April News Items

The following items were listed in the April newsletter of Madison’s newest jazz organization, “The Greater Madison Jazz Consortium.”

Madison Jazz Jam (MJJ), one of the Jazz Consortium’s founding member organizations, will hold its second annual Plant Sale fundraiser on Saturday, 5/4/13.  More details will be posted on the MJJ site later in April.

Sun Prairie High School’s Jazz Ensemble I has been chosen as one of the 15 national finalists out of over 100 competing bands in Jazz at Lincoln Center’s 2013 “Essentially Ellington”competition.  The finals will be held on May 11-12 in New York City, and will be broadcast live on the Internet at www.jalc.org.  The school will hold a benefit concert on Sunday, 5/5/13, to help raise the roughly $20,000 needed to send these terrific student musicians to New York. The concert will feature Jazz I and guest vocalist Kyle Ketelsen performing the music of Duke Ellington and Frank Sinatra.  For details on concert time and venue, visit www.spbb.org/jazz as the concert date draws near.  In the meantime, congratulations to jazz program director Steve Sveum and his students!

A New Jazz Venue: The Bourbon Street Grille

by guest author Mark Ramirez.

For quite some time, I’ve been wondering why Madison doesn’t have a larger jazz scene. Given the size of the city and the number of talented musicians in town, we still have a significant shortage of venues that support jazz. If you look in a given neighborhood, this music does not have much of a presence. I live on the east side of Madison. Where can I go to hear or play jazz in my neighborhood? Recently, I started exploring options from the point of view of a patron who is looking for a local club, restaurant or tavern that supports live jazz performance.

The Bourbon St Grille deck overlooking the Yahara River is a great place to hang out in summer.

Over the last few months, I’ve been talking with the management at Bourbon Street Grille in Monona about establishing a jazz venue at that location. I’m pleased to report that they have agreed to open up Wednesday evenings for jazz starting this next month. If things go well, there is also a potential to add more performance options on the weekend. I will help to organize the musicians and bands for the evenings. For now, we’ll start with one band in April. As the audience base becomes more established, I would like the venue to feature a variety of performers from trios to big bands. 

Doctet: a new jazz octet

Madison has many big bands, including the new Fountain Big Band that debuted last month, but not much in the way of mid-sized groups. The Tim Whalen Nonet was very popular and is sorely missed. Here is an announcement by Chris Van Hof about a new group that could possibly fill that void.  

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I would like to announce a new jazz octet in Madison. The band is operating under the name “Doctet.” The personel is a collection of some of the top players in the region, and I am the band’s leader. Here is the list:

New jazz club in Oconomowoc seeking house band

We are opening a jazz club in an old 1890s building in beautiful Oconomowoc. We have a basement cellar that is open now but the first floor venue is under construction and will be opening in May.

I am the music director for the house band and booking agent. On a side note, all performances will be recorded to analog tape and put out on vinyl every 6 months. We want a place for folks to be able to talk and enjoy their company and wine so dynamic control is very important to us. There are no TVs in the building, imagine that!

I have open auditions from now until March for the house band.

Thanks,

Jeremy Brockman
612-850-7311
http://www.lakecountryjazz.org
http://www.vinoetcetra.com

Musicians needed for New Year’s Day program to support homeless writers

Want to start the new year on a gracious note? The daytime warming shelter for homeless Madisonians (at 827 East Washington Avenue) is looking for a group of jazz musicians (perhaps a duo, trio or quartet) to kick off a New Year’s Day reading (poetry, short memoir, and more) by writers who use the shelter’s services and come to a writing group hosted by the shelter 2-3 times per week.

The program will begin at 11:00 AM, and the band’s performance would be about 20 minutes long (i.e., until around 11:20 AM). The musicians would be welcome to perform alone or – if they’d like – be accompanied by one or more of the day’s featured poets. Local spoken word poet and producer Heymiss Progress (a.k.a. Sabrina Madison) will be the MC. Refreshments will be served.

The shelter is hoping the musicians will donate their services, but could offer a $50 honorarium to the band if need be. The musicians will need to bring their own equipment, and will be able to plug in to the shelter’s electric service. Participating musicians will be added to the shelter’s Facebook event and a (hand drawn) flyer that one of our shelter family is creating.

If you’re interested, please contact program coordinator Meg Rothstein, megrothstein@gmail.com. And please forward this message to any musicians you know who might be interested in performing. Thanks for considering this request.

Madison Area jazz tidbits

Madison Music Foundry is starting a jazz workshop open to all ages. Rehearsals start April 20-22 and the gig is June 16th. Here ‘s a link to more information.

UW – Whitewater is hiring a jazz bassist. Here’s the ad.

The Richard Davis Foundation Bass Conference is coming up, April 6 and 7th. The faculty concert on April 6th is free and highly recommended.

Madison Jazz Jam has started hosting jams at the East Side Club on Monona Drive near Olbrich Park.  Great jazz and great views of the lake.

Madison Jazz Jam is having a fundraising plant sale on Saturday, April 28th from 8:30 am to 1 pm at 4123 S. Sunset Drive (near-west side 1 block from Mineral Point Rd). They are looking for volunteers and plants,  and hoping to borrow a canopy to protect shoppers in case of rain.  Contact MJJ here.