Slide Man Slim - Jazz Harmonica

Dumee & Dijkgraaf Quinteto

2011-04-03T07:21:00.000-07:00

A few months ago when I was too busy to listen to or post about it, the wonderful jazz harmonicist Wim Dijkgraaf sent me quite a few rough mixes from an upcoming album with his group "Dumee & Dijkgraaf Quinteto". They describe their music as "Impressionistic Brazilian Jazz", which fits what they do beautifully. I finally did get to listen to all those rough mixes, and they weren't very rough at all. I was blown away by this group and by Wim's playing on these cuts.

I've actually mentioned Wim before in this blog. He's one of the top jazz harmonica players out there right now. He plays with great feeling and technique to die for. Wim is into Kenny Werner's "Effortless Mastery" and it sure does work for him. The other musicians in the quintet all play beautifully and from what I've heard so far, the CD is simply a joy to listen to.

You too can get an advance taste of the album, called “Heloisando” here (note that the reverb nation page requires you to join the band's mailing list in order to listen to the samples in full length -- at least that was my experience). And hey, the album is supposed to be released this week according to Wim's website. I'm ready to order my copy now!

Nice work Wim!

- Slim.

Jazz Harmonica Stocking Stuffers: Mike Turk, Ron Kalina, Damien Masterson, Rob Paparozzi, Summit DVD

2010-12-04T10:21:00.000-08:00

For any jazz harmonica enthusiasts in your life, here are some relevant gift ideas for this holiday season.

The brilliant jazz harmonicist Mike Turk has a great new CD "The Italian Job". Like all of Mike's CDs, it is packed with great chops, a terrific quartet, and killer tunes. Beautifully recorded in Italy, the CD has extensive liner notes by Ira Gitler. It is available at Amazon and CD Baby, but I encourage you to purchase directly from the artist (like I did) at www.MikeTurk.com.

How 'bout a Tuba and Harmonica duet? LA-based Ron Kalina is a fantastic jazz harmonicist and piano player who teamed up with Tuba player Jim Self on a killer CD called "The Odd Couple" (and yes, they play the theme from the TV show on the CD). Also on the CD are beautiful versions of classics like "Stolen Moments" and "You Must Believe In Spring". You can hear samples and pick this up at CD Baby here.

Looking for something a little less traditional with a more modern harmonica sound? Then by all means go for Damien Masterson's CD "All Over The Map" (see my previous blog entry about this CD here). You can hear samples and pick this one up at CD Baby as well here.

Or how 'bout a crossover CD with great jazz and blues harmonica? You can't go wrong with this beautiful CD from Rob Paparozzi "Etruscan Soul". Rob is a harmonica master who covers all the bases with grace, style, and stunning technique. He's also an incredible singer (he is David Clayton-Thomas' replacement in Blood, Sweat, and Tears) and the band that he assembled for this project is second-to-none. Actually, you don't have to be a harmonica lover to love this CD -- the grooves are infectious and the recording quality is stellar. Here's the CD Baby link.

Well, if none of the above are doing it for you, you can't go wrong with the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit DVD, featuring eight jazz harmonica players (at least seven of them are fantastic -- bad form to characterize myself one way or the other). Lots of video samples here, and a variety of handy purchase options are here.

Have a great holiday season!

- Slim.

Howard Levy at SPAH 2010

2010-11-06T20:33:00.000-07:00

So, in my last post back in August I mentioned Howard Levy's great set with Chris Siebold at SPAH 2010. In case you haven't already seen this, here's a video from that set. It is their gorgeous version of Django Reinhardt's "Nuages". Breathtaking....

Jazz Harmonica at SPAH 2010

2010-08-22T12:03:00.000-07:00

I was fortunate enough to be able to attend the 2010 SPAH convention in Minneapolis week before last. (If you're not familiar with SPAH, and you're a harmonica player, well, you should really check it out. Please find all the pertinent details at spah.org.)

Lots of great music this year, and a fair amount of it was jazz. Some of the highlights:

From the host city, we have Steve Watne and Clint Hoover, who played a mighty fine set of harmonica duets (featuring two chromatics) on the main stage Wednesday night. They began with a few Baroque pieces and then performed a short jazz set. Both are highly accomplished players and they played together beautifully on these duets. The fun they were having on this material was absolutely contagious.

Clint Hoover also did a main stage set with his band East Side. This was a real treat. Every musician in this band was captivating, especially Clint, who plays jazz with ease, authority, and excitement. Clint was also at most of the jazz jams, both formal and informal. He brought great energy to all of these jams and played up a storm! You can find out more about Clint at his website.

David Naiditch doesn't call himself a jazz player (yet) and he is best known for his incredible Bluegrass chops on the chromatic. I ran into him on Tuesday and he mentioned he was playing on the main stage Wednesday night and hadn't quite decided what to do and btw would I consider backing him up on guitar for some Gypsy Jazz (aka Gypsy Swing) numbers? So, we spent some time in the hotel room figuring out if this would work or not and after we found ourselves having too much fun decided it was at least working for us. David played some killer uptempo Gypsy Swing harmonica for half of his set (and I had the pleasure of being his rhythm section) -- it was a real blast. He was also handing out samples of his upcoming Bluegrass harmonica CD -- sounds terrific! Check out David here.

Seems every year there are more diatonic players playing excellent jazz on their instrument. In case you don't know, this is extremely difficult to do and has a much different sound than jazz played on a chromatic harmonica. There was a lot of diatonic participation in both the formal and informal jazz jams. Just some of the heavy hitters: Howard Levy, Chris Michalek, PT Gazell, Jay Gaunt, and my pal who is always at the Bends harmonica booths at SPAH and NAMM: Thiago Cerveira. Thiago's solo main stage set was breathtaking, playing excellent jazz guitar while playing lightning fast bebop on a diatonic in a rack. His phrasing is perhaps the swingingist I've heard on diatonic. Thiago's myspace page is here.

Not mentioned above is my new friend (this is what I love about SPAH) from Poland who also plays incredible jazz on the diatonic. His name is Bart Leczycki. Bart is another all around incredible musician. He played a great main stage set with no backup aside from his live looping, which was done tastefully and creatively. His entire set was diatonic, as were his appearances (as far as I can remember) at the formal nighttime jazz jams. But during the informal jams, I got to hear him play jazz on the chromatic and he was excellent on that axe as well! Bart's myspace page is here.

One other comment before leaving this category. Howard Levy of course played an incredible set on Saturday night. He just keeps growing musically (I think he's physically tall enough already) and man can he put on a good show! He appeared with Chris Siebold on guitar. Howard played a lot of piano, really excellent jazz piano, like... top notch. His harmonica was superb as always, and the set was totally fulfilling beginning to end. Chops to die for, all played with feeling and finesse. Howard's webiste is levyland.com.

Back to the chromatic players....

Just some of my favorite chromatic players at the jazz jams, I love all these guys:

Pete Blasberg, Charles Spranklin, Smokey Joe Leone, Jim Lohman, Phil Caltabellotta, Tom Stryker, Jelly Roll Johnson, Rob Paparozzi, Michael Peloquin, Clint Hoover, Chris Bauer, Randy Singer, Michael Polesky....

My personal favorite moment at SPAH was playing Isn't She Lovely with Michael Peloquin and Clint Hoover. What fun and what an honor to play with these fellows.

Last but not least, the incredible Stan Harper, not normally thought of a jazz guy, played brilliantly in one of the casual jam sessions and played an incredibly beautiful and jazzy solo version of The Shadow of Your Smile (which he mentioned was inspired by the Miles Davis version) on the main stage Saturday night.

A great week of harmonica jazz!

Jazz Harmonica Summit DVD Now Available!

2010-07-11T21:39:00.000-07:00

You can now go to www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com for the latest order information. Currently, the DVD is available on FilmBaby and soon to be on Amazon (already taking pre-orders, although it looks like the sale price may be significantly lower on FilmBaby).

What a relief to have this finally out the door. So far lots of great comments from those who've already seen it. Rob Papparozzi has submitted what looks to be a wonderful review for his upcoming "Stateside" column in the UK mag "Harmonica World", so we're off to a killer start!

West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit 2009 DVD Available Soon!

2010-07-04T18:12:00.000-07:00

We have the DVDs in hand and are just working out the final details to make them available for sale online, hopefully by July 12. Here's a trailer in the meantime...

I'll be posting purchase information here and on www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com as soon as I have it.

San Francisco Harmonica Ensemble at the Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-04-18T14:27:00.000-07:00

The last act to perform before the big finale at the 2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit was The San Francisco Harmonica Ensemble, consisting of Steve Malerbi (bass, chromatic), Winslow Yerxa (chromatic, bass), Michael Peloquin (chromatic, diatonic), and Damien Masterson (chromatic).

Doing all original arrangements, they play in a wide range of styles using just harmonicas.

Each of the four tunes they played that evening was a real gem. Here's their final tune of the evening, their arrangement of Stevie Wonder's "I Wish". This one puts a big smile on my face every time I hear it...

For more information on all these guys, you can find bios, music, and links to their websites here at www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com.

- Slim.

West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit Trio

2010-04-18T14:25:00.000-07:00

As anyone who attended the show last August will tell you, the backing trio was a super treat. Creative, solid, inspiring, and incredibly good sports, these guys were a joy to work with all around.

Here's one of their set-openers, the jazz standard "How Deep Is The Ocean" (by Irving Berlin). You get to see a bit of everyone's chops on this, Jeff Massanari on guitar, Sam Bevan on Bass, and Bryan Bowman on drums. Beautiful job guys!

More details about these players including links to their websites and audio samples can be found here: www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com

- Slim.

Winslow Yerxa & Tuula Tossavainen at the Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-03-27T16:01:00.000-07:00

Winslow Yerxa, that walking encyclopedia of everything harmonica, is well known in the harmonica community for his expertise, amazing technique, and eclectic style. In addition to his talent as a consummate performer, he is the author of the fantastic Harmonica for Dummies, is a regular columnist at harmonicasessions.com (see his latest here, this is great stuff!), and is offering three classes (new session begins April 10!) at the Jazzschool in Berkeley, CA.

The classes are: "Chromatic Harmonica 101", "Beginning Diatonic Harmonica", and "Intermediate Harmonica Workshop". More info is available here. If you are in the Bay Area, this is a golden opportunity to hang with and learn from an excellent teacher and master of the instrument.

Winslow is also a member of the San Francisco Harmonica Ensemble and I hope to post a clip from their summit performance in the coming weeks...

You can read more about Winslow at the Jazz Harmonica Summit website.

Here, Winslow is joined by the wonderful Tuula Tossavainen on violin, doing their beautiful jazz adaptation of the Finnish folk tune "Lammen Laine" at the 2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit with Jeff Massanari: Guitar, Sam Bevan: Bass, Bryan Bowman: Drums.

- Slim.

Michael Polesky at the Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-03-02T06:35:00.000-08:00

I first met Michael Polesky at SPAH 2008 and was blown away by his cutting bebop style on the tenor chromatic (he plays an ILUS Renaissance), so naturally I asked him if he'd like to take part in last August's West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit. To my delight he agreed and drove up to Santa Cruz the morning of the event. He hit the stage with almost no rehearsal time with the trio and proceeded to cast his jazz spell on our unsuspecting audience, who were subsequently treated to his unique and brilliant approach to the instrument.

Here he is, playing Joe Henderson's "Recorda-Me"...

www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com

Damien Masterson at the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-02-17T19:56:00.000-08:00

This is Damien Masterson at the 2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit doing an original composition "Astoria". Damien is in fine form here, as he was all night long at the summit. Absolutely beautiful. After this number, he went on to play Donald Fagan's "New Frontier" and Michael Brecker's "African Skies", but I've only posted "Astoria" for now because I'm saving some of the best stuff to debut on the DVD of the summit, available this summer.

My previous post about Damien's latest album is here.

- Slim.

Jon Eriksen at the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-02-12T19:59:00.000-08:00

Today's clip is of Jon Eriksen playing the beautiful Jobim ballad "Dindi". Jon is playing the classic Hohner 270 chromatic on this number and gets a really sweet tone out of it. There is a wonderful bare thumb guitar solo by Jeff Massanari and a fantastic bass solo by Sam Bevan. Bryan Bowman is on the drums.

There's more info about Jon here.

And more info about the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit here.

Steve Malerbi at the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-02-07T17:52:00.000-08:00

Here's Steve Malerbi swinging his CBH 2016 chromatic on the Charlie Parker classic "Scrapple From The Apple". I love Steve's playing, he has a wonderfully smooth tone and he finds a really nice groove on this number. The trio is also cookin' with a fine solo by guitarist Jeff Massanari.

You can read about Steve's background and talents here.

And I've talked about him before on my blog here.

www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com

Slide Man Slim & Penny Hanna at the Summit

2010-01-31T20:21:00.000-08:00

Here's one of me and Penny, also from the Summit -- our rendition of Stevie Wonder's "You Are The Sunshine Of My Life".

For those of you not familiar with what we do, on most tunes I lay down a background guitar track live using a looper (in this case while Penny is singing the head) and then play harmonica along with Penny's live bass and the guitar loop.

www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com

Michael Peloquin at the Jazz Harmonica Summit

2010-01-31T19:56:00.000-08:00

Here's another video preview from the 2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit DVD. Michael Peloquin played a terrific set that night. After playing two absolutely gorgeous ballads on chromatic, Michael whipped out one of his trusty diatonics and blew everyone away with Clifford Brown's "Sandu".

If you have decent speakers or headphones and can turn this up a bit, you will feel the excitement in the room on this one ;-).

There's more info and links for Michael Peloquin here

For more details about the summit: www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com

First Jazz Harmonica Summit clip -- Pete Blaberg

2010-01-23T18:44:00.000-08:00

Here's a first look at the 2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit. This is Pete Blasberg's opening number at the summit - he hit the stage swinging hard and the crowd absolutely loved him. After this first little medley of Jimmy McHugh tunes (he did five medleys in fifteen minutes) this is what he had to say by way of introduction to the audience "Thank you, I'm an old guy, I do nothing but standards....". And then he continued to tear it up for the rest of the set. This was a fantastic kick off to a wonderful evening... There will be lots more of Pete's set on the upcoming DVD (which will hopefully available some time this summer).

- Slim.

www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com

Summit DVD Update

2009-12-31T08:36:00.000-08:00

Shortly following the 2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit, I promised that I would use this space to publish news on the progress of the DVD project. It would be very boring to give a blow-by-blow account, so here's a very brief update:

It has been a challenge, as I knew it would be, balancing my day job, playing music, and post production work on the DVD, but it is actually going quite well -- not easy, but rewarding and fun. After many, many hours of audio mixing, the audio is sounding great and is pretty much done (not just for the cuts that will make the DVD, but for the entire show).

Video editing started this week, and I am having a ball finally starting to get a glimpse of what the final product will look and sound like. I'm hoping to post some excerpts in this space some time soon. There is still a ton of work ahead, and I won't have a release date until the post production work has been completed.

For background on this event and the folks who made it possible, please visit www.JazzHarmonicaSummit.com.

- Slim.

The San Francisco Harmonica Ensemble at the

2009 West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit

Photo by Jeffery Luhn

Damien Masterson - All Over The Map

2009-11-28T15:16:00.000-08:00

Damien at the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit, 2009

(photo by Jeffery Luhn)

Damien Masterson has a new CD out and it is aptly titled "All Over the Map". This stylistically diverse album reflects Damien's love of Jazz, Brazillian, African, Funk, and other genres. It's his first major release in 10 years and is not only a fine piece of work but a joy to listen to from start to finish.

The harmonica playing is superb. Damien's chromatic playing has always been top notch but his style has matured over the years and everything he plays is very tasty, flawlessly executed, and his jazz sensibility is beautifully engrained in all he does. In addition to chromatic, Damien also employs bass harmonica on a number of cuts. The harmonica is beautifully recorded throughout (as is everything on the album).

Many of the cuts feature Damien on saxophone as well, both as a soloist and doing section work. He's got killer chops and beautiful tone on that instrument as well.

The backdrop for all this is a phenomenal bunch of musicians including Jon Evans on bass, Julie Wolf on keys, Allison Miller on drums, Peter Sprague and Matthew Heulitt on guitar and a number of other folks. They all combine to provide a beautiful backdrop and solid grooves throughout the album.

Currently my favorite cuts are:

Astoria - this tune opens the album and is an original that Damien also played at the jazz harmonica summit. It has really grown on me ever since hearing it at the summit. It has a very beautiful harmonica theme and the version on the album features a nylon guitar solo by Peter Spargue that knocks me out every time I hear it.

Safadinho - be sure to have your dancing shoes on hand for this cut.

Send One Your Love - Damien's Brazillian flavored instrumental cover of the Stevie Wonder hit. Damien did a really nice job on the arrangement as well as his improvising over Stevie's beautiful and interesting chord changes.

But all the cuts on this album are winners.

So here's the important part: You can hear samples and/or purchase the album for download on either iTunes or CDBaby:

https://www.cdbaby.com/cd/DamienMasterson1

Highly recommended!!!!

- Slim.

Antonio Serrano

2009-10-17T10:32:00.000-07:00

Just listened to a wonderful album entitled "Zamba Nueva" by Spanish harmonicist Antonio Serrano along with Jose Reinoso. I think this was released in 2007. It features a terrific mix of tango, Brazilian, and jazz styles. His chromatic playing is exquisite and masterful, the band is great, and the audio production superb. The album is available on iTunes, eMusic, and Amazon as an import (not cheap). I downloaded it from eMusic and unfortunately they don't provide any album credits for this one.

Here's a taste of Antonio from YouTube:

Also, you can check out some of his very beautiful studio recordings on his MySpace page (none of which, at least at the time of this writing, are from the Zambwa Nueva album):

http://www.myspace.com/antonioserranojazz

Great stuff!

- Slim

So Many Harmonicas

2009-09-20T08:45:00.000-07:00

One of the many fun things about the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit of 2009 was all the different model harmonicas that were played that night. Lately I've been busy reviewing raw footage from the event (in preparation for the beginning of post production work) and can report that at a minimum, we had:

Hohner CBH 2016 (Cham-Ber Huang model 16 hole chromatic, no longer manufactured)
Hohner CBH 2012 (Cham-Ber Huang model 12 hole chromatic, no longer manufactured)
Customized Hohner Super 64x (16 hole chromatic)
Suzuki SCT 128 (16 hole tremolo chromatic)
Hohner 270 (Standard 12 hole chromatic)
Hohner CX12 Black (new-fangled 12 hole chromatic)
Hohner CX12 Gold
Hohner Super 64 (16 hole chromatic)
ILUS Renaissance Tenor (12 hole chromatic, rare and expensive)
Hohner Bass
A few diatonics which I'm not able to identify (guys, feel free to chime in)

Those are just the ones played during the show (and I likely missed one or two). I can only imagine how many different models we have in our combined collections....

- Slim.

Community

2009-09-01T21:34:00.000-07:00

Over the last few years I've started to seek out other jazz harmonica players and become familiar with their work. It has really been an eye-opener for me -- I didn't realize how many there were and how much ground has already been covered. And I had so much fun meeting those that happen to be in my neck of the woods that it motivated me to organize the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit.

In addition to attending SPAH or other harmonica conventions the internet is a wonderful way to discover the worldwide jazz harmonica community. There are many online tools for finding other players and hearing their music, but perhaps one of the most significant ones is myspace.com. Partly by design and partly by accident, myspace is one of the most popular networking sites for musicians.

One reason for this is that it is a simple way for a musician or band to promote themselves, since their fans are not forced to sign up as a myspace member just to view the musician's profile, listen to their music, check out their "friends", etc... And many musicians (including me) use the myspace "friend" feature to easily network with other musicians.

Here are just a few of the jazz harmonica players who have myspace pages. You can find many more by going to each of the pages bellow looking through the list of each players friends (many of whom will also be harmonica players) -- quite a network of players here:

Mike Turk
Jens Bunge
Randy Singer
Hendrik Meurkens
Damien Masterson
Tollak Ollestad

Bruno De Filippi
Hermine Duerloo
Howard Levy
Gregoire Maret

You will find many, many more with a bit of exploration...

- Slim.

Gregoire Maret at SPAH 2009

2009-08-26T21:35:00.000-07:00

One of the coolest things for me about SPAH 2009 in Sacramento was the participation and performances of Gregoire Maret, a guy who I believe is and has been exploring new outer limits of the jazz harmonica. Unfortunately, the following YouTube clip ends before the tune does, but hopefully it will leave you wanting more...

A few other things about Gregoire:

Suzuki harmonicas are coming out with a couple of Gregoire Maret signature model chromatics. They had a couple of demo models at SPAH -- these are some very cool instruments: Suzuki Interview
He is the subject of a 2003 documentary called "Sideman". It is intense, but really very good -- you'll feel like you know him after watching it. You can order it here, It is in European DVD format (PAL) and wouldn't play in my DVD player, but it plays fine on my Macbook Pro (and most likely on other computers as well).
Gregoire's website
His album with Andy Milne is really great: Scenarios
He says he's currently working on a new album.

Check him out!

- Slim.

Steve Malerbi's "Harmonica Jazz"

2009-08-25T07:39:00.000-07:00

Steve Malerbi at the West Coast Jazz Harmonica
Summit - (photo by Jeffery Luhn)

If you were fortunate enough to attend the West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit earlier this month in Santa Cruz, you got to see a wonderful set by Steve Malerbi, who plays great chromatic, does most of the bass parts for the San Francisco Harmonica Ensemble, and also is a terrific customizer/repairman of chromatics.

If you weren't there, well, you'll have to wait for the DVD or go see him at one of his Bay Area gigs, such as the one this Saturday night, August 29th, in Berkeley from 8:30 to 11:00 pm.

Harmonica Jazz is:

Steve Malerbi on harmonicas, vocals
Alex Markels on 7 string guitar
Mike Gamm on double bass
Jimmie Hobson on drums.

Bobby G's Pizzeria
2072 University Avenue
Berkeley, CA.

I'm going to try my best to to be there, Steve's gigs are always a blast!

PT Gazell

2009-08-22T09:02:00.000-07:00

As I'm sure many of you are aware, jazz can be played on a diatonic harmonica, but it is not particularly easy to do well. Howard Levy and his followers do some wonderful stuff using overblows to get the missing notes and a few others accomplish this by using what is called a half-valved diatonic, where valves are used on half of the reeds to allow blow and draw bending of the reeds that normally will not bend on diatonic.

At last week's SPAH, I had the honor of backing up (on guitar, along with Todd Edmunds of Jason Ricci fame on bass) a master of the half-valved diatonic, PT Gazell. PT has a beautiful, rich tone and he makes the diatonic really swing.

There's a lot of great stuff on his YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/gazell) and here's an example of him doing the Wes Montgomery tune "The Thumb":

- Slim.

Wim Dijkgraaf

2009-08-20T07:01:00.000-07:00

Wim Dijkgraaf just posted some really nice stuff on YouTube. If you are into jazz harmonica, I recommend subscribing to Wim's YoutTube channel -- he posts often and he's a great player. Here's one of his latest...

- Slim.

Koei Tanaka

2009-08-19T13:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I mentioned meeting Koei Tanaka at SPAH. Here's a YouTube video of him...

That's just a small sample of what he's capable of. He also plays jazz on diatonic. At both the jazz jam on Friday night and the blues jam on Saturday night, he improvised brilliantly on the chromatic. Expect to hear more from this guy. His website (in Japanese) is here: http://www.tanakakoei.com/

- Slim.

Quick recap of a great week!

2009-08-18T07:27:00.000-07:00

What a week it was....

On Monday, August 10, I hosted the first West Coast Jazz Harmonica Summit (see JazzHarmonicaSummit.com) in my home town of Santa Cruz, CA and everyone (audience, staff, and players) had a blast. The other players were all fantastic and we played to a sold out crowd, almost all of whom stayed for the full three and a half hours worth of great music.

Penny Hanna and Slide Man Slim at the summit (photo by Jeffery Luhn)

Everything went so smoothly we were all in disbelief. Haven't seen the rough video yet, but my expectations are high -- hoping to be able to review it over the next week or so. Post production should start over the next month and we hope to have a CD and DVD available some number of months down the road -- no plans to rush this out as it deserves a bit of loving care (multi-track audio mixdown for four hours of music is likely to take a while followed by video editing, mastering, and manufacturing).

However, we will be posting preview clips, photos, etc... on the website in the coming weeks. If you'd like to be on the notification list for the release of the CD or DVD, please send email to me at slim@jazzharmonicasummit.com.

I attended the annual SPAH (see spah.org) convention in Sacramento Tuesday through Saturday and, in addition to our summit players (myself, Damien Masterson, Pete Blasberg, Winslow Yerxa, Jon Eriksen, Steve Malerbi, Michael Peloquin, and Michael Polesky) many other fine jazz (and crossover) harmonica players were in attendance at the various jazz jams including Gregoire Maret, Charles Spranklin, Phil Caltabellotta, Randy Singer, Ron Kalina, Rob Paparozzi, Tom Stryker, Chris Michalek, Joe Powers, Koei Tanaka, Doug Tanner, Christelle Berthon, Brendan Power... Sorry, I'm sure I've forgotten some folks, but wow, so many fine players in one place at one time -- all I can say is the jams were smokin'! Of all these folks, the only one I hadn't heard play before was Koei Tanaka and what a pleasant surprise he turned out to be!

That's all for now...

- Slim.