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Jazz Music ||
Chamber Music || Summer Festivals || New Music || Special Concerts || Mini-Concerts
Upcoming Events || Maps and Directions
“For 20 years, San Diego jazz fans have counted
on La Jolla’s
Athenaeum Music & Arts Library to present concerts
showcasing the rich and varied artistry of jazz.”
-Beth Wood, La Jolla Village News, September 11, 2008
"Stellar jazz in La Jolla"
- George Varga, San Diego Union-Tribune, March 2010
Athenaeum Jazz at the Neurosciences Institute, Fall 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 8 p.m. – Lee Konitz New Quartet
Thursday, October 14, 8 p.m. –Tom Harrell Quintet
Tuesday, October 26, 8 p.m. – Tierney Sutton Band
Series Tickets: $69 members/$84 nonmembers
Individual Concerts: $25 members/$30 nonmembers
Call (858) 454-5872 to reserve
The Athenaeum’s jazz program returns to The Neurosciences Institute for our annual fall series, which features return visits by jazz legend Lee Konitz and extraordinary trumpeter Tom Harrell, as well as an Athenaeum debut by Grammy-nominated jazz vocalist Tierney Sutton. Seating is limited and early reservations are advised! For tickets and information, call (858) 454-5872.
The fall series begins on Wednesday, September 29, with a return engagement by legendary alto saxophonist and NEA Jazz Master Lee Konitz, alongside the multinational Minsarah trio (San Diego–based bassist Jeff Denson, German pianist Florian Weber, and Israeli drummer Ziv Ravitz), collectively billed as the Lee Konitz New Quartet. Konitz last appeared at the Athenaeum in 2007, and Minsarah was last featured at the library in 2009. Together they recently released their second joint CD, Live at the Village Vanguard (Enja), recorded when Konitz selected the trio to join him for his 2009 return to the Village Vanguard for his first performances at the club in more than twenty five years. Superlatives abound for Konitz’s importance in jazz history: “One of jazz’s great saxophone improvisers” – New York Times; “Konitz stands out from the crowd of today’s players, existing with the elite few soloists in the music’s history” – Jazz Times; “One of the great surviving players of jazz’s postwar renaissance” – Los Angeles Times. Known for his intriguingly original tack on jazz standards, as The New Yorker noted, “Konitz brilliantly recasts standards and basic blues from the bottom up.” He finds a perfect set of musical collaborators in the members of Minsarah, whom Germany’s Jazz Podium magazine recognized for their “breathtaking technique, perfect timing, and great melodic richness.”
Lee Konitz New Quartet
The series continues on Thursday, October 14, with the Tom Harrell Quintet, featuring Harrell on trumpet and fluegelhorn, Wayne Escoffery on tenor sax, Danny Grissett on piano, Ugonna Okegwo on bass, and Rudy Royston on drums. This concert marks Harrell’s first appearance on the Athenaeum series since his 1997 performance with saxophonist Charles McPherson. Widely recognized as one of the most creative jazz instrumentalists and composers of our time, Harrell is a frequent winner in DownBeat and JazzTimes magazines’ Critics and Readers polls. His warm, burnished sound and the harmonic and rhythmic sophistication in his playing and writing have earned Harrell his place as a jazz icon to aspiring musicians and devoted fans alike. Roman Nights (2010) is Harrell’s latest album featuring the current members of his quintet, a unit that demonstrates Harrell's skills as a leader of a tight, small ensemble that calls to mind the energy and rapport of Art Blakey’s and Horace Silver’s bands. JazzTimes wrote, “There is no one in jazz today writing with more intelligence, depth and heart than Tom Harrell and Harrell’s playing on trumpet or fluegelhorn is equally breathtaking and cliche-free.” Jazziz commented, “Harrell is the complete package – an exceptional improviser whose talents for composition and arranging equal his skill as an instrumentalist.”
Tom Harrell
The series concludes on Tuesday, October 26, with an Athenaeum debut by the Tierney Sutton Band, featuring jazz vocalist Tierney Sutton, Christian Jacob on piano, Kevin Axt on bass, and Ray Brinker on drums. Nominated for Best Jazz Vocal Grammies for both of her most recent CD releases, On the Other Side (2007) and Desire (2009), Tierney Sutton is celebrated as an artist “at the forefront of jazz vocalists working within the popular-song tradition” (San Francisco Chronicle). With an astonishing fifteen-year history as a cooperative ensemble, the Sutton band has headlined in recent years at such leading venues as Carnegie Hall, the Hollywood Bowl and Lincoln Center, and has appeared at the Monterey, Marciac and Umbria jazz festivals. The New York Times wrote: "Ms. Sutton is a pure jazz spirit who respects a song. Even when going out on an improvisatory limb, she never lets its essence slip away. The singer and her trio with whom she has worked for years have refined the kind of rapport that could only be achieved over time.” JazzTimes concurred, writing, “With certain singers, it's possible to pinpoint the specific recordings that marked the transition from great to iconic. Tierney Sutton's latest disc is her passport into the classic. Sutton's brilliance is her ability to blend seamlessly with the three superlative bandmates.”
Tierney Sutton
The Neurosciences Institute is located at 10640 John Jay Hopkins Drive, north off of Genesee Avenue and just east of North Torrey Pines Road, easily accessible from I-5.
These concerts are part of Performing Arts at The Neurosciences Institute, a series of events presented in the Institute’s auditorium for the benefit of the community. This series is supported in part by the City of San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture and the County of San Diego. Thanks also to the Empress Hotel of La Jolla and to the Athenaeum Friends of Jazz for their support of the Athenaeum’s jazz programs.
Holiday Jazz Concert at the Athenaeum
Solveig Slettahjell / Tord Gustavsen / Sjur Miljeteig
Sunday, December 5, 7:30 p.m.
Individual Concert: $19 members/$24 nonmembers
Call (858) 454-5872 to reserve
The Athenaeum hosts a special holiday jazz concert in the Music Room of the library, featuring a trio of leading European jazz artists from Norway – vocalist Solveig Slettahjell, pianist Tord Gustavsen, and trumpeter Sjur Miljeteig. For four nights in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, the three artists combined to record a program of well known and lesser known Christmas hymns in Norwegian, Swedish, and English. The resulting CD, Natt i Betlehem (Night in Bethlehem), exquisitely blends Slettahjell's beautiful and evocative voice with Gustavsen's lyrical keyboard touch and Miljeteig’s hauntingly muted trumpet. Athenaeum jazz-goers will remember the stunning 2008 debut of Gustavsen's trio at the library, a performance that echoed the words of London's Observer, which called him “a pianist of a poetic cast, a lucid soloist with a sure sense of melodic structure and an often astonishing lyrical imagination.” Slettahjell provides a perfect match to Gustavsen with her “Slow Motion” concept of improvisation, “effortlessly suspend(ing) lyrics in mid-air, a high-wire act where every note is held as she explores its timbral density for expressivity and nuance” (The Independent). Through Gustavsen's subtle arrangements, the trio evokes the hush and intimacy of a winter’s night and reveals the emotional power of traditional Christmas songs as never before.
Solveig & Tord