Jazz Scene 2017/2018 by Jim Woodford

      Many of you know that after 4 decades, the downtown Dayton jazz & blues iconic club, Gilly’s closed its doors on 12-31-17. This follows the heavyhearted news of the passing of the founder of Gilly’s, Jerry Gillotti. Very sad news for music fans in the Dayton area and beyond. Jerry, you will be missed. But as I lament Jerry’s passing I also have to point out that many spirits were lifted with the standing-room-only tribute to Jerry on 12-27-18 with all the musicians and all the music fans that showed up for Jerry’s Last Jam! They play the funeral dirge going to the graveyard in New Orleans but they play joyful, uplifting music on the way back. They do this for a reason obviously, life goes on and we celebrate that good things from a life well lived. Thank you Jerry for all that you did for the music scene in Dayton!

      With the joyful march back in the New Orleans funeral procession in mind I am going to take this opportunity to point out that the Dayton area is lucky enough to have other music venues that will hopefully help take away the pain of the closing of Gilly’s. Followers of the music scene in the Dayton area know that there is an ebb and flow of these music venues. A few years ago, Cincinnati musicians were commenting about how vibrant the jazz scene was in Dayton and now maybe that mantle has moved back down south but you can still hear jazz in the Dayton area. Bands play certain venues for a period of time and then those situations come to an end. The Generations Big Band was playing Friday nights at the Mandalay for quite a while as well as Jazz Central one Thursday a month. Both of those situations have changed and now it looks like The Generations Big Band will be playing at least once a month at the Milton Club in Dayton. Followers of the Jazz Central Big Band over the past 4 decades know that this band ebbs and flows as well. Early on it was made up of a bunch of hot young players who blew the roof off at Jazz Central but many of those players moved on to other opportunities, some out of the state entirely. The most recent iteration of the Jazz Central Big Band was managed by Linda Landis, trombone player of Columbus Jazz Orchestra fame but it was recently announced that they will be on indefinite hiatus. The Dayton Jazz Orchestra has also had their time at Jazz Central but most recently they are holding court at the Dog’s Breath Tavern in Kettering [just a few blocks from the Wilmington Pike/Whipp Road intersection] every third Tuesday of the month.

      I have mentioned Jazz Central a number of times thus far and there is a reason for that. Jazz Central has the longest running jazz jam in the Dayton area. I can tell you personally that there has been a Sunday night jazz jam there since I started attending in 2001. The thing about a jazz jam is that it is always different, it is always interesting and you never know what you are going to get and sometimes it is way beyond your expectations. I felt this way recently. Sunday night, 1-7-18 saw some of the same jazz jammers that show up most Sunday nights. I have been there when the stage is full of musicians playing just about every type of jazz instrument you can think of. But I have also been there when there was a core set of jazz jammers and while you may not get the wild and sometimes exciting swings that you get with a variety of jammers, when you have 5 or 6, they can get into a groove that is memorable. This was one of those nights, Kenny Baccus on Hammond organ, King Koeller on tenor sax, Ron Appleberry on bass, Craig Saunders on drums and Jeff Slinker on jazz guitar. You can see these fellows most Sunday nights at Jazz Central. There was a special guest this night, Berkeley College in Boston student Craig Jackson. Regular Jazz Central attendees pretty much saw Craig grow up on this stage right before their eyes and this night he came back to show us what else he has learned.

And what a night it was. Here are some of the songs that were played:

Softly As in a Morning Sunrise

Lullaby of Birdland

Blue Train

Corcovado

Tenor Madness

Impressions

Scotch and Soda (this following a crowd request for some Zoot Sims)

Don’t Get Around Much Anymore

Take 5 (this after a crowd request for some Paul Desmond)

Let it Snow

All Blues

Autumn Leaves (another crowd request)

Chameleon

      King Koeller and Craig Jackson tore it up on Blue Train. I only regret that I was not recording. And when tenor sax player Craig Jackson switched to drums, he was challenged by the crowd request for Paul Desmond when they picked Take 5. It went surprisingly well even with the different time signatures. All-in-all, a very good night. If you weren’t there then you missed it. Jazz is alive and well in Dayton, Ohio. I do want to give a special shout out to Berkely & Avril and Leslie & Roger, DIE HARD jazz fans!

      Two final notes, Jason Swann emceed and played at least two Thursday night jazz jams at Jazz Central for most of 2017, and while he still jazz jams on Sunday nights, his talent has been drawn to Hannah’s in downtown Dayton on Thursday nights. Have been there myself, things are going quite well. Last and most certainly not least, there was a performance extraordinaire at Jazz Central on Thursday 12-28-17 which I missed because I was out of town. But because people cannot stop talking about it, making me feel even worse that I was out of town, I want to at least mention the players, Ismail Mohammad on drums, Mike Fageros on jazz guitar, Mark Smarelli on vibes and the dean of Dayton jazz bass guitar, Eddie Brookshire on bass. I have paid money to see Mike, Mark and Eddie at individual gigs and they were all on the same stage at once! Apparently if you weren’t there you really did miss one. The good news is that Ismail Mohammad is now organizing Thursday night jazz performances at Jazz Central so come on down. See you around the jazz scene.