Preservation Hall Jazz Band will perform Friday, February 8, 8:00 pm at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, MA. Advance tickets are $42 ($38 members and students); $45 at the door. To order tickets, visit clarkart.edu, or call 413-458-0524.
The band derives its name from Preservation Hall, the venerable music venue located in the heart of New Orleans’s French Quarter and founded in 1961 by Allan and Sandra Jaffe. The band has traveled worldwide, spreading their mission to nurture and perpetuate the art form of New Orleans jazz — a mission strengthened by the devastation brought about by Hurricane Katrina in 2007.
Whether performing at Carnegie Hall or Lincoln Center, for British royalty or the king of Thailand, this music embodies a joyful, timeless spirit. Under the auspices of current director Ben Jaffe, son of founders Allan and Sandra, Preservation Hall continues with a deep reverence and consciousness of its greatest attributes in the modern day as a venue, band, and record label.
PHJB began touring in 1963. Many of the band’s charter members performed with the pioneers who invented jazz in the early twentieth century, including Buddy Bolden, Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, and Bunk Johnson. Band leaders over the PHJB’s history include the brothers Willie and Percy Humphrey, husband and wife Billie and De De Pierce, famed pianist Sweet Emma Barrett, and Wendall and John Brunious. These founding artists and dozens of others passed on the culture of their music to a younger generation, who now follows in their footsteps.
The eighth annual Pittsfield CityJazz Festival takes place Oct. 5-13 in various venues around downtown Pittsfield. The music spans the spectrum of jazz, and includes the New England Jazz Ensemble with guest soloists Giacomo Gates and Ali Ryerson 8PM Oct. 13 at the Colonial Theatre; The Jazz Arts Trio, 7:30 PM Oct. 12 at Barrigton Stage; Jazz About Town, local musicians performing in Pittsfield restaurants and lounges during Columbus Day weekend, Oct. 4-8 (see schedule); and a new entry in the Jazz Prodigy series, Adam O’Farrill, a trumpet player who is garnering accolades across the northeast. (Get directions).
O’Farrill, son of renowned pianist Arturo O’Farrill, will appear at the Berkshire Athenaeum in an Oct. 10 concert sponsored by the Friends of the Athanaeum. His quartet has appeared at significant jazz venues in New York, and he will be making his Berkshires debut at the festival.
Colonial Theatre show added to schedule
Later that same evening, the Berkshire Theatre Group presents Michael Bellar and the AS-IS Ensemble at The Garage (the lounge at The Colonial Theatre). Show time for this high-energy, eclectic group is 8:30pm. They will also be conducting a improvisational workshop for musicians (of all ages) at 4pm. Read more … .
Pittsfield CityJazz Festival headline weekend
The headline weekend opens on Friday, Oct. 12 with the Jazz Arts Trio, headed by the remarkable concert pianist Frederick Moyer. What can safely be called the only jazz group of its kind, the Jazz Arts Trio, through note–for–note transcriptions of historic moments in piano jazz, is keeping alive music that otherwise would live on only in recordings. Their latest CD, Swing of Many Colors, includes a full re-performance of Ahmad Jamal’s landmark album But Not For Me: Live at the Pershing. The Jazz Arts Trio will appear at the Sydelle and Lee Blatt Performing Arts Center on Friday, Oct. 12, and is a co-presentation with Barrington Stage Co.
The New England Jazz Ensemble is a 16-piece big band whose repertoire will include material from the band’s latest CD, recorded live in performance in Hartford, Connecticut. They appeared at the first Pittsfield CityJazz Festival in 2006, putting the festival on the map when they issued a recording from that performance.
A renowned jazz/blues vocalist, Giacomo Gates’ will be a guest artist with the New England Jazz Ensemble. His CD Luminosity spent over three months in the top 20 of the Jazz Week charts; his latest recording, The Revolution Will Be Jazz, a tribute to Gil Scott-Heron, was the most-played CD on jazz radio for 7 consecutive weeks in 2011. Gates has been nominated as Jazz Vocalist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association.
Guest soloist Ali Ryerson has emerged as one of the most exciting and versatile flutists on the scene. She has performed with such diverse talents as Billy Taylor, Kenny Barron, Stephane Grappelli, Frank Wess, and (as principal flutist with the Monterey Bay Symphony) with Luciano Pavarotti. She put alto flute in the spotlight in her years of duet concerts and recordings with guitarist Joe Beck.
The New England Jazz Ensemble with Gates and Ryerson will appear on Saturday, Oct. 13, at the Colonial Theatre, with the Williams College Jazz Ensemble, under the direction of Andy Jaffe.
The new Berkshires Gateway Jazz Weekend in Lee took place Sept. 14-16. Produced by the Lee Community Development Corp., in collaboration with Berkshires Jazz. Headline performers included Grammy-nominated vocalist Karrin Allyson, the Amherst Jazz Orchestra, reed virtuoso Charles Neville, and the Sonny and Perley Quartet. .
Jazz About Town – Oct. 4 – 8
Thursday, October 4
Sister City Jazz Ambassadors
Patrick’s Pub – Park Square
6:30-9:30pm
Friday, October 5
Woody Stroebeck Duo
Spice Dragon – 297 North Street
6:30-9:30pm
Fran Tokarz Guitar Trio
The Lantern – 455 North Street
9-11pm
Sister City Jazz Ambassadors
Mission Tapas Bar and Restaurant – 438 North Street
7:30-10:30pm
Saturday, October 6
Rob Fisch Quartet
Patrick’s Pub – Park Square
7-10pm
Johnny Pontoon Quintet
Baba Louie’s Backroom – 34 Depot Street
7-10pm
Ted Murray Trio
Port Smitt Restaurant – Pecks Road
7:30-10:30pm
Sunday, October 7
Benny Kohn Piano Brunch
Dottie’s Coffee Lounge – 444 North Street
11am-1pm
Monday, October 8
Andy Wrba and Friends
Mission Tapas Bar and Restaurant – 438 North Street
As part of our year-round commitment to presenting jazz in the Berkshires, we have scheduled a double bill featuring DownBeat award-winning baritone saxophonist Gary Smulyan and pianist/composer/author Noah Baerman. The special program will take place at 8PM August 3 in the intimate setting of the backroom at Baba Louie’s Sourdough Pizza, where we have instituted a jazz series to follow Pittsfield’s monthly First Fridays Artswalks. Tickets are $20, general admission, concert starts at 8pm.
Please phone 413-841-7718 to see if there will be any seats available.
The guest artists will be backed by the Berkshires Jazz Duo, featuring bassist Jeff Link and drummer Peter Coombs. With Baerman at piano in the first set, the trio will then perform with Gary Smulyan, this year’s DownBeat Magazine critics poll winner.
Considered the standard bearer of his generation for the baritone saxophone, Smulyan has consistently been ranked as the Number 1 performer on his instrument in both the annual Downbeat Readers and Critics polls. He is the baritone saxophonist with the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, and played with its previous incarnation, the Mel Lewis Big Band. He also plays baritone saxophone with the Dave Holland Big Band and Octet, and the Dizzy Gillespie All Star Big Band.
Noah Baerman has performed at the Pittsfield CityJazz Festival and as a rising talent in the Tanglewood Jazz Festival. A prolific composer, he has earned top honors from the Billboard Song Contest, the Unisong Contest, and ASCAP (“ASCAPlus Awards” every year since 2004). His long list of recordings is topped by a new solo album, Turtle Steps. He earned his bachelors and masters degrees in Jazz Studies from Rutgers University, where his mentor was Kenny Barron.
The concert caps-off the “First Fridays Artswalks” in downtown Pittsfield, when some 30 venues will be featuring the paintings and other hanging art from local and regional artists. Dinner will be available earlier in the restaurant (34 Depot St., Pittsfield), in the backroom starting at 7pm and continuing during the music in the backroom.
In reference to May 4, 2012 Elli Fordyce, Jazz Tuber Trio concert at Baba Louie’s in Pittsfield, MA:
By Richard Houdek, Special to the Eagle – This city embraced its creators of painting, sculpture, photography, film and other visual expression Friday evening at its first ever Arts Walk, but it also acknowledged its reputation as a center of jazz performance.
Hundreds of curious viewers munched hors d’oeuvres while viewing artists’ works on nearly every available wall, table and pedestal, in boutiques, restaurants and even a barber shop. Scores then convened in Baba Louie’s Backroom where BerkshiresJazz.org offered a live double feature of music.
Elli Fordyce, enjoying her third career as a singer, was the headliner, joined by the Berkshires Jazz Trio — Andy Jaffe, keyboard, Richard Downs, bass, and Peter Coombs, drums — in a set that included reliable standards, often performed in fresh tempos and unlikely harmonies.
Fordyce, candid about being a mid-septuagenarian, displays still-fine vocal support and pitch, she scats easily and she and Jaffe’s instrumental ensemble meshed remarkably, given that they met only a couple of hours prior to the downbeat, and had virtually no rehearsal.
Earlier, Eli Neuberger’s Jazz Tuber Trio — Neuberger on tuba, Jimmy Mazzy, vocals and banjo, and Ted Casher on reeds — produced some persuasive Dixieland sounds.
Their repertory was filled similarly with standards, but their instrumentation, punctuated by Neuberger’s tuba, bombastic as well as occasionally surprisingly sensuous, created fascinating textures. Mazzy’s flexible high baritone is reminiscent of the favorite old jazz masters of song Fordyce and the two trios, all of whom contributed their services for the evening as a presumed benefit for BerkshiresJazz and the Arts Walk, returned to wind up the evening with a couple of numbers that also were unrehearsed. Casher noted that he had not played with Jaffe’s group for more than 30 years before Friday’s gathering. But such risks are what make the art of jazz exciting, both for the players, and certainly for their listeners.
The entry of Ky Hong Le of Miss Hall’s School was chosen from more than 100 entries from all four of Pittsfield’s high schools as the winner of the annual BerkshiresJazz Student Art Contest. It will become the graphic symbol for the seventh annual Pittsfield CityJazz Festival, which will be held from Oct. 3-13, 2012. Chosen for second and third place were the entries of Valerie Smalls of PHS and Lena Godfrey of Taconic H.S. The awards ceremony, April 12 at the Berkshire Museum, included a performance by the Berkshires Jazz Youth Ensemble under the direction of Pittsfield High School band director Ronald Lively, and the announcement by Berkshires Jazz of its music programming for 2012.
The contest is a way to engage more of the student community in a cross-genre creative activity. Many of the students conduct independent research the subject, and jazz music is sometimes played during the classes, as a way of inspiring the student artists. The top three entries receive small cash prizes and the opportunity to show their work in a world-class exhibit space at the Berkshire Museum.
This year’s judges included artist Julio Granda; graphic designer Tom Buckley of Greylock Marketing Group; and fine art photographer Ken Green of Museum Facsimiles. Art teachers engaged in the project were coordinator Colleen Quinn, Pittsfield High School; Lisa Ostellino and Barbara Patton, PHS; Marybeth Eldridge and Mike Boroniec, Taconic; Dale Zola, St. Joseph’s; and Ellie Kreischer and Sophie Lee from Miss Hall’s.
Honorable Mention and Judges Choice awards
Judges Choice: Kaileigh Hyman St. Joseph’s H.S.
Kristen Bossio, PHS
Lauren Farry, PHS
Winnie Lee, Miss Hall’s
Hannah Penner, Miss Hall’s
Emily Ren, Miss Hall’s
The Judges Choice selection is intended to call attention of especially creative work that would not be suitable to be a part of the festival marketing materials.
Project coordinator is Art Niedeck, a jazz musician and music educator, and chairman of the Education Committee of Berkshires Jazz, Inc., which is responsible for planning the Pittsfield CityJazz Festival and other events throughout the year. In addition to its mission of presenting ‘live’ jazz, the not-for-profit Berkshires Jazz is chartered to promote jazz education throughout Berkshire County. Its activities are supported by ticket sales from the festival, as well as donations from sponsors, which this year include the Pittsfield Cultural Council, the New England Foundation for the Arts, Berkshire Bank – Legacy Region, and Greylock Federal Credit Union.
The Pittsfield Sister City Jazz Ambassadors have concluded another successful season of bringing jazz into the schools of Berkshire County. An embodiment of our ongoing commitment to jazz education, these visits comprise performances, discussion, demonstrations, and even jamming with the students. As documented herein, the Ambassadors bring an unforgettable experience to the schools. The musicians included Andy Kelly, leader (guitar, banjo, vocals, docent); Charlie Tokarz (woodwinds); Matt Cusson (piano, vocals); James Lumsden (bass); Jon Haddad (percussion).
Mount Everett Regional High School, Sheffield. We did a seminar with the school’s jazz ensemble at 7:30 in the morning, which is their rehearsal time! (Too early for musicians, some might say). The young musicians got a lot out of it, and several came to jam with us at our performance, later in the morning. Here is a clip of us practicing with the students.
Abbott Memorial School, Florida, MA. Kindergarden through 8th grade. We played for the entire school in an underground cement gymnasium. They were dancing to the music. The band was interviewed by the school newspaper, and each class wanted to have their pictures taken with the band. They left the show loving jazz music!
New Marlboro Central School. pre K through 6th grade. Marvelous show. High energy. The kids all left feeling like jazz enthusiasts. The young teachers wanted dates with (pianist) Matt Cusson!
Lee Elementary School. The students were the most excited here! The teachers and administrators said that it was their best assembly, EVER!
Farmington River Elementary, Otis. These students don’t get much cultural enrichment, so, they cherished having live music to dance to, to learn the history of jazz, and how jazz works.
Morris Elementary, Lenox. They sent about 200 students to the show. As teachers were passing by in the hall, they were asking, “why didn’t our class get to come and see this great show, too?” That was the principal’s call. He really wants us back so he can have all of the students get to see the program. Huge success!
Clarksburg Elementary and Middle School, in this faraway northwest corner of the state. In addition to the music, we got to answer some great questions about jazz from. The show was lively, and the entire school attended.
We had about 1,700 spectators at the shows this fall. That would include 1,500 students and 200 parents, PTO members, teachers, and administrators. Thank you for the opportunity to offer these performances, and to introduce our young people to jazz music. It is a true gift that they are receiving! The school administrations thanked the Jazz Festival Committee, our sponsors, and the Sister City Jazz Ambassadors profusely!
Feedback from the schools
The schools reacted positively to the Pittsfield Sister City Jazz Ambassadors’ outreach in 2011, part of the extended activities of the Pittsfield CityJazz Festival. Here are some of their responses.
I can’t thank you enough for the wonderful performance by the talented Sister City Jazz Ambassadors. It’s not often that both students and adults alike find a program so totally engaging. Everyone had praise and thoroughly enjoyed it. We all learned quite a bit about the history of jazz while being swept away by your highly entertaining and interactive presentation. We hope to have you back. – Linda Reardon, Principal, Clarksburg School
As an employee at Farmington River Elementary, as well as a parent of an aspiring 4th grade saxophone player, I was very happy to hear of your planned visit to our school. I’m must say that The Sister City Jazz Ambassadors far surpassed expectations!! Your ensemble was absolutely outstanding and not only did you perform an amazing set, your ability to engage the children (and adults!) was truly inspirational. Thank you for all your hard work and your passion for communicating the love of Jazz music to our youngest citizens. I look forward to attending your future concerts. – Ilona Packie
Thank you so much for coming to our school! It was by far the best assembly we have had in many years. The music was outstanding and the children learned so much about jazz. Encouraging the students to get up and dance the Charleston was great way to include movement into the presentation. Your group did an outstanding job introducing their instruments and encouraging children to play music. It was truly an inspirational performance. – Mary Turo, Principal, Farmington River School
We really enjoyed the performance, both kids and teachers! You guys were great and I love the educational aspect of it. We wish you well on the rest of your performances! – Courtney English, Band Director, Southern Berkshire Regional School District
Reviews of Phil Woods and Grace Kelly at the 2011 Pittsfield CityJazz Festival
The headline concert of the 7th Pittsfield CityJazz Festival was a reunion of sax players Grace Kelly and Phil Woods. Here are excerpts and links to reviews of the Oct. 15, 2011 concert at tThe Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield, MA.
By: Charles Giuliano – 10/16/2011 – It was five years ago to the day when the 75-year-old NEA Jazz Master, alto player Phil Woods, first performed on stage at the Colonial Theatre with the then 14-year-old alto prodigy, Grace Kelly.
That was year two of the annual Pittsfield City Jazz Festival organized by the resourceful, dedicated, and titubating Ed Bride.
The two musicians had met a month before jamming on stage in Pittsfield. That event has become a part of jazz history.
Woods is known as The Man with a Hat. That evening he was so blown away by the teenager’s chops that he literally passed, not a torch, but the hat itself. It was the highest and most personal honor that an artist of one generation might bestow on another. The more remarkable as it spanned not one but two generations. Continue reading: Berkshire Fine Arts.
By Richard Houdek, Special to the Eagle – The veteran and the wunderkind enjoyed a happy reunion as one of the highlights of the seventh annual Pittsfield CityJazz Festival Saturday evening at the Colonial Theatre.
Actually, Phil Woods, the NEA jazz master, and Grace Kelly, his favorite protégé, have made an album and been frequent stage companions since he invited her and her saxophone up to the festival stage at the Colonial in 2006, to join him and his sax.
The two, who appear supremely in sync, offered an engaging nine-minute reprise of their initial collaboration, “I’ll Remember April,” often transferring solo duties mid-phrase.
Among the compositions by Kelly was her powerful and thoughtful tribute to Woods, the title tune from their album, “Man with the Hat,” ably assisted by the members of her trio, Doug Johnson, a fine pianist; Evan Cooper, her versatile bassist, and Bill Goodwin, a most talented drummer. Continue reading: Berkshire Eagle.
Sat. Oct. 8 – Rob Fisch Trio – Brulees Restaurant – 41 North St. 443-0500 – 7 – 10 PM
Sat. Oct. 8 – Ted Murray Quartet – Patrick’s Pub, Park Square, 499-1994 – 6:30 to 9:30 PM
Oct. 12, 7:00pm – The Alma Macbride Trio – Berkshire Music School, 30 Wendell Ave.
The inaugural concert in our “Jazz Prodigy” series
Oct. 14, 7:30pm – The Armen Donelian Trio – Baba Louie’s Music Hall, 34 Depot St.
Oct. 15, 8:00pm – The Colonial Theatre, 111 South Street
The Grace Kelly Quartet with NEA Jazz Master Phil Woods and special guest Greg Caputo, drums plus the Berkshires Jazz Youth Ensemble.
Oct. 20, 5-8pm – Third Thursday block party; North Street and environs. Music, food, fun
Download the Festival At A Glance in other formats: .pdf, .txt.
Jazz About Town (PDF rackcard)