I hope I can ask this question on here without being fed to the sharks...
So I'm a relative newcomer to NYC (moved here last Sept -- only recently started attending Frim Fram), and I'm looking for some good live jazz in NYC. I know there are tons of great jazz clubs in Manhattan, and I like to think that my tastes in jazz are pretty broad but every time I look on a jazz club listing and find a recording of the musician on MySpace or YouTube, it's almost always the kind of jazz that completely turns me off: in many cases music I would characterize as lacking swing (like it has that icky fake-rock beat), melody, and what I would call "blues feeling" [without putting forth a definition].
And then I have the problem of every time I go out to hear something billed as a "blues band," they play almost entirely rock music which certainly has blues-ish characteristics but isn't what I would call blues music
Anyway I didn't want to start debates about what-is-jazz, etc. just sort of lay the groudwork for my question, which is:
Where/when can one go to hear live jazz music that's, I guess, let's say firmly rooted in jazz and/or rhythm-and-blues styles of the 1950s and earlier?
I'm NOT strictly talking about danceable jazz. For example, I love bebop.
Sorry for excessive wordiness... I just want to be clear about what I'm asking... which is very difficult to say concisely.
Originally posted Wednesday, April 2, 2008 (4 years ago)
You should come out for Blue Vipers of Brooklyn this Saturday, my current favorite NYC band. They also play in central park most days near the fountain. Also Vince Giordano on Sunday at NYSDS, although that is more 20's.
Also, keep an eye on the Jazz at Lincoln Center schedule - sometimes really good stuff, lots of tributes to the classics. Sometimes, although rarely, free. http://www.jalc.org
Air has a good list of cheap or free spots on his thread.
I almost always dance to live music when I am in NYC, and until recently, went out several times a week, so there are a lot of good live bands to dance/listen to.
Originally posted Wednesday, April 2, 2008 (4 years ago)
Please PM me if you're interested in checking some of these out - there's also a place catty-corner to Banjo Jim's that a trio plays almost every night that I've been meaning to check out too.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
Originally posted Wednesday, April 2, 2008 (4 years ago)
Junior Mance has a concert coming up;
April 18, 2008
Flushing Town Hall
137-35 Northern Blvd.
Flushing, New York 11354
718-463-7700 Ext. 222
www.FLUSHINGTOWNHALL.ORG
Originally posted Wednesday, April 2, 2008 (4 years ago)
This is usually a fun event, the first Friday of every month.
Starry Nights, live jazz in the Rose Center of the Natural History Museum. 6:00pm-8:00pm, with beer, wine, sangria and tapas available. They usually have really good bands there. This week's:
Friday, April 4, 2008
Valerie Capers Ensemble
A native of the Bronx, New York, Valerie Capers attended the New York Institute for the Education of the Blind after losing her sight at the age of 6. She obtained both her bachelor's and master's degrees from the Juilliard School of Music. Capers has recorded numerous albums and has performed with many jazz greats such as Dizzy Gillespie, Wynton Marsalis, Ray Brown, Mongo Santamaria, Tito Puente, Slide Hampton, Max Roach, James Moody, and Paquito D'Rivera. Most recently, she headlined at the Jazz at Lincoln Center Women in Jazz Festival at Dizzy's Club Coca Cola; the Worldwide Plaza Summer Festival, New York City; and the Gateway Music Festival, Rochester, New York. She also conducted master classes this past summer at the Mozarteum Music Conservatory in Salzburg, Austria. Capers was the first recipient of Essence magazine's "Women of Essence Award for Music," where she was in the elite company of fellow honorees Oprah Winfrey and Marla Gibbs.
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "rikomatic" I'm saddened that Yakov feels like he might be fed to the sharks for asking a simple and reasonable question.
I love my lindy hop virtual community, but I hate that we aren't always the friendliest place for newcomers.
It saddens me too! To no end!!! But that's what "warnings" and "Time Outs" are supposed to be used for Rik... If warnings and time outs were used more liberally on the cranky and "snarky" people, Yehoody would not be called "Yesnooty" behind our backs.
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
oh man, Ernestine Anderson is at JALC... and she's playing with this dude on tenor... but I can't go out on Fridays or Saturdays most of the time , but... it's Ernestine freakin Anderson...!
-y.
Friday night, I'm Jewy, and on Sunday mornings I get up early to go teach in Suffern, NY
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "asane" You should come out for Blue Vipers of Brooklyn this Saturday, my current favorite NYC band. They also play in central park most days near the fountain. Also Vince Giordano on Sunday at NYSDS, although that is more 20's.
Also, keep an eye on the Jazz at Lincoln Center schedule - sometimes really good stuff, lots of tributes to the classics. Sometimes, although rarely, free. http://www.jalc.org
Air has a good list of cheap or free spots on his thread.
I almost always dance to live music when I am in NYC, and until recently, went out several times a week, so there are a lot of good live bands to dance/listen to.
Where are the Blue Vipers on Sat? I see they are at Children's Aid for the Hop Swing party on Friday, which I will definitely be at!
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "Lindynymph"
Quoted from "asane" You should come out for Blue Vipers of Brooklyn this Saturday, my current favorite NYC band. They also play in central park most days near the fountain.
Where are the Blue Vipers on Sat? I see they are at Children's Aid for the Hop Swing party on Friday, which I will definitely be at!
Ooops, was that Friday? That's what I meant. It's hard to keep track of dances when you don't dance anymore ;)
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "Rik" I'm saddened that Yakov feels like he might be fed to the sharks for asking a simple and reasonable question.
I love my lindy hop virtual community, but I hate that we aren't always the friendliest place for newcomers.
I do, however, wish that our dance community were more open to alternate forms of music, even within the jazz genre, even if you can't necessarily dance to it. Modern jazz is the sh t, which this community might realize, if you were all to drop the lindy hop pretense going into it. So much amazing music has been played and imagined in the last 50-60 years; why limit yourselves?
instead of Yakov, i'm feeding myself to the sharks...
"If music be the food of love, play on!" - Shakespeare
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "pocotell"
Quoted from "Rik" I'm saddened that Yakov feels like he might be fed to the sharks for asking a simple and reasonable question.
I love my lindy hop virtual community, but I hate that we aren't always the friendliest place for newcomers.
I do, however, wish that our dance community were more open to alternate forms of music, even within the jazz genre, even if you can't necessarily dance to it. Modern jazz is the sh t, which this community might realize, if you were all to drop the lindy hop pretense going into it. So much amazing music has been played and imagined in the last 50-60 years; why limit yourselves?
instead of Yakov, i'm feeding myself to the sharks...
Everyone's tastes are different - my favorite listening music is Wagner/Beethoven/Bach followed by System of a Down and Zepplin. Besides one or two pieces I can't STAND Mozart despite being one of the composing giants. However if I want to be cheered up 30's swing is what will do it for me more than anything else. I have to be in a mood for some of the modern jazz - not that there's anything wrong with that and I can be in that mood quickly. I think it's a little presumptuous to assume people don't listen to more but on a swing board I can see why discussions don't travel far outside 'danceable' music.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
I can see how it might come across as presumptuous, and of course everyone has their own tastes.
I find, in general (of course, there are always exceptions), that swing dancers don't have much patience for jazz that doesn't have a swingable/danceable beat, which also stays fairly melodic. Of course everyone has their own tastes, but from my experience, I think this goes beyond taste to being a kind of trend. And, this isn't speaking to people's taste for classical, hip hop, rock, country, etc... I'm sure we all have a broad taste of music we listen to, and just because something is supposed to be popular or historical, doesn't mean we automatically like it (Air, while I do enjoy much of Mozart, I can't stand Vivaldi, and while I consider myself to be open to all music, I really don't like modern country, which tends to be more like pop music...those aren't the differences I'm speaking about).
But within jazz, I find dancers to have a rather limited scope in which sounds they find acceptable for listening. Here, we see someone who has pretty much limited all the sounds of jazz after 1950 -- that's a lot of music, styles, sounds, etc. Me thinks they just haven't given it all a chance.
Maybe it speaks to the obsessive nature of dancing -- we love it so much that we want our whole lives to be filled with only dance-related things; or, maybe we dance so much that our ears are just highly attuned to swing music. I remember when I first started dancing that it was like a drug -- I'm sure I didn't do much else with my time and I beefed up my music collection and listened to swing all the time (in the car, around the house, etc...). And when I'm in a place where most of my friends are dancers, I really have to make an effort to do things outside of dancing, mostly because I can't convince anyone else to go with me (there might be a dance, afterall!). I remember many a classical music concert, jazz club or movie that I went to all by myself in New York because dance friends weren't interested, either due to the fact that the music wasn't swing related, or because it would conflict with something swing related. Such is life, I suppose.
Anyways, this is a totally different discussion -- I don't feel much like starting a new thread on it; it's just something to think about.
"If music be the food of love, play on!" - Shakespeare
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Pocotell,
There is a LOT of jazz that I like that is NOT danceable -- I seriously dig Mingus, OJQ, Bud Powell, JJ Johnson, Monk, ---- many others. Also, I like a lot of more recent music, although I really don't know how it would fit into the almost-useless classification of "jazz." i.e. world fusiony jazz, i.e. klezmer jazz, Balkan jazz, Celtic jazz, whatever else.
Let's try it this way:
To me, jazz is a division of pop music -- albeit one of the most exciting, artistic, fascinating, intricate forms of pop music. Jazz that's too chromatic or amelodic, to me, is more within the realm of "new music," contemporary composition, that sort of thing, which I heard quite a bit of in music school and never grew to like. Either that, or a lot of the contemporary jazz-club groups just sound like "smooth jazz" to me, completely lacking in appeal.
When I said "pre-50's" that was an arbitrary designation, with almost no meaning whatsoever.
anyway I find the conversation about venues and bands much more interesting than all this. I have several new venues in my list. Air, if you were talking to me when you mentioned checking out that venue, I'm definitely game for that, even though I have no idea who you are. PM me d00d...
Regarding the friendliness of this board/scene, I must say that I have had nothing but positive experiences at Frim Fram in the few times I've been there. Only a few times have I been turned down for a dance and that was when the follow was clearly sitting out and not dancing that song. I've had lots of wonderful dances with lots of friendly people there. So, hooray for Yehoodi and Frim Fram. I'll see you all tonight.
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
this is obviously off-topic, but how is it that I have a blue "lindy" guy under my profile picture when someone with many more posts than me doesn't have a guy?
Originally posted Thursday, April 3, 2008 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "yak0v" Air, if you were talking to me when you mentioned checking out that venue, I'm definitely game for that, even though I have no idea who you are. PM me d00d...
I was - and just let me know your schedule. You mentioned weekends are out and I can be a night owl.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
Listen 24 hours a day! Weekly updated shows
Good bets for live jazz in NYC that isn't, um, overly modern
I hope I can ask this question on here without being fed to the sharks...
So I'm a relative newcomer to NYC (moved here last Sept -- only recently started attending Frim Fram), and I'm looking for some good live jazz in NYC. I know there are tons of great jazz clubs in Manhattan, and I like to think that my tastes in jazz are pretty broad but every time I look on a jazz club listing and find a recording of the musician on MySpace or YouTube, it's almost always the kind of jazz that completely turns me off: in many cases music I would characterize as lacking swing (like it has that icky fake-rock beat), melody, and what I would call "blues feeling" [without putting forth a definition].
And then I have the problem of every time I go out to hear something billed as a "blues band," they play almost entirely rock music which certainly has blues-ish characteristics but isn't what I would call blues music
Anyway I didn't want to start debates about what-is-jazz, etc. just sort of lay the groudwork for my question, which is:
Where/when can one go to hear live jazz music that's, I guess, let's say firmly rooted in jazz and/or rhythm-and-blues styles of the 1950s and earlier?
I'm NOT strictly talking about danceable jazz. For example, I love bebop.
Sorry for excessive wordiness... I just want to be clear about what I'm asking... which is very difficult to say concisely.
Thanks.
Yehoodi Featured Topics
(21 items total, 30 per page)
Here's something I started on that.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
You should come out for Blue Vipers of Brooklyn this Saturday, my current favorite NYC band. They also play in central park most days near the fountain. Also Vince Giordano on Sunday at NYSDS, although that is more 20's.
Also, keep an eye on the Jazz at Lincoln Center schedule - sometimes really good stuff, lots of tributes to the classics. Sometimes, although rarely, free. http://www.jalc.org
Air has a good list of cheap or free spots on his thread.
I almost always dance to live music when I am in NYC, and until recently, went out several times a week, so there are a lot of good live bands to dance/listen to.
Please PM me if you're interested in checking some of these out - there's also a place catty-corner to Banjo Jim's that a trio plays almost every night that I've been meaning to check out too.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
Junior Mance has a concert coming up; April 18, 2008 Flushing Town Hall 137-35 Northern Blvd. Flushing, New York 11354 718-463-7700 Ext. 222 www.FLUSHINGTOWNHALL.ORG
This is usually a fun event, the first Friday of every month.
Starry Nights, live jazz in the Rose Center of the Natural History Museum. 6:00pm-8:00pm, with beer, wine, sangria and tapas available. They usually have really good bands there. This week's:
Friday, April 4, 2008 Valerie Capers Ensemble A native of the Bronx, New York, Valerie Capers attended the New York Institute for the Education of the Blind after losing her sight at the age of 6. She obtained both her bachelor's and master's degrees from the Juilliard School of Music. Capers has recorded numerous albums and has performed with many jazz greats such as Dizzy Gillespie, Wynton Marsalis, Ray Brown, Mongo Santamaria, Tito Puente, Slide Hampton, Max Roach, James Moody, and Paquito D'Rivera. Most recently, she headlined at the Jazz at Lincoln Center Women in Jazz Festival at Dizzy's Club Coca Cola; the Worldwide Plaza Summer Festival, New York City; and the Gateway Music Festival, Rochester, New York. She also conducted master classes this past summer at the Mozarteum Music Conservatory in Salzburg, Austria. Capers was the first recipient of Essence magazine's "Women of Essence Award for Music," where she was in the elite company of fellow honorees Oprah Winfrey and Marla Gibbs.
Martinis do not contain vodka. —Rachel Maddow
I'm saddened that Yakov feels like he might be fed to the sharks for asking a simple and reasonable question.
I love my lindy hop virtual community, but I hate that we aren't always the friendliest place for newcomers.
Why It Took Me 13 Years to Learn the Big Apple • My hiphop crew Freeplay performing at the Dance-a-Rama (video).
Check out the Cangelosi Cards. They play all around the city each week. Banjo Jim's and Telephone Bar are two of the places I remember.
It saddens me too! To no end!!! But that's what "warnings" and "Time Outs" are supposed to be used for Rik... If warnings and time outs were used more liberally on the cranky and "snarky" people, Yehoody would not be called "Yesnooty" behind our backs.
oh man, Ernestine Anderson is at JALC... and she's playing with this dude on tenor... but I can't go out on Fridays or Saturdays most of the time , but... it's Ernestine freakin Anderson...!
-y. Friday night, I'm Jewy, and on Sunday mornings I get up early to go teach in Suffern, NY
Where are the Blue Vipers on Sat? I see they are at Children's Aid for the Hop Swing party on Friday, which I will definitely be at!
Ooops, was that Friday? That's what I meant. It's hard to keep track of dances when you don't dance anymore ;)
I do, however, wish that our dance community were more open to alternate forms of music, even within the jazz genre, even if you can't necessarily dance to it. Modern jazz is the sh t, which this community might realize, if you were all to drop the lindy hop pretense going into it. So much amazing music has been played and imagined in the last 50-60 years; why limit yourselves?
instead of Yakov, i'm feeding myself to the sharks...
"If music be the food of love, play on!" - Shakespeare
Everyone's tastes are different - my favorite listening music is Wagner/Beethoven/Bach followed by System of a Down and Zepplin. Besides one or two pieces I can't STAND Mozart despite being one of the composing giants. However if I want to be cheered up 30's swing is what will do it for me more than anything else. I have to be in a mood for some of the modern jazz - not that there's anything wrong with that and I can be in that mood quickly. I think it's a little presumptuous to assume people don't listen to more but on a swing board I can see why discussions don't travel far outside 'danceable' music.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
I can see how it might come across as presumptuous, and of course everyone has their own tastes.
I find, in general (of course, there are always exceptions), that swing dancers don't have much patience for jazz that doesn't have a swingable/danceable beat, which also stays fairly melodic. Of course everyone has their own tastes, but from my experience, I think this goes beyond taste to being a kind of trend. And, this isn't speaking to people's taste for classical, hip hop, rock, country, etc... I'm sure we all have a broad taste of music we listen to, and just because something is supposed to be popular or historical, doesn't mean we automatically like it (Air, while I do enjoy much of Mozart, I can't stand Vivaldi, and while I consider myself to be open to all music, I really don't like modern country, which tends to be more like pop music...those aren't the differences I'm speaking about).
But within jazz, I find dancers to have a rather limited scope in which sounds they find acceptable for listening. Here, we see someone who has pretty much limited all the sounds of jazz after 1950 -- that's a lot of music, styles, sounds, etc. Me thinks they just haven't given it all a chance.
Maybe it speaks to the obsessive nature of dancing -- we love it so much that we want our whole lives to be filled with only dance-related things; or, maybe we dance so much that our ears are just highly attuned to swing music. I remember when I first started dancing that it was like a drug -- I'm sure I didn't do much else with my time and I beefed up my music collection and listened to swing all the time (in the car, around the house, etc...). And when I'm in a place where most of my friends are dancers, I really have to make an effort to do things outside of dancing, mostly because I can't convince anyone else to go with me (there might be a dance, afterall!). I remember many a classical music concert, jazz club or movie that I went to all by myself in New York because dance friends weren't interested, either due to the fact that the music wasn't swing related, or because it would conflict with something swing related. Such is life, I suppose.
Anyways, this is a totally different discussion -- I don't feel much like starting a new thread on it; it's just something to think about.
"If music be the food of love, play on!" - Shakespeare
I think swing dancers don't listen to nearly enough Jimmy Buffett.
Martinis do not contain vodka. —Rachel Maddow
i don't know if you qualify as a dancer... :wink:
"If music be the food of love, play on!" - Shakespeare
Pocotell, There is a LOT of jazz that I like that is NOT danceable -- I seriously dig Mingus, OJQ, Bud Powell, JJ Johnson, Monk, ---- many others. Also, I like a lot of more recent music, although I really don't know how it would fit into the almost-useless classification of "jazz." i.e. world fusiony jazz, i.e. klezmer jazz, Balkan jazz, Celtic jazz, whatever else.
Let's try it this way: To me, jazz is a division of pop music -- albeit one of the most exciting, artistic, fascinating, intricate forms of pop music. Jazz that's too chromatic or amelodic, to me, is more within the realm of "new music," contemporary composition, that sort of thing, which I heard quite a bit of in music school and never grew to like. Either that, or a lot of the contemporary jazz-club groups just sound like "smooth jazz" to me, completely lacking in appeal.
When I said "pre-50's" that was an arbitrary designation, with almost no meaning whatsoever.
anyway I find the conversation about venues and bands much more interesting than all this. I have several new venues in my list. Air, if you were talking to me when you mentioned checking out that venue, I'm definitely game for that, even though I have no idea who you are. PM me d00d...
Regarding the friendliness of this board/scene, I must say that I have had nothing but positive experiences at Frim Fram in the few times I've been there. Only a few times have I been turned down for a dance and that was when the follow was clearly sitting out and not dancing that song. I've had lots of wonderful dances with lots of friendly people there. So, hooray for Yehoodi and Frim Fram. I'll see you all tonight.
this is obviously off-topic, but how is it that I have a blue "lindy" guy under my profile picture when someone with many more posts than me doesn't have a guy?
You picked it when you said you're a lindy lead. Someone else might not've defined him/herself as a lead or follow.
Edited to say: the "Yehoodite" under your name is based on the number of posts you have.
I was - and just let me know your schedule. You mentioned weekends are out and I can be a night owl.
Do you know how awkward it is to have a political argument with a naked man?
The season is almost upon us for Cajun martinies and afternoon golf, Baybee!
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