Berkeley jazz venue has an electric debut.
California Jazz Conservatory packs in fans during Rendon Hall’s opening week
Hovering around the door to Rendon Hall, the intimate 85-seat theater in the California Jazz Conservatory’s new Fiddler Annex, Susan Muscarella looked anxious on Sunday, March 4. Since opening on Wednesday, Feb. 28, the Berkeley venue had been packed every night for concerts focusing on foundational conservatory faculty, like Brazilian pianist Marcos Silva and singer Laurie Antonioli, with disappointed fans turned away at the door. Sunday’s sold-out show featured another faculty mainstay, trumpeter Erik Jekabson and his 17-piece Electric Squeezebox Orchestra, but Muscarella was fretting about logistics and the show running behind schedule. “We still have to wrinkle out some irons,” she said, turning a cliche into mysterious koan (which is a pretty good description of jazz). Lee Brenkman, the conservatory’s unflappable sound guru
who’s been running mixing boards long enough to tell stories about setting up mikes for Janis Joplin, said the room “is still a work in progress.” Opening-week bugs are a given, but as the Electric Squeezebox Orchestra launched into its set with trumpeter Darren Johnston’s blazing “The Falling Dream,” the title track of the band’s just-released second album, it was clear that Rendon Hall has immediately arrived as one of the Bay Area’s leading jazz spots.
A creative powerhouse that features some of the region’s finest improvisers and composers, the Electric Squeezebox Orchestra held down a Sunday night gig at Doc’s Lab in North Beach on and off for four years. That came to an end in the fall (as did Doc’s Lab , sadly, shortly afterward). Introducing the band, Muscarella announced that the show initiates the Electric Squeezebox’s Rendon Hall residency, turning Sunday afternoons in Fiddler Annex into an essential weekly hang.
Jazz in the Neighborhood, the organization that sponsors gigs in local venues with a guaranteed fee so musicians don’t have to rely on tip jars or splitting the door, is booking Wednesday nights at Rendon Hall (the trio of the inveterately soulful pianist Tammy Hall plays March 14 with bassist
Rendon Hall: California Jazz Conservatory’s Fiddler Annex, 2040 Addison St., Berkeley. (510) 845-5373. https://cjc.edu
Ruth Davies and drummer Ruth Price). Add in the conservatory’s well-established track record of presenting leading local and touring jazz players in its Hardymon Hall, in the main campus across Addison Street, and the school brings another shot of cultural energy to the Downtown Berkeley Arts District.
Susan Powning, a pianist who takes classes at the conservatory’s Jazzschool and has caught many shows in Hardymon Hall, was attending Sunday afternoon’s concert with pianist Terry Ricks, a fellow student at Laney College. A music major, he hopes to transfer to the conservatory’s bachelor’s degree program. She heartily approved of the new venue, noting that “it’s much more clubby,” than Hardymon Hall.
The sound was a little bright in Rendon Hall, but every detail was discernible when the Electric Squeezebox Orchestra surged into baritone saxophonist Charlie Gurke’s “The Captive,” a piece that sounded like the theme to a hip 1970s detective show, driven by special guest John Santos’ churning congas.
Part of what makes the orchestra such an ideal fit for the conservatory is that the group invites a student ensemble to open just about every performance. For Sunday’s show, Berkeley High senior Isaiah Hammer presented three tunes by his 14piece Cosmic Conquerors, a group that surpasses many a professional ensemble in its creative ambitions. The pianist/composer originally assembled the cast of top high school students from around the East Bay to play some new music he’d written. He successfully submitted a tape to the Next Generation Jazz Festival, where the Conquerors will be competing this weekend for a coveted spot at the Monterey Jazz Festival.
With Oakland’s already ubiquitous teenage drum phenomenon Genius Wesley driving the Conquerors, Hammer made full use of the band’s unusual instrumentation. On “Calling Plant Earth,” he engineered radical dynamic shifts, at one point moving suddenly from dense, high-energy polyphony to his yearning duet with cellist Veronica PageHarley.
“My goal is to feature a diversity of talent, with students and faculty,” Muscarella said.
She and her conservatory crew might still be working out the Rendon Hall bugs, but judging by Sunday’s show it’s not too early to say mission accomplished.