September 10, 2004

Pop and Jazz Listings

selective listing by critics of The Times: New or noteworthy pop and jazz concerts in the New York metropolitan region this weekend. * denotes a highly recommended concert.

MUHAL RICHARD ABRAMS ENSEMBLE, SOLO, Community Church of New York, 40 East 35th Street, Manhattan, (212) 594-7149. Two different sets led from one of the most accomplished composers and pianists of the 1960's experimental-jazz generation. The first is a group that includes the saxophonist Aaron Stewart, the bassist Brad Jones and the drummer Reggie Nicholson; the second is solo piano. Tonight at 8; tickets are $20 (Ben Ratliff).

* BEN ALLISON'S MEDICINE WHEEL, Birdland, 315 West 44th Street, Clinton, (212) 581-3080. The music that the bassist Ben Allison writes for his octet, Medicine Wheel, is fast moving and carefully put together, with echoes of all that young jazz musicians are listening to these days: dance music, funk, Ellington, North African music and so on. But what distinguishes Mr. Allison's mixtures is that they aren't lumpy, shallow demonstrations of A coexisting with B; he uses all kinds of felicitous arranging devices to make the ensemble cohere, harmonies and rhythms and panning effects and changes in texture that run through the band like waves. There is room for volume and swing and some wild solos, but overall Mr. Allison's music tends to be very composed; it's all within a plan of escaping jazz clichés. Tonight and tomorrow night at 9 and 11; cover charge is $30, and there is a $10 minimum (Ratliff).

PETER APFELBAUM & THE NEW YORK HIEROGLYPHICS, Jazz Gallery, 290 Hudson Street, South Village, (212) 242-1063. Mr. Apfelbaum, reared in the Bay Area, is a connector: his work has been about finding the affinities between jazz and Latin and African music. Tonight and tomorrow night at 9 and 10:30; admission is $15 a set (Ratliff).

* CYRO BAPTISTA'S BEAT THE DONKEY, Makor, 35 West 67th Street, Manhattan, (212) 601-1000. Cyro Baptista, a Brazilian percussionist who is fond of melody and humor as well as rhythm, leads a troupe of percussionists and dancers in Beat the Donkey, his 10-member minicarnival, playing instruments and rhythms that are both traditional and newly concocted. Tomorrow night at 9; admission is $15 (Jon Pareles).

* KENNY BARRON SEXTET, Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Avenue South, at 11th Street, West Village, (212) 255-4037. Mr. Barron, the pianist who has been a widespread presence in jazz over the last three decades, seeks out collaborators of various generations and styles and works energetically on the bandstand. This group includes the saxophonists David Sanchez and Vincent Herring, the trumpeter Terrell Stafford, the bassist Kiyoshi Kitagawa and the drummer Ben Riley. Tonight through Sunday night at 9 and 11; cover charge is $30 (Ratliff).

* DAVE BINNEY AND FRIENDS, 55 Bar, 55 Christopher Street, West Village, (212) 929-9883. This weekend, Mr. Binney, a nimble alto saxophonist who also experiments with live digital processing in his shows — a rarity in the jazz world — gets together with some of his colleagues, who are also among the best younger jazz musicians in the country. They include the tenor saxophonist Chris Potter, the pianists Craig Taborn and Jacob Sacks, the guitarist Adam Rogers, the bassist Scott Colley and the drummer Brian Blade. He has become a common presence at this little club as it redefines itself toward a newer kind of jazz. Tonight through Sunday at 9 and 11 p.m. and 12:30 a.m.; cover charge is $10 (Ratliff).

* BILL CHARLAP TRIO, Jazz Standard, 116 East 27th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-2232. For about seven years, Mr. Charlap has had a steady trio with the bassist Peter Washington and the drummer Kenny Washington; his performances have become extraordinary displays of discipline and improvisation — the wonders of an organized, creative mind. Tonight through Sunday night at 7:30 and 9:30, with an 11:30 set tonight and tomorrow; cover charge is $25, $20 on Sunday (Ratliff).

GEORGE COLEMAN QUARTET, Smoke, 2751 Broadway, at 106th Street, (212) 864-6662. Mr. Coleman, the tenor saxophonist probably best known for the great couple of years he spent with Miles Davis's quintet in the early 1960's, often plays around town with the pianist Harold Mabern. These two men, adept at the post-bop rhythmic and harmonic vocabulary, are from Memphis and have a lot of history between them, and it shows. Mr. Mabern is on hand in this group, along with the bassist John Webber and the drummer Joe Farnsworth. Tonight and tomorrow night at 9, 11 and 12:30; cover charge is $20 (Ratliff).

SANDRA COLLINS, Avalon, 662 Avenue of the Americas, at 20th Street, Chelsea, (212) 807-7780. A late-night dance party starring Sandra Collins, who tends toward clean, energetic progressive-house tracks, letting misty atmospherics and grand synthesizers glide over precise rhythm tracks. Tomorrow night after 10; admission is $30 (Kelefa Sanneh).

* CHARLES DAVIS QUARTET, the Jazz Spot, 375 Kosciuszko Street, entrance at 179 Marcus Garvey Boulevard, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, (718) 453-7825; www.thejazz .8m.com. The saxophonist Charles Davis has played in supporting roles with Dinah Washington, Steve Lacy, Kenny Dorham, Sun Ra, Barry Harris and others. He is best known for playing the baritone saxophone, but he also plays with a rather elegant understatement, balancing melodic embellishment with the kind of magpie's relationship to chords that Coleman Hawkins practiced. Now in his 70's, he is the kind of musician worth paying attention to: he has the secrets of the past. Tomorrow night at 9; admission is $10 (Ratliff).

EL GRAN COMBO/SPANISH HARLEM ORCHESTRA, Lehman Center for the Performing Arts, 250 Bedford Park Boulevard West, at Goulden Avenue, Bedford Park, the Bronx, (718) 960-8833. El Gran Combo was formed in 1962 and has been consistently on the Latin charts ever since. The Spanish Harlem Orchestra reclaims salsa classics under the direction of the keyboardist Oscar Hernandez. Tonight at 8; tickets are $25 to $45 (Pareles).

* THE EX, PANTHERS, Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard Street, TriBeCa, (212) 219-3006. The Ex, a band from Amsterdam that rarely visits the United States, combines the bent oom-pahs of a European heritage, surreal and politicized lyrics and the precise dissonances and cantilevered structures of progressive rock into songs with a bleak, brittle wit. Panthers play a New York version of harsh political rock, with plenty of dissonant guitars. Tomorrow night at 10:30; tickets are $12 in advance, $14 tomorrow (Pareles).

FIELDWORK, Whitney Museum of American Art, 1845 Madison Avenue, at 75th Street, (800) 944-8639; www.whitney.org. A cooperative trio, including the pianist Vijay Iyer, the saxophonist Aaron Stewart and the drummer Eliot Humberto Kavee. They make intense, twisting music, precise here and free-floating there; it's a balancing act. Tonight at 7; admission is pay what your wish (Ratliff).

SALLY FINGERETT, Satalla, 37 West 26th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-1155. The songwriter Sally Fingerett performs songs from her show "Faces on My Wall," about her family and other Jews past and present, singing with humor and heart. "Though my nose has been revised, I fit right in," she sings. She performs as part of the New York Jewish Music and Heritage Festival (See below). Tomorrow night at 10; tickets are $15 (Pareles).

* JOHN WESLEY HARDING, KELLY HOGAN AND NORA O'CONNOR, Joe's Pub, at the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street, at Astor Place, East Village, (212) 539-8778 or (212) 239-6200. Kelly Hogan, who has a torchy voice and a streak of country, has sung duets with both of her companions on this shared bill: John Wesley Harding, whose songs can be rueful or cynical, and Nora O'Connor, who has sung with Andrew Bird's group Bowl of Fire. They'll sing individual sets and trade duos and trios, backed by Ms. Hogan's band. Tomorrow night at 7 and 9:30; tickets are $20 (Pareles).

DAVY JONES, THE TURTLES, FLO AND EDDIE, THE GRASS ROOTS, ROB GRILL, THE BUCKINGHAMS, Westbury Music Fair, 960 Brush Hollow Road, Westbury, N.Y., (516) 334-0800. It's a back-to-nature bill of 1960's oldies, with fauna including a Monkee (Davy Jones) and Turtles (Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, a k a Flo and Eddie, who still sing "Happy Together") and, for flora, Rob Grill of the Grass Roots, whose hits include "Midnight Confessions" and "Baby Hold On." The Buckinghams, whose hits was "Kind of a Drag," are also on the program. Tomorrow night at 8; tickets are $41.50 (Pareles).

KLEZSKA, Satalla, 37 West 26th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-1155. Klezska mixes the Eastern European bounce of klezmer with the Jamaican bounce of ska. It's appearing as part of the New York Jewish Music and Heritage Festival. Sunday afternoon at 2; admission is $12 for adults, $7 for children under 12, or $40 a family (Pareles).

AL KOOPER AND THE REKOOPERATORS, B. B. King Blues Club and Grill, 243 West 42nd Street, Manhattan, (212) 997-4144. The keyboardist Al Kooper has a résumé full of unlikely connections. He was a founder of the Blues Project and Blood, Sweat and Tears; the organ player who helped define the sound of folk-rock when he backed Bob Dylan on "Like a Rolling Stone"; and the producer of Lynyrd Skynyrd. He has always been happiest at the cusp of blues, jazz and pop. This concert is a tribute to the blues guitarist Mike Bloomfield, with whom Mr. Kooper made "Super Session" in 1968; the band includes Jimmy Vivino on guitar and Anton Fig on drums. Sunday night at 8; tickets are $20 (Pareles).

LAIKA AND THE COSMONAUTS, Pianos, 158 Ludlow Street, below Stanton Street, Lower East Side, (212) 505-3733; and Mercury Lounge, 217 East Houston Street, at Ludlow Street, Lower East Side, (212) 260-4700. Laika and the Cosmonauts, from Finland, have devoted themselves to the exotic music of California: surf-rock. At Pianos tonight at 10, with the Latebirds at 8 and Barbacoa — with James Chance of the Contortions as guest — at 11, along with a screening of the Finnish film "L.A. Without a Map"; admission is $12. At Mercury Lounge tomorrow night at 9:30, in the middle of a bill with Isaiah at 7:30, Pink Steel at 8:30, Hair Supply at 10:30, and Baby Dayliner at 11:30; admission is $10 (Pareles).

* LIGHTNING BOLT, the Hook, 18 Commerce Street, near Columbia Street, Red Hook, Brooklyn, (718) 797-3007. This anarchic bass-and-drums duo is known for letting wild squalls of bass guitar collide with pummeling, galloping drums. On "Wonderful Rainbow," the duo makes its sweetest racket so far: more often than you'd expect, a melody emerges from the scrum and sees daylight, dashing off toward the horizon. Tomorrow night at 9, with Afrirampo, Made in Mexico, Mouthus and No Doctors; tickets are $15 (Sanneh).

JESSE MALIN, Bowery Ballroom, 6 Delancey Street, near the Bowery, Lower East Side, (212) 533-2111. Jesse Malin led D Generation, the glam-rock kings of St. Mark's Place, and has gone on to a solo career that's considerably more earnest. Tomorrow night at 11, with the Stalkers at 9 and the Damnwells at 10; tickets are $15 (Pareles).

MARAH, ERIC AMBEL AND THE ROSCOE TRIO, Sin-é, 148 Attorney Street, Lower East Side, (212) 388-0077. Philadelphia isn't that far from the Jersey Shore, and Marah, a Philadelphia band, can't avoid comparisons to early Bruce Springsteen for good reason: its articulate songs are doused in greasy, sweaty, exuberant rock. Eric Ambel, a k a Roscoe, is a guitarist who has become one of the most important producers of roots-rock albums. Tomorrow night at 8; tickets are $10 in advance, $12 tomorrow (Pareles).

SUSAN McKEOWN, Fez, 380 Lafayette Street, at Great Jones Street, East Village, (212) 533-2680. Susan McKeown, a Dubliner who now lives in New York, puts her forthright and unmistakably Celtic singing atop arrangements that stretch a long way from Ireland. Tonight, doors open at 7; admission is $15 (Pareles).

MIKVEH, Satalla, 37 West 26th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-1155. Mikveh brings together women from various klezmer bands, including the fiddler Alicia Svigals from the Klezmatics, the singer Adrienne Cooper, the trumpeter Susan Watts, the accordionist Lauren Brody and the bassist Catherine Popper. Sunday at 5 p.m.; admission is $12 (Pareles).

BEN MONDER, Barbes, 376 Ninth Street, at Sixth Avenue, Park Slope, Brooklyn, (718) 965-9177. A regular with bands led by musicians like Paul Motian and Lee Konitz, as well as a powerfully inventive guitarist in his own material, Mr. Monder plays widespread chords you've never heard, frequently going into a kind of gentle outer-space music. Tonight at 9; call for cover charge (Ratliff).

NEKTAR, CARAVAN, B. B. King Blues Club and Grill, 243 West 42nd Street, Manhattan, (212) 997-4144. Nektar, formed in Germany in 1969, and Caravan, formed in England in the late 1960's, were progressive rockers who were fond of elaborate constructions and keyboard variations; Nektar leaned toward pomp, Caravan toward whimsy. They never reached the arena circuit, but they found enough fans to persist for three decades Tomorrow night at 7:30; tickets are $28 (Pareles).

NEW YORK JEWISH MUSIC AND HERITAGE FESTIVAL, Pier 17, South Street Seaport, www.oyhoo.com. Part of a continuing festival celebrating 350 years of Jewish music in America, this all-day, nine-band concert offers some of the best of the jazz-informed Jewish-themed music in New York right now, including the superb clarinetist Andy Statman and his trio, and the trumpeter Steven Bernstein, with his band Diaspora Soul mixing Jewish melodies, New Orleans soul and cha-cha rhythm. Also scheduled are the Frank London Brass Allstars, De Amsterdam Klezmer Band, the New Orleans Klezmer Allstars, Pharaoh's Daughter, Blue Fringe, the Moshav Band and Matisyahu. Sunday, beginning at noon, preceded by the arrival of a ship representing the initial Jewish immigration (Ratliff).

* NEW YORK WORLD FESTIVAL, Central Park Summerstage, midpark at 69th Street, Manhattan, (212) 545-7536. Not the whole world, but Mexico and Colombia provide music for what should be an afternoon of oom-pah, trumpets and amor, presented by the World Music Institute and the Center for Traditional Music and Dance. The Mexican music comes from Banda Manzanera, a brass band that plays the raucous, joyfully out-of-tune arrangements heard in village squares and on radio stations from Mexico to Los Angeles, and from Mariachi Real de Mexico, a mariachi group of musicians and dancers based in Queens. The Colombian part features Aniceto Molina, a top Colombian performer of vallenato music, accordion-driven songs that might remind American listeners of Louisiana zydeco, and La Cumbiamba Eneyé from Brooklyn, which plays Colombian styles including gaitero (which features a wooden flute called the gaita) and Colombian brass-band music. Sunday afternoon, there are dance workshops from 1 to 2:45, followed by the concert at 3; free, with a $10 suggested donation (Pareles).

TOM PAXTON, Joe's Pub, at the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street, at Astor Place, East Village, (212) 539-8778 or (212) 239-6200. Tom Paxton has written songs like "The Last Thing on My Mind" that are so unassumingly right they seem traditional, and since the 1960's he has also written topical songs that show quick reflexes and a wry but clear-headed sense of humor. Sunday night at 7; admission is $25 (Pareles).

* RAINER MARIA, Mercury Lounge, 217 East Houston Street, Lower East Side, (212) 260-4700. Everything is in flux in the music of Rainer Maria. From verse to verse, its songs sound like hurtling punk or grand arena-rock or pensive folk-rock. But amid the musical shifts and ambivalent lyrics, the music is full of muscle and conviction. Tonight at 11:30; admission is $12 (Pareles).

TERRE ROCHE, Satalla, 37 West 26th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-1155. Terre Roche, one of the three sisters in the Roches, continues to write sly, thoughtful, tender songs that may not be as cozy as they seem. Her sister Maggie Roche and Richard Barone will be sitting in. Tomorrow night at 7:30; admission is $12 (Pareles).

* SIMON AND THE BAR SINISTERS, Rodeo Bar, 375 Third Avenue, at 27th Street, Manhattan, (212) 683-6500. Simon Chardiet is the kind of guitarist that bar-band fans dream of finding: a one-man twang meltdown who knows where surf meets blues, rockabilly meets klezmer, country meets punk. His songs are wryly frustrated; his guitar solos assuage his troubles with the grand sweep of American music. Tonight at 10; free (Pareles).

* TED SIROTA'S REBEL SOULS, Brecht Forum, 122 West 27th Street, Chelsea, (212) 242-4201. A drummer from Chicago, Ted Sirota, has put together a band that includes some of the better young musicians in Chicago who can play on both sides of the inside and outside split in jazz aesthetics — which is to say they take their cues from bop harmony and swing rhythm as well as the dynamics of free jazz and Ornette Coleman. (Besides Mr. Sirota, they are the saxophonist Geof Bradfield, the guitarist Jeff Parker, the trombonist Jeb Bishop and the bassist Clark Sommers.) The band's recent album, "Breeding Resistance" (Delmark), is full of urgent political themes and smart ensemble playing that thickens up into collective jamming; here and there reggae rhythm takes over. Tomorrow night at 9; admission is $10 (Ratliff).

SOULFLY, Irving Plaza, 17 Irving Place, at 15th Street, Manhattan, (212) 777-6800. The Brazilian singer Max Cavelera is a heavy-metal survivor. His old band, Sepultura, worked through the 90's, establishing a worldwide audience and occasionally collaborating with compatriots like Carlinhos Brown; since then, with Soulfly, he has become a kind of Bob Marley of metal, preaching unity and peaceful tribalism. He sings some of his lyrics in Portuguese, the rhythm section flirts with reggae rhythms, and occasionally the big surdo drums of samba poke out from between force-fields of metal guitar riffing. The band Ill Niño opens. Sunday night at 7:30; tickets are $24.50 (Ratliff).

TABANKA DJAZ, Satalla, 37 West 26th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-1155. Tabanka Djaz builds its rock on the traditional gumbe rhythm from Guinea-Bissau; it has become one of the most popular bands in Portuguese-speaking Africa and recently collaborated with the Brazilian samba composer Martinho da Vila. Tonight at 10 and midnight, sharing the bill with Jorge Neto; admission is $20 (Pareles).

* CLARK TERRY QUINTET, Blue Note, 131 West Third Street, West Village, (212) 475-8592. The trumpeter and fluegelhornist Clark Terry is one of the most beloved musicians in jazz, not just for his sense of humor, which can crack the most glazed of New York faces even at its floppiest, but for his incredible ability to improvise. Catch him on the right night, and he will slay you with a floating sense of time, mastery of harmony and that knack for playing the perfect note that only the great ones learn. Tonight through Sunday night at 8 and 10:30; cover charge is $30 at the tables, with a $5 minimum; $20 at the bar with a one-drink minimum (Ratliff).

THE TOASTERS, the Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard Street, TriBeCa, (212) 219-3006. Jamaican ska was fast enough to make punk-rockers happy, and its revival has survived for a quarter-century. A dozen ska bands, with the Toasters as headliners, bring bounce, oom-pah and horn riffs to all three floors of the Knitting Factory. The bill also includes King Django, Coolie Ranx, Westbound Train and Spider Nick. Tonight at 7:30; tickets are $15 (Pareles).

* TO LIVE AND SHAVE IN L.A., Northsix, 66 North Sixth Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, (718) 599-5103. This wildly inaccessible group specializes in gargled, tangled constructions that gesture (violently, if mystifyingly) toward something more familiar: rock 'n' roll. This incarnation of the band includes a few special guests, among them the hard-rock performance artist Andrew W. K., who made noise-rock long before he made ads for Kit Kat. Tonight at 9, with Ortho, Kites and the duo of Thurston Moore and Carlos Giffoni; tickets are $12 (Sanneh).

TRIO MUNDO, Sweet Rhythm, 88 Seventh Avenue South, above Bleecker Street, West Village, (212) 255-3626. A band mixing Latin rhythm with jazz in sometimes unexpected ways, led by the percussionist Manolo Badrena and including the guitarist Dave Stryker and the bassist Andy McKee; the saxophonist Steve Slagle will join them this week, as he did on the recent album "Trio Mundo Rides Again" (Zoho). Tonight and tomorrow night at 8, 10 and midnight; cover charge is $20 and there is a $10 minimum (Ratliff).