Jazz Festival

I must start by saying that while I'm writing this Brad Turner is absolutely ripping the crap out of Tom Harrell's MOON ALLEY. WOW!!!! The festival is officially half over and I haven't heard anything outside of whats played at the club. Things started off a little bit slow but have since picked up a lot. We opened with THe Night Crawlers; a band that Im a part of that I happen to be very excited about. The crowd was a little lack lustre and didn't appear to really know when to clap and when not to but for the most part they enjoyed the band. Its a fun band playing the music of the likes of Jack McDuff, Lou Donaldson etc. All blues which is right up my alley. Saturday was quite a night with Tom Keenlyside and ALTERED LAWS occupying the stage. They sounded wonderful as they usually do. This band has a buzz about it similar to that of SKYWALK as Tom Keenlyside says. Sunday was the slowest night in jazz festival history while I have owned The Cellar. Its really to bad to because Matthias Lupri's Quintet really sounded wonderful.......It was back to being packed on Monday night with The Jill Townsend Big Band. This night was a lot of fun despite there being a lot of subs in the band. Hugh Fraser's VEJI took a lot of Jill's regulars out on the road for a CDN tour. You would've never known though. Everyone sounded great. The highlight of the night by far was baritone saxophonist Chad Makela's feature on a tune called 'Dont Call Before Ten." writting by Ross Taggart. It appears on Ross' quartet album recorded Live @ The Cellar called Thankfully. The big band chart was smoking and Makela tore it apart!!!! Tonight Brad Turner's TRIBUTE TO THE TRUMPET MASTERS has been awesome. The band of Jesse Cahill, bassist Paul Rushka, pianist Chris Gestrin, saxophonist Jon Bentley made their way through two sets of music ranging from Dizzy Gillespie to Woody Shaw to Tom Harrell beautifully. It was a good reminder that I don't have to go very far to hear world class music played by world class musicians. God we're so lucky!!

Tomorrow is a big day for me. Dr. Lonnie Smith at The Center for the performing arts. Im nervous and exicted. Mostly excited at yet another opprotunity to play with someone who has become a huge hero of mine. Im also excited to have the chance to play with Pete Bernstein who for many years has occupied a special place in my music loving heart. To me, Bernstein is the finest guitarist on the planet combining an incredible sound, a terrific touch and a sense of melody that is simply sublime. It should be a blast!!!!!

Radio show

Hello all, long time no blog.......

Im excited to announce that "Chasin The Train" will return to the airwaves starting Thursday, June 16th on 102.7 CFRO from 11:00 to noon. I am curerntly filling in for someone but the show will hopefully be extended to 90 minutes by the end of the summer and will become a permanent fixture on COOP once again. I have enlisted the help of Steve Mynett who will not only be hosing the show from time to time but also helping on the production side of things. The first few months will be spent just relearning a bunch of stuff that I forgot and getting back into the groove and then we will start up with some very exciting features etc......

THe jazz festival is just around the corner and I hope you have circled a bunch of stuff on your calendar to go see. The Cellar's lineup is something I'm particularily exicted about his year with its focus being solely on local artists with the excpetion of a few nights. Be sure to circle July 1st and 2nd on your calendar to catch accordian phenomenon Frank Marocco with Campbell Ryga. These two nights are being recorded for what will hopefully be a Cellar Live CD in the fall. Speaking of which saxophonist Coat Cooke and his trio have been playing some wonderful music on Monday nghts at The Cellar. The last two nights have been recorded with the third being recorded on Monday, June 20th. I have to admit that I wasn't to thirlled about the MOnday night thing simply because the music wasn't my thing. Seeing as I'm the owner I could just take the night off. Now I say all this with absolutely no dis -respect to the musicians...as I said the music just isn't my thing. I was hired to engineer the nights and I have to say I look forward now to going on Monday nights to hear Coat, Clyde and Kenton make their music. I get a particular kick out of Kenton Loewen's drumming. Its so tasty!!! Coat has asked me to sit in on a number of occasions and I have turned him down simply because I don't really know whats going on or how to respond to what they're doing. Now I'm looking forward to being able to play with the band.

Another Cellar highlight took place on Thursday, June 2nd. My favorite bassist in the whole world Jodi Proznick brought her quartet to The Cellar. You may remember guitarist Mike Rud being the 4th member of the quartet but now that Mike has moved to Ottawa it has left Jodi wondering what the heck to do. Well she nailed it!!! Tenor saxophonist Steve Kaldestadt who unfortunately lives in London England was in town to visit some family and thats how the gig got hooked up. THIS GUY CAN PLAY!! He swung so hard and played so beautifully I wanted to record them right then and there....well I did record them but I just did it for fun so its not the greatest quality. This guy really struck me and the trio of Jesse Cahill, Jodi Proznick and Tidlen Webb demonstrated once again what playing with each other often and growing up togehter can do to the sound of a rhythm section. These guys are so in tune with one another. They will definitely be back and there will definitely be a record!!!

On another note James Danderfer's RUN WITH IT CD got Pick of The Week on CBC's AFTER HOURS with a very nice write up. If you don't have this CD, get it!!!

Forgot To Post

Another spectacular weekend at The Cellar this past weekend. Kate Hammett-Vaughan filled the place both nights and the rest of the week was awesome to. We haven't experienced the usual slow down that we usually experience at this time of year which has been very nice. Much easier on my nerves. We should have a pretty decent beginning to June and then before you know it we'll be at the jazz festival. I have to say this has so far felt like our most successful year yet. There has been something in the air here. I don't know what it is but everything has just felt better. This year seems to have been easier to book so far to. Its hard to explain how that works but the bookings have just been easier. I have managed to hook up with a lot of singers who have their own following that have really helped fill the club up on Sunday nights which have made a huge difference to our overall sales. Wednesday's have slowed down a little bit but I suppose thats to be expected at times. Its been one year since Crash started the Wednesday night house gig and the band is looking forward to a two month break (July and August) to write a bunch of new material and hopefully come out of the gate burning and looking to record at the club in the fall.

The reno plans are coming together nicely. A few problems. One really funny one. To make a long story short....because of the type of license we have..anytime we wnt to make a change we have to go through city council. This is fine except for the fact that its takes three months to go through. With literally no chance of us being denied the change it scared me because we told all our staff to take holidays from July 4th to 21st. As it turns out we still got granted our builidng permit which means we can do the renovations and expansion but cannot physically use the seats until Council approves the change, sometime in September. Kind of funny but I'm just happy that the renos got approved and we go the proper permits.

It would appear that we have tenor saxophone legend Frank Wess making an appearance at The Cellar. This is big time folks!!! I always wanted to get him here but he's an expensive ticket. It wasn't until Red Holloway who played here in April talked to Frank that he agreed to do it. Its so nice to know that folk like Red HOlloway leave The Cellar and talk about it to their friends and peers and tell them what a great time they had. Look for an official announement soon but you might want to mark September 30th and October 1st down on your calendar!!