Pat Bianchi returns to the Mile High | Norman Provizer’s Jazz Notes

If you check out DownBeat’s 63^rd “Critics Poll” in the August issue of the magazine, you’ll discover that Pat Bianchi occupies the number two spot among rising-star organ players according to the 141 critics participating in the noted annual survey. And on Thursday and Friday, Bianchi will be in town at Dazzle, 930 Lincoln, to celebrate the release of his new CD A Higher Standard.

Born in Rochester, Bianchi ended up in Denver after graduating from Boston’s Berklee College of Music in 1998. Here he held down the piano chair at El Chapultepec for almost three years and became a regular on the scene, including recording with an area-based organ trio. He ventured to New York for a spell,  connecting with saxophonist Lou Donaldson and working with drummer Alvin Queen, and then returned to the Rockies. He began working with drummer Ralph Peterson Jr. in the Unity Project tribute to Larry Young; and in 2006 he released his first disc under his own name (East Coast Roots) with Byron Landham on drums and Mark Whitfield (who will be at Dazzle on Saturday as part of bassist Christian McBride’s Special Trio) on guitar.

 Two years after East Coast Roots came out, Bianchi was back in New York, gaining increased national attention while working with Donaldson, guitarist Pat Martino and others. His new CD features his trio with Landham and guitarist Craig Ebner. At Dazzle on Thursday and Friday at 7 and 9 p.m., Bianchi is in the company of Landham and guitarist Dave Stryker (303-839-5100). Stryker, of course, has a number of discs out under his own name and developed his chops with Brother Jack McDuff and Stanley Turrentine. There’s no need to use any qualifiers, Bianchi is simply one of the best new Hammond B-3 players around.

On Saturday, bassist McBride takes over the Dazzle stage for two, sold-out shows at 7 and 9 p.m. with the superb guitarist Whitfield and pianist Emmet Cohen. Before making it to Denver, McBride, who occupies his now familiar spot at the top of the bassist list in the current DownBeat poll, is in Aspen on Thursday at Jazz Aspen Snowmass’ “Downstairs at the Little Nell” series at 7 and 9:15 p.m.  Interestingly, in Aspen, McBride has his more conventional piano-bass-drums trio on hand (970-920-6334).

 Also, over the weekend, there are two festivals on tap. On Saturday and Sunday at Hideaway Park in Winter Park, there’s the crossover and pop oriented Winter Park Jazz Festival that runs from 1 a.m. until 6 p.m. The lineup for Saturday has She303, Marcus Anderson, Mindi Abair and Tower of Power on stage before Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds closes down the day starting at 4:30 p.m. Come Sunday, it’s Dotsero, Norman Brown, Rebirth Brass Band and then Dave Koz and Rick Braun with   (866-461-6556).  

In addition to Winter Park, Saturday offers the Longmont Jazz Festival in Roosevelt Park Pavilion from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. The free event has the Longmont Jazz All Stars, a clinic with trumpeter Bob Montgomery, Dana Landry’s 7 on 7, the MHQ Quintet, the Vibe Tribe, the Brad Goode Quintet and the Brazilian band Ginga that closes it down starting at 5:45 p.m.

 Also on Saturday, KUVO’s free “Jazz at the Movies” series begins at the Blair-Caldwell Library, 2401 Welton. Things get going at 2:30 p.m. with some shorts and the film Jazz on a Summer’s Day, featuring performances from the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival (720-865-2401). It’s not a perfect documentary but it is a classic one. The Library also has a display on KUVO  30th Anniversary that’s up until September 9.

On Sunday at 6 p.m., the City Park Jazz series continues with free sounds from the Colorado Conservatory for the Jazz Arts. Also, on Sunday, the top-shelf pianist Eric Gunnison has a CD release party at Dazzle at 7 p.m. Gunnison, who has been in Denver since 1980, toured with Carmen McRae for a long spell and, more recently has performed as part of the Dizzy Gillespie All Stars Big Band and with singer Roberta Gambarini. Long before I moved to Denver, I saw Gunnison live for the first time at Carnegie Hall with McRae doing the music of Thelonious Monk.

 After the weekend, saxophonist Wil Swindler leads his Elevenet in some pop deconstruction at Dazzle at 7 p.m. on Monday. On Tuesday, guitarist Alex Nauman, originally from Wyoming, has his Organ Trio at Dazzle at 7 p.m., while, on Wednesday, a different kind of elevenet, the steel drum music of Pan Nation, is at Dazzle also at 7 p.m.

Submissions and comments: Normanprovizer@aol.com