ALL THAT jazz SINGING
A slew of talented vocalists hitting Bay Area venues
Some stories about jazz are perennials, revived by journalists every season. The hardiest cliche is some version of “jazz is dead,” a tale of decay usually written by someone who shows few signs of having stepped into a jazz club in decades. Close behind and thematically related are profiles of “jazz saviors,” which cast musicians with popular albums as the jolt required to resuscitate a faded scene (hello, Kamasi Washington!).
These tropes are resistant to the facts on the ground, where the art form is hale and hearty (albeit a little hard up for cash), but one formerly common narrative of decline has largely disappeared in the face of incontrovertible strength. After the passing of the storied generation of grand dames identifiable by a single name, it wasn’t long ago that writers regularly lamented the dearth of earth-shaking jazz vocalists. No one is going to replace Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae, Peggy Lee, Nina Simone or Anita O’Day, but the contemporary
scene is awash with outsized talent. One thing that hasn’t changed is that women still dominate the jazz vocal heights. Here are 10 world-class vocalists performing in the Bay Area in the coming weeks, artists who provide a clarion answer to the question: Where are today’s great jazz singers? TIFFANY AUSTIN >> Part of what makes Berkeley-based Tiffany Austin such an exciting artist is that she’s still in self-discovery mode, evolving rapidly as a songwriter and improviser. Keeping company with hard-bop masters like pianist Cyrus Chestnut and drummer Carl Allen, who performed on her breakthrough 2018 album “Unbroken” and will join her in the Miner Auditorium show, will only accelerate her growth. DETAILS >> 7:30 p.m. July 27; SFJazz Center, San Francisco; $30-$55; www.sfjazz.org LISA FISCHER >> Since the Grammy Award-winning vocalist made the long 20foot walk back into the spotlight about five years ago, she’s performed almost exclusively with the highly versatile trio Grand Baton. But seeds planted with Los Altos-raised piano master Taylor Eigsti two years ago at the Stanford Jazz Festival have blossomed into this new duo, which showcases two extraordinary artists in the process of discovering each other’s sound in real time. DETAILS >> 8 p.m. Saturday; Stanford University’s Dinkelspiel Auditorium; $18$62; www.stanfordjazz.org AMIRTHA KIDAMBI >> After performing with guitar star Mary Halvorson’s Code Girl quintet at the SFJazz Center on Saturday and Sunday, Amirtha Kidambi presents her own compositions with her New York band Elder Ones, an exploratory quartet built around her harmonium drones and Carnatic devotional ornamentation. A startlingly inventive singer and bandleader with a fine-grained textural palette, Kidambi has carved out a singular niche on New York’s creative music scene. DETAILS >> 8 p.m. July 27 at Kuumbwa Jazz Center, Santa Cruz; $21-$25, www. kuumbwajazz.org; 4:30 p.m. July 28 at Bird & Beckett Books, San Francisco; $20; birdbeckett.com; 9 p.m. July 29 at Oakland Freedom Jazz Society; $5-$15 suggested donation; www.facebook. com/oakfreejazzsocy SASHA MASAKOWSKI >> A decade after being named best emerging artist by the Big Easy Association, New Orleans vocalist Sasha Masakowski seems to have delivered on her huge promise with 2018’s “Art Market” (Ropeadope), a kaleidoscopic project that surrounds her cool, understated vocals amid an array of signature Crescent City grooves, from bounce to second line. DETAILS >> 7 and 8:30 p.m. Aug. 10; SFJazz Center, San Francisco; $30; www.sfjazz. org KIM NALLEY >> San Francisco jazz and blues icon Kim Nalley has turned her formidable attention and talents to the legacy of Aretha Franklin, delving deeply into a catalog that started years before the epochal soul hits for Atlantic. In Mendocino, she performs the Franklin material with a big band, while in Santa Cruz, she’s backed by pianist Tammy Hall, bassist Michael Zisman and drummer Kent Bryson, one of the best working bands in the business. DETAILS >> 7:30 p.m. Saturday at Tent Concert Hall (part of Mendocino Music Festival); $15-$55; mendocinomusic.org; 7 p.m. Monday at Kuumbwa Jazz Center, Santa Cruz; $31.50-$36.75; www.kuumbwajazz.org ALICIA OLATUJA >> An R&Btinged jazz vocalist who was raised singing in church, the conservatory-trained Alicia Olatuja possesses one of the most glorious sounds around. With her 2018 album “Intuition: Songs from the Minds of Women” ( Resilience Music Alliance ), she radically expanded her repertoire, reinventing songs recorded by Brenda Russell, Sade, Kate Bush, Joni Mitchell and others. She’s accompanied by a top-notch trio led by Los Angeles pianist Josh Nelson. DETAILS >> 7 and 8:30 p.m. July 27, 6 and 7:30 p.m. July 28 at SFJazz Center, San Francisco; $30-$35; www. sfjazz.org; 7 p.m. July 29 at Kuumbwa Jazz Center, Santa Cruz; $31.50-$36.75; www.kuumbwajazz.org JACKIE RYAN >> After several years with few performances in the aftermath of her jazzloving father’s death, the wondrous North Bay jazz vocalist Jackie Ryan returns in a big way with a celebration of the American Songbook (dedicated to her dad). She’s joined by a talent-laden quintet including trumpeter Erik Jekabson, who’s tailored the arrangements to caress her sumptuous voice. DETAILS >> 7:30 p.m. July 25; SFJazz Center, San Francisco; $25-$45; www.sfjazz.org MARY STALLINGS >> Just a few weeks away from turning 80, San Francisco’s incomparable Mary Stallings has entered rarified territory trod only by the late great Ernestine Anderson, another inimitably soulful singer whose gift was undiminished into her ninth decade. Stallings is joined by most of the players from her critically hailed new album, “Songs Were Made to Sing” (Smoke Sessions Records), including pianist David Hazeltine and trumpet great Eddie Henderson, a Lowell High classmate of Stallings in the late 1950s. DETAILS >> 7:30 p.m. July 26; SFJazz Center, San Francisco; $30-$70; www.sfjazz.org VERONICA SWIFT >> At 25, Veronica Swift has already joined jazz’s top ranks as a ferociously swinging singer whose astounding technique is matched her seemingly boundless intuition. She kicks off the well-curated Jazz at Lesher concert series with a trio led by Emmet Cohen, the 29-year-old who recently won the Cole Porter Fellowship, jazz’s most prestigious and lucrative piano prize. She returns at the end of the summer for a four-night SFJazz Center run in the Joe Henderson Lab, Sept. 5-8. DETAILS >> 5 and 8 p.m. July 27; Lesher Center for the Arts, Walnut Creek; $45; www.lesherartscenter.org KENNY WASHINGTON >> Ask a jazz musician to rank the greatest male jazz vocalists alive, and the odds are good that Oakland’s Kenny Washington will place in the top three. Check out his YouTube video version of “Cry Me a River” for a sampling. His sweet sound, rhythmic prowess and improvisational brio turn every performance into a revelatory journey. He’s accompanied by a trio led by pianist-arranger Adam Shulman, who has distinguished himself in recent years via his finely wrought work with vocalists Paula West, Ed Reed and Tiffany Austin. DETAILS >> 7 p.m. July 28, SFJazz Center, San Francisco; $25-$45; www.sfjazz.org