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Jazz on Jay No. 11- Claire Daly Quartet

“Funk in the Deep Freeze” was a wishful thinking song title Thursday as baritone saxophonist Clalre Daly led three local heroes at Jazz on Jay, an over-heated endurance contest the band only narrowly won. Playing baritone sax with any fluency at all takes as much lung power as it does arm strength to tote one. … Continue reading Jazz on Jay No. 11- Claire Daly Quartet →

Mister Charlie

The Immaculate Percussion Until recently, I greeted news of every death with the hope that it wasn’t COVID. This was a strange superstition about how our dreaded plague somehow drowned out the possibility of anything else deadly happening around here. Not so, obviously. Am I more pissed off that John Prine died of COVID than … Continue reading Mister Charlie →

Kabul (We’ve seen this movie…)

Choppers full of fear Families of graves Leaders lying Pockets of pirates Filling with blood and gold I wish rumsfeld were alive to eat this shame

Jazz on Jay No. 6 – Dylan Perrillo Quintet July 22

“Schenectady is a-a-a-a-ll right,” said Dylan Perrillo late in his quintet’s Jazz on Jay show Thursday. The sunny noontime concert was also very a-a-a-a-ll right.  Perrillo said this without irony; the bassist-bandleader wields a wry wit and was often pretty funny at the announcer mic. But he clearly meant this, and he and his guys … Continue reading Jazz on Jay No. 6 – Dylan Perrillo Quintet July 22 →

It all felt just so…normal.

At 151, the restaurant-bar on Lafayette Street, we met and hugged friends, we heard live music, we enjoyed food and drinks. 151 sits two blocks north of long-gone St. Joseph’s, middle school for my brother Jim and me, and next door to Great Flats Brewery; these two new-ish businesses sharing what once was a tire … Continue reading It all felt just so…normal. →

Jazz on Jay No. 5 – Center Square featuring guest Dylan Canterbury July 15

“I’m not used to being the old guy in the band,” said Dylan Canterbury, the (still dark-) bearded “old guy,” late in Center Square’s set at Jazz on Jay Thursday. “But it’s fun playing with these young guys, kicking my butt.” The trumpeter and flugelhorn player was actually first among equals, though bassist Nicholas Dwarika … Continue reading Jazz on Jay No. 5 – Center Square featuring guest Dylan Canterbury July 15 →

Thanks to old friend Ray Simboli for suggesting a photo safari on a soggy, gray day when rain fell about every 15 minutes and I might otherwise not have dragged my camera out into the wet. I’m posting these despite believing – as I told Ray – he might have shot all the good ones. … Continue reading →