One of the most unique jazz ensembles in the Twin Cities, Soul Café is the imaginative collaboration of three stellar local artists, Laura Caviani (piano), Steve Blons (guitar), and Brad Holden (alto sax). Merging music and poetry, the trio has provided local audiences with some highly enjoyable—and stimulating—evenings, including a “Rogers and Hart Meet Pablo Neruda” set last June at the Dakota (featuring guest vocalist Lucia Newell) and an intriguing mesh of Monk and the beat poets in October at their monthly gig at Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church (with Artists Quarter host Davis Wilson).

The theme was “Made in Minnesota” for the JazzMN Big Band’s second concert of the season last Saturday night, and the rafters of the Ted Mann Auditorium must have been vibrating long after the last chorus. A popular staple of the local jazz scene since 1998, this ensemble of the area’s top band performers never disappoints with its fresh takes on standards and original compositions. Under the baton of director Doug Snapp, JazzMN Big Band paid tribute to local connections to the big band canon, from Lester Young and Oscar Pettiford to contemporary composers and arrangers, including Maria Schneider, Pete Whitman, Laura Caviani, Steve Devich, Dean Sorenson, and John Ahern. In addition to the instrumental charts, Saturday night’s performance featured three popular soloists, vocalists Charmin Michelle and Jose James, Jr., and sax legend Percy Hughes.

 I just saw the musical play “Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill” at the Old Arizona Theatre and I left wanting more.  More songs, more stories, more Thomasina Petrus as Billie Holiday.

The show runs approximately one hour and 45 minutes including a 15minute intermission.  The set is minimal (a small stage with a piano, and a microphone and stool for “Lady Day”) and the theatre seating is tables with white tablecloths and candles, with some bleachers behind them. With the lights set just right and mostly spotlighted on Thomasina you can really feel sometimes as if you are in “Emerson’s Bar & Grill”. I actually turned around once to look for “Emerson” thinking to see him sitting at the bar.

Since 1998, Minnesota’s big band enthusiasts have had the fortune to hear performances by the JazzMN Big Band. Formed to “promote, preserve and perpetuate jazz, America's indigenous art music, through performance, historical preservation, and education," this non-profit group is an amalgam of the best band artists in the Twin Cities. Over its five seasons, the JazzMn Big Band has presented a who’s who list of guest artists, including Arturo Sandoval, Phil Woods, James Moody, Dave Weckl, Terry Gibbs, and Buddy DeFranco. The band released its first self-titled CD on the Artegra label in 2000. Under the leadership of Dr. Doug Snapp, the JazzMN Big Band’s 2004-05 season features some well-established, if not all well-known brass specialists in concert with some of the best of the area’s vocalists.

“Made in Minnesota” is the November 13^th installment of the Big Band’s season. This concert will feature works by some of the Twin Cities’ renowned composers and arrangers, including Lester Young, Maria Schneider, Dean Sorenson, Adi Yeshaya, Laura Caviani, Pete Whitman, Steve Devich, and John Ahern. Local vocal diva Charmin Michelle and young upcoming vocal star Jose James will join the band, along with local legend Percy Hughes on sax. As always, the band will start off with some charts of big band standards but the focus this evening is on our home grown Minnesota talent.

Photos by Don Berryman
I haven't been able to keep up with the writing OR the music so well this summer, unfortunately.  We haven't been to many shows, but we did see The Minders and The Sunshine Fix (with Saturday Looks Good To Me), and Monday night (wait- it's now the end of October?!?) caught the second set of the Dave Holland Quintet at the lovely, smoke-free Dakota, one of the only local bars where you can get a good Manhattan.

I don't know much about Dave Holland, other than that he played bass on a couple of Miles Davis CDs I own, but I've heard very good things about his touring unit, and I'm always attracted to live jazz with a vibraphone player. They kept us waiting for nearly 45 minutes, which was kind of a drag since our surroundings were less than genial.  We were seated at a two-person table that was squished together with an identical table, sitting at which was a couple who apparently asked our server to scoot us over some two and a half measly inches away from them.  I wouldn't have even cared (I didn't want to sit next to strangers) but the woman said "it's nothing personal," which just drew attention to the pointless, awkwardness of it all.  I exclaimed "it's like we're in a whole new world!" but I don't think they noticed.  Following this was a stinky, steaming pile of french fries which did not add to the ambience, and a server who asked to see my I.D. but ignored that of my female companion.  I'm not one for traditional gender roles, but c'mon -- either card both of us or neither of us, but don't act like the woman at the table is too old!

With the Dakota, Artists Quarter, and Rossi's Blue Star Room hosting live jazz at least six nights per week, along with scores of other clubs that offer jazz on a regular basis, the Twin Cities provides nearly as many choices on any given night as does Chicago, and probably only New York City itself has more simultaneous options for national artists. If St. Paul would activate a smoking ban downtown, the Artists Quarter would surely rival the Village Vanguard as the nation's no-frills choice for jazz purists. And with its own self-imposed smoking ban, consistently creative kitchen, and near-perfect sound and sightlines, I'll go out on a limb and declare that Minneapolis' Dakota surpasses the best of New York. And it may be a blessing that there are few nights in the Twin Cities where we have to decide between five or six venues of jazz superstars. Our options create enough indecision!

Don't let indecision keep you from some of the hottest jazz sets of the season, from Madeleine Peyroux to Toots Thielmans ... all live at the Dakota in November.