Secret Agent’s strong Bond
Akira Tana, the first-call jazz drummer who made his name in New York with top artists like Sonny Rollins, Jim Hall and Lena Horne before coming home to the Bay Area 17 years ago, wasn’t a fanatical James Bond fan before recording his 2011 album of Bond themes, “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.” But his appreciation for the 007 movies and their scores has grown ever keener.
“Doing this project has turned me on to listening to that music more carefully and really checking out the films,” says Tana.
In addition to his other gigs and projects, Tana continues to lead the Secret Agent Band, a stylish organ-jazz ensemble featuring superior Nashville singer Annie Sellick. The current version of the band — whose seeds were planted when Tana recorded his 2002 album of film and TV themes, “Secret Agent Man,” featuring the turbaned organ master Dr. Lonnie Smith — brings Sellick and Tana together with two fine Bay Area players, saxophonist James Mahone and guitarist Jeff Massanari, plus the rousing Osaka-based Hammond B-3 organist Midori Ono.
This stripped-down group — Ono covers the bass line with her foot pedals — serves up the Bond songs its way on Sunday, Aug. 6 at Jazz at Filoli in Woodside. They play off the harmonically rich arrangements that Larry Dunlap wrote for the recording in a leaner, looser setting ripe of improvisation.
“It’s really fun, timeless music. People know these songs, so for those who many not be that familiar with jazz, the intricacies of it, this is a good introduction,” says Tana, who grew up in Palo Alto, where he used to see Jerry Garcia teaching guitar at Dan Morgan’s music store and where he played in a rock band that opened for the Pigpen-era Grateful Dead.
Tana was unfamiliar with Sellick, a versatile vocalist with subtle theatrical flair, until the producer of “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” put them together. She brings a pleasing insouciance to the Bond stuff, singing “Goldfinger” with a sultry sinuousness befitting Dunlap’s bossa nova arrangement. She also tells stories about the songs.
“She’s the Bond girl,” Tana says.
They also perform this music at the Blue Wing Blues Festival in Upper Lake (Lake County) Friday, Aug. 4, as well as a set with Japanese blues guitarist Takezo Takeda.
For more information, go to https://filoli.org/event/jazz-atfiloli or http://bit.ly/2tH2JSt.
Children’s theater celebrates 50 years
Children’s Musical Theater San Jose, the South Bay city’s oldest performing arts enterprise, celebrates its golden anniversary this year with a string of performances and reunions. Company alumni include actor Ryan Vasquez, who is in the national touring cast of “Hamilton,” and Alex Brightman, nominated for a Tony Award for his Broadway performance in “School of Rock.”
In addition to productions of “West Side Story,” “Avenue Q,” “Guys and Dolls,” “The Who’s Tommy” and other shows performed by children and young adults age 4-20 — the company prides itself on turning no child away, “regardless of financial or physical limitations” — the 2017-18 season includes performances in December of “Disney: Newsies the Musical” by a cast of company alumni and Bay Area dance pros.
For more information, go to www.cmtsj.org.
‘Mighty’ Mike in Oakland
Veteran Bay Area blues guitarist “Mighty” Mike Schermer, who has backed Bonnie Raitt, Elvin Bishop and Marcia Ball, headlines as a leader for the first time at Yoshi’s on Aug. 21, playing and singing with a solid crew featuring saxophonist Nancy Wright, drummer Paul Revelli, keyboardist Tony Stead, bassist Steve Ehrmann and the harmonizing singers of Sweet Nectar.
He also performs as part of the Guitarsonists, along with Chris Cain and Daniel Castro, at Kuumbwa Jazz in Santa Cruz on Aug. 24.
Schermer is a native of Long Island, N.Y., from a brainy family. His father was a nuclear physicist who worked at Los Alamos, N.M.; one sister is a geophysicist, another, a trauma surgeon. He calls himself the black sheep of the clan.
“I took a left turn,” he says, “when I heard the first note by Albert Collins.”
For more information, go to www.yoshis.com or www. kuumbwajazz.org.
A day of music of many kinds
As usual, the SF Friends of Chamber Music, which recently renamed itself InterMusic SF, has booked a wide range of groups for the 10th annual SF Music Day on Sept. 24, a free, seven-hour feast of noncommercial Bay Area music on four stages around the Veterans Building.
The ensembles include the Paul Dresher Ensemble, Alexander String Quartet, Amy X Neuburg, saxophonist Howard Wiley’s Trio and Real Vocal String Quartet.
For more information, go to www.intermusicsf.org.