Chicago Jazz Audio Experience

Blues in Chicago with Dave Katzman and an interview with vocalist Petra Van Nuis and guitarist Andy Brown.

 

About Andy Brown

 

Andy Brown is a guitarist based in Chicago. Born in New York in 1975, he has played professionally for over twenty five years. He has had a varied performing career that has included stints in Cincinnati and New York City.

Since coming to Chicago in 2003, Andy has been fortunate to work at many of the area's finest jazz venues with his own bands, as well as playing his unique brand of solo jazz guitar. He has backed visiting jazz names at places including The Jazz Showcase, Ravinia and the Harris Theater. Currently he plays solo guitar every Thursday at The Green Mill, leads his quartet every Wednesday at Andy's Jazz Club and performs with his trio bi-weekly at Winter’s Jazz Club.

As a sideman he has performed with internationally know jazz musicians including Scott Hamilton, Howard Alden, Harry Allen, Warren Vaché, Ken Peplowski, Hod O’Brien, Rebecca Kilgore, Judy Carmichael, John Pisano, Michael Feinstein, Anat Cohen, Kurt Elling and many others. He has also worked with many names on the Chicago jazz scene including Russ Phillips, Don Stiernberg, Chris Foreman, Eric Schneider, Bobby Lewis and Judy Roberts.

His love of great tunes, as well as accompanying skills have made him a favorite with vocalists. Married to frequent partner vocalist Petra van Nuis, Andy has worked with many of Chicago's finest singers. Andy also had the good fortune to accompany Barbra Streisand when she appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show in 2009.

Andy has made many festival and club appearances around the world. Highlights include Dizzy’s Club at Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Chautauqua Jazz Party, the Chicago Jazz Festival, the Cleveland Classic Jazz Party, as well as festivals in Rio de Janeiro, the Netherlands, Germany and throughout the United States.

Andy has provided the music for a wide variety of parties and private events. In 2012, his trio was invited by the Chicago Mayor's office to perform for the Nobel Peace Prize dinner in Chicago where invited guests included U.S. presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, as well as the Dalai Lama and Mikhail Gorbachev. Also in 2012, Andy's trio was hired by the U.S. State Department to provide music for the opening night gala at the NATO summit held in Chicago.

Andy enjoys being a member of several bands besides his own. He works often with vocalist Petra van Nuis, either in duo or larger groups, including Petra's Recession Seven. They have worked together all over Chicago and in venues throughout the country, as well as tours of Europe and Canada.

Since 2009, Andy has co-led a two-guitar quartet with renowned guitarist Howard Alden. In 2013, Delmark Records released a CD of the group entitled "Heavy Artillery" which received four stars in Downbeat magazine and was featured in their annual Albums Of The Year issue.

Andy plays regularly with jazz mandolinist Don Stiernberg's trio. They have worked at festivals in Germany and Brazil, as well as throughout the United States. He is also a member of trombonist Russ Phillips' group, both with Russ' Quartet and his Windy City All-Stars.

Andy has been featured on a wide array of recordings. As a leader, his latest is the 2016 Delmark Records release “Direct Call” which received four stars in Downbeat magazine. His previous Delmark release “Soloist” was his first solo jazz guitar recording and received warm reviews from critics and fans alike. 2015 marked the release of organist Chris Foreman's debut recording "Now Is The Time” which featured Andy on several cuts. In 2016, mandolinist Don Stiernberg released a CD titled “Good Numbers” featuring Andy on acoustic archtop guitar. Andy has collaborated on four CDs with Petra van Nuis, the most recent being their 2017 duet release “Lessons Lyrical."

Andy had the good fortune to learn directly from several guitar masters, including Cal Collins, Ted Greene, and Howard Alden. His most important mentor was the late Kenny Poole, who called Andy his protégé.

 

About Petra

 

Petra van Nuis (pronounced Pay-tra van Nouse) is a Chicago-based jazz vocalist who has been described in Downbeat Magazine as having "a light, gorgeous, and fairly delicate voice...a gift for melody and plenty of rhythmic confidence."

A Chicagoan since 2003, Petra sings at all the finest jazz venues in town including the Jazz Showcase, the Green Mill, Andy's Jazz Club, Winter's, Fitzgerald's, the City Winery, and the Old Town School of Folk Music. Chicago's Department of Cultural Affairs has presented Petra's groups at the Chicago Cultural Center and Chicago Summer Dance. The Jazz Institute of Chicago has featured Petra's Recession Seven band at the Chicago Jazz Festival and Jazz City. Petra has been interviewed and her music featured on Chicago's WGN for Rick Kogan's "After Hours" show and on WBEZ's "Morning Shift" with Tony Sarabia.

Outside of Chicago, Petra plays at jazz festivals such as the Cleveland Classic Jazz Party, the Roswell Jazz Festival and Joe Boughton's Chautauqua Jazz Party with such renowned musicians as Dan Barrett, Nicki Parrott, Ken Peplowski, John Di Martino, Dan Block, Scott Robinson, Frank Tate, Hal Smith, Rossano Sportiello, and Duke Heitger.

Petra's latest project, Because We're Night People, is a live recording of night-themed standards which was awarded 4 stars by DownBeat Magazine and included in their "Top Rated Albums of 2019" listing. Revered Chicago pianist Dennis Luxion blends his signature impressionistic harmony with Petra's lush vocals. This CD was re-issued in Japan on the Japanese label Muzak in October 2018 and was used as in-flight music on All Nippon Airways (Japan's largest airline) in January/February 2019.

Germany's Jazzpodium Magazine hails Petra's seventeen year musical collaboration with her husband, guitarist Andy Brown, as "a magical musical dialogue, which can only partially be described as blind understanding." Petra and Andy's romantic style has been enjoyed in intimate club settings around the country including Shanghai Jazz (Madison, NJ), the Kerrytown Concert House (Ann Arbor, MI), Night Town (Cleveland,OH), the Saugatuck Center for the Arts (Saugatuck, MI), and the Blue Wisp Jazz Club (Cincinnati, OH). Several European tours have brought the duo to Germany (Traditional Jazz Hall Stuttgart, Jazzhaus Heidelberg, Mampf Frankfurt, Le Pirate, Jazz Club Neustadt, Jazz Club 77, Musikhaus Birlkehof) to the Netherland's (Gorinchem Jazz Festival, Culuurschip Thor, Jazz Hall 72, Stichting Jazz Zevenbergen) and to Belgium (Jazz Cafe Hopper). With the re-release of the duo's 2017 CD Lessons Lyrical and their 2009 CD Far Away Places on Japan's Muzak label, Petra and Andy continue to spread their swinging sounds far and wide.

Petra and Andy often augment their duo with bass and drums forming the Petra van Nuis/ Andy Brown Quartet. In addition to Chicago performances, the quartet frequently tours the Midwest having played for the West Michigan Jazz Society (Grand Rapids, MI), Polyrhytms (Davenport,IA), the Firefly Jazz Club (Ann Arbor, MI), the Wilson Center for the Arts (Milwaukee, WI), the Detroit Institute for the Arts (Detroit, MI), and headlined the 32nd Michelob Women In Jazz Festival (Dayton, OH).

At the start of the Great Recession in September 2008, Petra's Recession Seven, a Chicago-style early swing/trad jazz band was born at Chicago's legendary Green Mill. This seven piece ensemble features an all-star line up of internationally known Chicago veterans including trombonist Russ Phillips, reed man Eric Schneider, and trumpeter Bob Ojeda. Festival appearances include the 32nd Elkhart Jazz Festival, 33rd annual Chicago Jazz Festival, the 34th, 35th, 37th, 40th and 42nd annual Cedar Basin Jazz Festival, Fitzgerald's 29th annual American Music Festival, the Juvae Jazz Society's 25th anniversary Festival, and the Illiana Club of Traditional Jazz's 40th anniversary Jazz Festival. The band regularly travels to regional jazz societies such as the Madison Jazz Society, the Starr-Gennett Foundation, the "Masters of Swing" series at Cincinnati's Xavier University, the Lafayette Jazz Club, and the Indianapolis Jazz Club. The American Rag, in a review of the band's 2011 on location recording Live In Chicago praises "a killer of a band that grabs your attention and doesn't give it back until they are finished playing."

You may have heard selections from Petra's 2006 debut CD A Sweet Refrain on digital cable's Music Choice, where it regularly rotates on the "Singers & Swing" channel. In a review, Los Angeles Jazz Scene critic Scott Yanow notes "a sweet voice, a straightforward delivery....one hears touches of Billie Holiday, Blossom Dearie, and Mildred Bailey in her phrasing, but not in the sound of her voice which is distinctive." This CD is a throwback to the classic vocal recordings of the 50's with a blend of duo, quartet, quintet, and tight two-horn sextet arrangements by bassist/arranger Joe Policastro. In 2012, these arrangements were recreated with the teaming of Petra and Andy with four Canadian musicians at Edmonton's famed Yardbird Suite. In 2015, two songs from this CD were selected by famed Japanese jazz writer/historian/record producer Yasukuni Terashima to be included in the compilation CD For Jazz Vocal Fans Only on the Japanese label Disk Union.

Petra continues to play with Chicago's finest instrumentalists including Bobby Lewis, Art Davis, Kim Cusack, Larry Harris, Greg Fishman, Chris White, Joe Adamik, Joe Policastro, Bob Rummage, Andy Schumm, Jeremy Kahn, Judy Roberts, Phil Gratteau, Don Stille, Dan Delorenzo, Tom Bartlett, Mike Schlick, Bill Overton, Bradley Williams, Ron Dewar, John Otto, Stewart Miller, and Don Stiernberg.

Mike Jeffers and special guests Wayne Powers and Brett Dean from the Shout Section Big Band.

About Wayne Powers

Wayne started out as a “boy singer” in New York nightclubs at age 16.  “I wasn’t very good,” he freely admits, “but you’ve gotta start someplace – and I grew up with this music inside me – in my heart and soul – and treasure it enough to gladly do whatever it takes for me to live inside the music.  You see, when I was growing up we couldn’t afford a piano (and we had no room for one, anyway). so I just learned to play the human voice.”

 

Persistence paid off as Powers eventually studied in New York with renowned  vocal coach of the day, Fred Steele, mentor to Steve Lawrence & Eydie Gorme, Eddie Fisher and widely credited with helping restore Tony Bennett’s voice.  Wayne continued to hone his craft,  performing in stage musicals, reviews and in nightclubs after relocating to the Midwest – and eventually, the West Coast.

 

After arriving in L.A., Wayne landed a job with Henry Mancini and, soon after, fulfilled another dream by establishing his network TV career.  But Powers was still pulled to return to his roots, augmenting his comedy and acting work by putting together his “Hoi Polloi,” band with a uniquely joyous sound that dazzled audiences in some of the top west coast nightclubs, showrooms and jazz festivals.

 

The sound was reminiscent of Louis Prima, “Fats” Waller, Louis Armstrong and others who were among Wayne’s major musical influences in creating this unique band.  They released one CD, “Plain Old Me.”

Mike Jeffers and special guest vocalist Jd Walter talking about his new recording "Dressed in a Song" where he performs with 6 of his favorite piano players and mixture of original compositions and well known songs. JD also discusses how he developed his sound and improvisational style at the UNT College of Music and studying with Deborah Brown. Thanks to the Epiphany Center for the Arts.

 

About JD Walter

A native of eastern Pennsylvania, JD Walter’s past, present, and future has always embodied music. From church Boy choirs at the age of six to the American Boy choir school in Princeton to the University of North Texas on a vocal jazz scholarship, Walter has become a pioneer of improvisation and electronic innovations in the world of jazz. His recording career spans 20 years and his purist progressive approach to jazz music has been recognized worldwide.

After extended studies in Amsterdam with Jazz vocal Icon, Deborah Brown, Walter returned to the U.S. and embedded himself in the New York Jazz scene. It was in New York, surrounded by visionaries of jazz, where he began to organically develop his liberated, vibrant style that turned him from straight-ahead to progressive jazz singing. Walter’s recordings include, "Dressed in a Song", “Sirens in the C-House,” “Clear Day,” “Dedicated to You,” “2Bass, a Face and a Little Skin,” “Live in Portugal,” “Live at the 55 Bar,” “One Step Away,” and Guest appearances on over 100 recordings.

While recording his most recent album, “Dressed in a Song,” a life-threatening health scare and subsequent heart and vocal cord surgeries kept Walter out of the studio and off the road for several years.

The latest album, released on February 7, 2020, testifies to his personal progression as an evolving artisan and provides an intimate, inventive collection of standards and originals. “Dressed in a Song,” produced by Walter and Grammy-winning producer and A&R executive Al Pryor, features piano and vocal duets and trios with veterans and up-and-comers alike, including Jim Ridl, Orrin Evans, Jean-Michel Pilc, Marc Cary, Taylor Eigsti, Julius Rodriguez, Ben Wolfe, Obed Calvaire, and Becca Stevens.

Over the decades, Walter has performed as a featured artist at numerous American jazz clubs and festivals in the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, Central America as well as over 80 tours in Russia. He remains a regular in the New York music scene, and has headlined at Dizzy’s Lincoln Center, The Jazz Standard, The Blue Note, and The Jazz Gallery, among other venues.

He has shared the stage with legendary artists, ranging from Dave Liebman, Billy Hart, Tom Harrell, Eddie Gomez, Bob Dorough, Nicholas Payton, Ben Monder, Sean Jones, Jean-Michel Pilc, Bill Evans, Mark Murphy, Greg Hutchinson, Ari Hoenig, Randy Brecker, Tim Warfield, Jim Ridl, Orrin Evans, Seamus Blake, Igor Butman, Nasheet Waits, Craig Handy, Boris Kozlov, Robin Eubanks, Eric Revis, Billy Drummond, Christian McBride, Adam Nussbaum.

Walter currently resides in New York and teaches privately and abroad at The Prince Claus Conservatory in Groningen, Holland, The Jazz and Music School in St. Petersburg, and the Music Wave School in Moscow.

About Bear Williams

In 1976, I attended the funeral services of "Howlin Wolf" at the A.R. Leak Funeral Home in Chicago.  I was just 17 but it was a very impactful moment in time for me. I was just deciding at that time what I wanted to do with my life and I just knew soon after that chance encounter with the late legend that music would indeed become my life's passion.  My high school band director, Mr. George Hunter was the teacher that urged not only myself, but all of my classmates to attend this homegoing service. Mister Hunter didn't let us know who the artist was, but what he did say was "All of you need to go up to Leak's funeral home after school today and pay your respects to a giant in the music industry." I think the seeds of the Blues were somehow planted in me that day. Throughout my long career I've played many styles of music from Rock to Soul to Jazz to Country to Reggae to Pop. But I must admit, that the one music that brings me the greatest joy inside my soul is that of the Blues and Americana roots genre. Perhaps it's the simplicity and rawness of the music coupled with the complexity and raw emotion of the stories that grabs me and just won't let go. The great B.B. King once said that, "The Blues is soothing to me, just like if someone had a toothache and a dentist gives them some medicine to stop the toothache." That's what the Blues meant to B.B. and I can agree with him wholeheartedly.  My new project, "Waters Of Love" is the beginning of a brand new journey in music for me. Its a path that I am extremely proud and excited to be traveling upon. If you're a fan of Blues and Americana Roots music, then won't you come along on this journey with me? I know that we'll have a ball together!

EPISODE 036 Chicago Music Revealed with special guest Sam Newsome discussing his 3 new releases.

 

About Sam Newsome

New York-based saxophonist and composer Sam Newsome often works in the medium of solo saxophone, an approach for which he gained world-wide critical acclaim with his 2009 recording, Blue Soliloquy: Solo Works for Soprano Saxophone. This recording received a five-star review in Downbeat magazine. 

 

Newsome has since released several critically acclaimed solo saxophone CDs: 

 

Sonic Journey: Live at the Red Room (2020);

Chaos Theory: Song Cycles for Prepared Saxophone (2019);

Sopranoville: Works for Prepared and Non-Prepared Saxophone (2017);

The Straight Horn of Africa (2014);

The Solo Concert: Sam Newsome Plays Monk and Ellington (2013); 

The Art of the Soprano, Vol. 1 (2012).

EPISODE 034 of Chicago Music Revealed with Mike Jeffers and special guest Spanish Harlem Orchestra Artistic Director Oscar Hernández discussing the upcoming release "The Latin Jazz Project" due out May 22nd. Visit http://www.spanishharlemorchestra.com/

 

About the Spanish Harlem Orchestra

 

Spanish Harlem Orchestra, the three-time Grammy® winning Salsa and Latin Jazz band, sets the gold standard for excellence in authentic, New York style, hard core salsa. 

Whether in a concert hall or at an outdoor jazz festival, there is no easing you in, they come at you full force, from start to finish. Their energy on stage and their rich sound and musical precision leave audiences mesmerized until the last note is played. With an unwavering respect for the music’s storied history, the ensemble’s thirteen world-class musicians and vocalists come together to create an unparalleled musical experience.

Now celebrating their 15th year, SHO, as they are known to fans, is dedicated to the sounds of the barrio (Spanish Harlem NYC). Their music is characterized by the raw, organic and vintage sound defined by the genre. They are on a mission to keep the musical legacy of salsa dura (hard salsa) alive and expand its audience to those who love great music, not just Latin music. Grounded in the past, while focused on the future, they strive to keep the music relevant, creating a unique and fresh approach.

With six CD’s and five Grammy nominations, this powerhouse orchestra is aware that it is crucial to continually push themselves and raise the bar. Their latest release and 6th album entitled “Anniversary” won the 2019 Grammy® Award for “Best Tropical Album”.

Episode 033 Chicago Music Revealed with Mike Jeffers and special guest Bobby Broom talking about his upcoming performance as part of the Jazz Foundation of America Musicians' Emergency Fund Concert 5/14 Featuring: Sheryl Crow, Robert Cray, Milton Nascimento, Anjelique Kidjo, Stanley Jordan, Ivan Neville and many more.

Watch Live Tonight at 8pm EST and 10pm EST.

EPISODE 032 CHICAGO MUSIC REVEALED with Mike Jeffers and special guest founder of These Days Magazine Patrick Welby.

Visit thesedaysmag.com/ for article and information.

EPISODE 031 Chicago Music Revealed with Mike Jeffers and special guest trumpeter Rachel Therrien. Rachel and Mike talk about her new release "Vena".

Thanks to the EPIPHANY Center for the Arts for the support htt://www.epiphanychi.com

Visit http://www.chicagomusicrevealed.com#windyfest#chicagomusic#musicnews#themusicbusiness

About Rachel Therrien

Between New York City and Montreal, French-Canadian trumpeter, composer and producer Rachel Therrien boasts an enviable CV. She is considered one of the most promising jazz musicians, playing a wide variety of musical styles and rhythms.

Winner of the 2015 TD Grand Prize Jazz Award at the renowned Montreal International Jazz Festival, the 2016 Stingray Jazz Rising Star Award and nominated as Best Jazz Producer at the IMA’s 2018 Award, she has shared stages with many world-class musicians in clubs, festivals and on television throughout the Americas and the Caribbean.

Blues man John Primer talks about his career on Chicago Music Revealed