–drummer/ bandleader/NEA Jazz Master Roy Haynes and his family and friends. Each of the three acts is part of Roy-alty. During his own set with the Fountain of Youth band, Roy’s son Craig—who has obviously learned the necessity of dancing behind the drum kit from Dad—will be guesting on percussion.

Second on the bill, fellow NEA Jazz Master Sheila Jordan, has been a family friend of Roy’s since the early ‘50s; she pushed newborn Craig around in a stroller along with her own daughter. Opening act Vijay Iyer, a fast-rising star in jazz, has invited Roy’s son Graham, a brilliant cornetist/electronic music artist, to sit in as a special guest.

Roy Haynes and Fountain of Youth with guest Craig Haynes

Roy Haynes, at 87, is jazz Roy-alty. He’s one of the greatest drummers of all time, he’s an NEA Jazz Master with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Grammys, he’s played with practically every significant jazz artist of note going back to Louis Armstrong, he’s produced two sons and a grandson who each are great musicians–and even his name means “king.”... {read more about Roy Haynes}

Sheila Jordan and Cameron Brown Vocal and Bass Duo

Something that can’t be said about many singers is true of Sheila Jordan. She doesn’t sound like anybody else. Emerging in Detroit in the late 1940s, Jordan fell under the sway of Charlie Parker. That wasn’t unusual for singers.

But Sheila found a way into bebop that was unique. Instead of merely singing the horn solos or the melody, she treated the tunes much as a great visual artist uses a block of clay, cutting tantalizing aural sculptures with precision vocal strikes that swoop, shock and delight… {read more about Sheila Jordan}

Vijay Iyer Trio with guest Graham Haynes

Vijay Iyer, who earned a Ph.D at UC Berkeley in the ‘90s while playing jazz piano in dives around town, moved to New York in 1998 and gradually established himself as one of the leading lights of creative improvised music. His last album Historicity, earned a Grammy™ nomination, and his just released Accelerando has been attracting nonstop raves for his radical yet sensual trio interpretations of tunes like Michael Jackson’s “Human Nature” and Herbie Nichols’ “Wildflower” … {read more about Vijay Iyer}

There’s another thing each of these musicians shares with Roy–a compulsion to perform at the highest level. Will there be any surprises for the grand finale? Impossible to say, but with all the jazz royalty occupying Healdsburg this year, it wouldn’t be wise to count anything out.

Solo and Trio Performances

@ RAVEN THEATER
115 North Street | 8pm
$65 | $45 | $35 student/senior

Dedicated to the memory of Al Voigt

With Kenny Burrell’s two sets ringing in the final weekend, the Healdsburg Jazz Festival’s Jazz Masters begin showing what it’s like at the top of the artistic mountain. Burrell, who turned 80 last year, picked up his Jazz Masters knighthood from the NEA in 2005, just another feather in the cap of a musician who’s got a room full of them.

But it was an occasion to consider what  Kenny Burrell represents in jazz. If, of the other Jazz Masters at Healdsburg, Roy Haynes could be seen as determination and Sheila Jordan as  innovation, then Kenny is definitely precision.

Burrell has been hitting the sweet spots on his fretboard since 1951, when as a young guitarist in Detroit he landed a record date with Dizzy Gillespie. After arriving in New York, Kenny instantaneously became a hot ticket among the jazz elite. He had to figure out how to balance making his own records against calls from people like John Coltrane, Billie Holiday, Jimmy Smith, Tony Bennett, Lena Horn and many more.

What’s his secret? He told the Los Angeles Times that music “has to be a balance between heart and mind. The thing is to not let your technique or your analytical side overshadow your feelings.”

On his way to recording over a 100 albums as a leader, and appearing on hundreds more, Kenny has demonstrated two sentiments: an abiding love of Duke Ellington’s music (Ellington called him his favorite guitarist) and a penchant for teaching. He combined the two passions in 1978 when he created a class at UCLA called Ellingtonia, teaching it for 18 years until the university instituted a full-fledged Jazz Studies Department, naming Kenny the director. The guitarist teaches ethnomusicology, jazz studies and leads a few guitar workshops – all while continuing to record albums and perform concerts. He was also involved with Herb Alpert and Herbie Hancock in folding the Thelonious Monk Institute into UCLA’s jazz programs.

Burrell will play two sets at the Raven. The first will be solo guitar, where the audience is likely to hear the remarkable picking and finger-style technique he displayed on his new album of live solo guitar, Tenderly. On this casually paced, evocatively arranged tour de force – surprisingly his first recording of unaccompanied guitar – he balances original tunes with tributes to Billie Holiday, Wes Montgomery, Louis Armstrong and Ellington. At the second set he’ll front a trio.  

Expect the polished drive and professional swing that has made Kenny Burrell arguably the most respected guitarist in jazz history. 

Al Voigt, an artist, inventor and art patron, passed away in 2011. Co-founder of the Voigt Family Sculpture Foundation, Al’s generosity and artistic vision are widely recognized for boosting the quantity and quality of public art in Northern California. Visit thespiritoftheman.com for details about a yearlong sculpture exhibition honoring Al that will open with a reception on May 20th at Paradise Ridge Winery, featuring the Lorca Hart Trio.

Open Panel Discussion with Craig, Graham and Roy Haynes
Moderated by Billy Hart

@THE RAVEN THEATER
115 North Street | 2-4pm | FREE

Why is the music of NEA Jazz Master Roy Haynes important? What kind of influence has he had on drums? On the jazz world at large? What is it about Roy that has made him one of the most sought-after drummers in jazz history?

Any artist who has worked with the likes of Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, Sarah Vaughan, Lester Young, Gary Burton, Sonny Rollins, Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Chick Corea has something going on that deserves being discussed. In honor of 2012 Healdsburg Jazz Festival Headliner Roy Haynes, fans are encouraged to attend a panel discussion on jazz’s Roy-al family.

Roy Haynes will air his thoughts and take questions, and his sons, drummer Craig Haynes and cornetist/ electronic music artist Graham Haynes, will talk about what it was like to grow up with a dad who happened to be a star in the jazz firmament. They’ll talk about how he encouraged them and influenced them.

Billy Hart, a first-call drummer from a slightly later generation who teaches at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the New England Conservatory of Music, the New School and New York University, will moderate and discuss Roy’s impact on drummers and on the jazz world in general. Perhaps he’ll reveal some tricks he learned from Roy–or vice versa!

Getting Your Act Together

@ HEALDSBURG HIGH SCHOOL
1028 Prince Avenue
Band Room | 11AM-2PM
$50 participants | $25 to audit
The class is open to all levels of expertise

2012 NEA Jazz Master and Healdsburg Jazz Festival featured performer Sheila Jordan invites singers of all levels to a Vocal Master Class. Teaching since 1978, Sheila is as passionate about passing on her knowledge as she is about singing. “My purpose in life is to keep this music alive, Sheila says. “I’m going to die one day. Is the music going to die with me? No!”

In the class Sheila will talk about her own life, how she learned singing and what her approach is to it. She will cover bebop and scat singing, and teach at least one song that the class can sing together. She urges anyone who wants to learn a specific song to bring in a lead sheet, although that’s not necessary. “I want to give people the jazz fever,” Sheila says. “Once they get the jazz fever, they won’t want to sing anything else.”

From 1978 until 2005 Sheila taught jazz singing at City College of New York. She teaches every year with Jazz in July at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and at the Vermont Jazz Center in Brattleboro. She also conducts workshops around the world. She says she believes in teaching from the heart, offering encouragement to build confidence.

with Andy McKee and Billy Hart
special guest Julian Priester

@THE RAVEN THEATER
115 North Street
8PM | $50 | $30 | $25 Student/Senior

Those who have been lucky enough to catch Michele Rosewoman’s occasional homecoming performances in the Bay Area over the decades can feel like members of a secret society; pilgrims to the shrine of a piano goddess who has illuminated mysteries of the keyboard that very few have accessed.

Raised in Oakland and schooled by Northern California’s late piano guru, Ed Kelly, Rosewoman was a prodigious talent who, while still in her teens had multiple strains of jazz and world music dancing in her head. Around the time she moved to New York in the late 1970s she was like a magnet to many of the rising stars of the day – Oliver Lake, Billy Bang, Julius Hemphill and many more.

Technique is what immediately bowls you over about Michele’s playing. She is equally virtuosic at in-the-pocket post-bop playing, rippling romanticism, atonal flights or the Afro-Cuban clave. But while many have chops, few can muster them with the sense of equipoise that Michele brings. Like a dancer in the eye of a hurricane, Michele choreographs the piano keys in a way that’s electrifying.

In a 2007 interview with allaboutjazz.com, Michele touched on the essence of what she’s about:  “One is called on to deal with so many things, and the key is balance,” she said. “Balancing limitation and expansion, form with free form, respect for and acknowledgment of tradition with a drive for creativity and evolution, aggressiveness with receptiveness, how to react and listen at the same time, incorporating the voices around you, taking the initiative.”

She’s still attracting  young  hotshots – recent bands she’s led have featured  Mark Shim, Gene Jackson and MacArthur “Genius Grant” winner Miguel Zenon – but for this evening’s concert at the Raven Michele pulls out some big guns:  Billy Hart on drums, Andy McKee on bass, and special guest Julian Priester on trombone.

Well known to the Healdsburg audience, Billy Hart is a master of shading and color who can crank up the raw power when necessary. He’s worked with McCoy Tyner, Wayne Shorter, Stan Getz, Miles Davis and dozens more. Julian Priester was hired by Sun Ra and Duke Ellington both, which tells you most of what you need to know about him. From the low register of his instrument he extracts  alluring  narratives that have also brought him into the bands of  Max Roach, Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Tyner and John Coltrane. Andy McKee is a prodigiously talented bassist who was schooled in the band’s of Philly Joe Jones and Elvin Jones and went on to play with Mal Waldron, Don Cherry, Michel Petrucciani and many others.

Rosewoman has played with Hart and Priester separately for years, but this evening marks not only the first time the three will have worked together. It’s also a reunion of Priester and Hart, who played on Herbie Hancock’s groundbreaking Mwandishi album from 1971. Andy McKee is a prodigiously talented bassist who was schooled in the bands of Philly Joe Jones and Elvin Jones and went on to play with Mal Waldron, Don Cherry, Michel Petrucciani and many others.

Between Michele, Billy, Julian, and Andy, you have a resume that could fill Carnegie Hall, but we’ll talke the Raven Theater. Be prepared for magic.

Friday with the Gary Johnson Trio
Saturday with Susan Sutton Trio

ACROSS FROM THE RAVEN THEATER
Parking lot at North & Center Streets
5:30-7:30pm | $1: includes duo wine tasting, food bites are free

Sponsored by Simi Winery

Founded in 1876 and located just down the road off Healdsburg Avenue, Simi is one of Sonoma County’s most historic wineries. As part of the weekend festivities, we invite you to stop by the “Simi Winery on Wheels,” parked across from the Raven Performing Arts Theater, and relish locally inspired bites crafted by Simi’s resident head Chef, each artfully paired with either the 2008 Simi Alexander Valley Cabernet Sauvignon or the 2010 Simi Sonoma County Sauvignon Blanc – available on tap!