Love, and Music, Is In The Air! Valentine's Day Live Music Events

 

Valentine's Day is all about LOVE! 

So Check out this fabulous event guide made for 

LOVERS 

of live music!

 

A night with Joey D, his phenomenal B3 and maybe a crystal ball!

Photo courtesy of Janet Jardine

For quite some time in the early 2000s I was an 'Orbit Room Girl'.The Orbit Room is one of the very FEW places anywhere that has an original B3 Organ. Its a musicians bar. Only those serious about music, and fun, go to The Orbit, and only the best play there. I hung out at Orbit A LOT. It was at The Orbit Room that I first saw Joey DeFrancesco dazzle on the keys. The LAST time I saw him, he was battling on the B3's with Brian Auger and his Bolivian Express at The Mod Club. That was WAY back in 2005. AWESOME night!!! Unfortunately,  I just haven't been able to catch any of Joey's other gigs since then. Something I have always regretted. But then JazzFM came along and convinced Joey D to perform alongside The JazzFM Youth Big Band as part of the Sound Of Jazz Concert Series at The Old Mill. Well,  actually, I doubt it took much convincing. Joey has always been incredible at encouraging the younger generations. Handsome Man had never seen Joey live so we grabbed tix right away. As usual we were Keeners, arriving second in line to only one couple. While waiting, Marty and the other new friends we made at the Dick Hyman Sound of Jazz performance showed up, and wonderful music discussions unfolded. But in reality,  we were all just chomping at the bit, waiting to get in to hear Joey. What we didn't expect, all of us that is except the first couple in line, was that Joey would be taking a back seat that night.

Mike Murley at The Homesmith Bar...... and how I USED him!

Mike Murley at Homesmith Bar

Ok, I admit, I'm a Mike Murley groupie. That's NOT my confession, but just had to get that out there first. I've been catching his gigs for a decade now. I first saw him one Sunday afternoon when I popped into The Pilot for some afternoon jazz. I was blown away. He is one of the foremost Jazz Sax players around, and that's not just groupie-me talking. His music speaks for itself. One of my favourite CDs (wearing thin now!) is Mnemosyne's March, and Reflections is on my Christmas list. I have seen Mike at Montreal Bistro with David Occhipinti (still my fave gig of all time!), The Pilot quite few times, China House and various JazzFM Sound of Jazz concerts. But my favourite venue to see and hear Mike Murley is Homesmith Bar in The Old Mill Inn.  

He was there last Saturday.

Just Call Me Julie.....My Evening With Dick Hyman

Originally published on Days Of Whine and Rosè 

 

Just Call Me Julie.....My Evening With Dick Hyman

 

TD Jazz Fest 2013 and how amazing Jazz can be tainted by Age-ism

Originally published on Days Of Whine and Rosè 

Fear Not The Sneer 

One of the truly wonderful things about living in T-Dot is the abundance of festivals during the summer months. Go away for a weekend and you're sure to miss something incredible. The last week of June (June 20th-29th) was the ever increasingly amazing TD Jazz Fest. Major headliners like Smokey Robinson paired with Martha and the Vandellas (FREE CONCERT!), to Willie Nelson,Steve Martin and Nikki Yanovsky, fabulous well known local talent such as Ori Dagen , Mike Murley, Danny Marks, Norman Marshall Villeneuve along with amazing out of towners and up and coming locals made for a fabulous run. 

Montreal, I have incredible memories of The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal but look out- you may be de-throned as King of the Canadian Jazz Festivals in the near future!