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Live From The Village Vanguard-Part 1

Jazz Unlimited for February 9 is “Live from the Village Vanguard-Part 1.”  We continue our survey of New York jazz clubs with the first of two parts on the Village Vanguard.  Max Gordon started the club in 1935 and ran it until his death in 1989.  Since then, his widow Lorraine continues to run it.  It remains the way it was when Max died.  The featured artists for this show, guitarist Jim Hall, the Gerry Mulligan Concert Jazz Band, the Brad Mehldau Trio, Roy Eldridge, Coleman Hawkins, Earl Hines, the Steve Kuhn Trio, the J.J. Johnson Quintet, the Cannonball Adderley Sextet, the Bobby Timmons Trio, the Wynton Marsalis Quartet, the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, the Keith Jarrett American Quintet, the Great Jazz Trio, the Hamiet Bluiett Quartet, the George Adams/Don Pullen Quartet, the Bill Evans Trio, the Sonny Rollins Trio, the Gil Evans Orchestra, the Joe Lovano Quartet, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, the Fred Hersch Trio and the John Coltrane Sextet, reflect the diverse nature of the music played in that club.

The Slide Show has my images of some of the musicians heard on this edition of Jazz Unlimited.

Here is a performance of "Groove Merchant" by the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Jazz Orchestra in 1968.  The tune is by Jerome Richardson and the soloists are Sir Roland Hanna (p) and Richard Davis (b).  Thad Jones is the conductor and Mel Lewis is the drummer.

Dennis Owsley has broadcast a weekly jazz show for St. Louis Public Radio since April 1983. He holds a Ph.D. in organic chemistry and is a retired Monsanto Senior Science Fellow and college teacher. His show, Jazz Unlimited, airs every Sunday from 9:00 p.m. to midnight. The show has the largest jazz audience in St. Louis and was named Best Jazz Radio Show in St. Louis for the years 2005-2007 and 2009 by the Riverfront Times. In celebration of his 25 years on the air, January 24, 2008 was proclaimed Dennis Owsley Day" in the City of St. Louis. He is the 2010 winner of the St. Louis Public Radio Millard S. Cohen Lifetime Achievement Award. Dennis is also a noted photographer, and his exhibit, In the Moment: Photographs of Jazz Musicians, ran from September 23, 2005 to January 21, 2006 at the Sheldon Art Gallery. He is a lifetime student of jazz history and teaches short courses on the subject. Dennis is the author of the award-winning book City of Gabriels: The History of Jazz in St. Louis 1985-1973, published in 2006.