BayTaper.com is an online multimedia documentary featuring original live music recordings and photography from the San Francisco Bay Area creative music scene. Learn More...
Please note that all of the photos, videos, and audio recordings found on this website are copyrighted works being made available for personal, non- commercial use only. These works may not be used for any other purpose without the direct consent of the artists involved. If you are the copyright holder of any material posted on this website and no longer wish it to be made available on the Web, please contact me immediately and I will take it down posthaste.
A few months back, I suggested to Mario Guarneri that he should play a gig at one of my favorite venues in town, the Red Poppy Art House. Well, that suggestion culminated in a fantastic performance by the Guarneri Jazz Quartet on February 1, 2008. The lineup featured Mario on trumpet and flugelhorn, and included Jeffrey Burr on guitar, Omar Clay on drums, and John Wiitala on Bass. Check out this video I shot of their song Baile from the second set of the night, and don’t forget that you can catch these guys playing live at Cafe Divine in North Beach on most Sunday nights.
Here’s a couple of live tracks from Smith Dobson’s new band, the Lovecraft Ghostwriters, playing at the Red Poppy Art House on January 12, 2008. They performed a mix of new songs and old favorites from their recent release Basement Bloodlines.
Smith Dobson, Vibraphone John Finkbeiner, Guitar John Hanes, Drums John Wiitala, Bass
Here’s a real treat for everyone, a long video from what I think was the last jazz gig of the year at the Red Poppy Art House. I shot this on December 29, 2007 using two tiny MP4 pocket cameras plus a field audio recorder from the back of the room (with permission of course), and considering how dark it was and how low budget my cams were, the final edit still came out pretty nice! The performance featured Marcus Shelby on bass, Matt Clark on piano, Jeff Marrs on drums, and Howard Wiley on tenor sax. Although Jeff was the main drummer for the night, the video features the one track that Marcus’s old friend Lorca Hart played on as a guest.
Please note that I’m trying out a new way of displaying video on my website that requires Flash 8, but also be aware that this is a huge video file, so it may require some patience while buffering. Thanks!
The Music of The Supplicants is so much more than an intricately woven framework of sounds, beats, and melodies. It is an experience. The level of emotion with which they play is so deep, so personal, and the energy so pure that it is almost as if existence, or being itself, creeps most surprisingly yet receptively into our souls. … The Supplicants personify the spirit of jazz in its purest form. It is fitting that their members—David Boyce, tenor and soprano sax, bass clarinet; Richard Howell, tenor and soprano sax; David Ewell, bass; and Sameer Gupta, drums—have not chosen a leader; rather, they all lead in their own right. This humility is both at once rare to find in the age of individual jazz and a perfect epitome for their art. The purity of their music is just as rare to find in a time in the history of jazz where its staunch supporters, critics, and historians have crystallized an art form which is still very much alive and placed it behind the glass displays of museums as an untouchable antiquity. ~ Drew Foxman, All About Jazz
After a year hiatus, the four original members of The Supplicants got back together and put on one hell of a live show at the Red Poppy Art House on November 25, 2007. It was a great Sunday evening of improvised music in the Mission, and one that I’m pleased to be able to share with you. So download and listen to these two spontaneously-created audio tracks, and make sure to support these fine musicians whenever you have the chance.
On Friday, October 27th, 2007 I was invited to record the incredible FOCUS Trio live at the Red Poppy Art House in the Mission District of San Francisco. The trio featured Marc Cary (all the way from New York) on keys and synth, Sameer Gupta on drums and tabla, and David Ewell on double bass. They played a few new tracks as well as songs from their 2006 album FOCUS. The audience was also treated to a guest appearance by Marcus Shelby who stepped in to play bass on Elephants’s Eye and Minor League. The recording is a bit ambient because I set up in the back of the room, but it’s positively worth a listen, so you can thank Marc, Sameer, David, and Marcus for letting me share this sample track with all of you!
“The concept of FOCUS Trio is a collaboration between three cultures. Aside from that, playing our asses off the in the tradition of the great Duke Ellington, Max Roach and Paul Chambers, is the focus. … The live show will expand on the concepts developed since the recording of our 2006 album, FOCUS. The recording is the seed and the performance is when the plant grows.” ~ Marc Cary
Scott Amendola (percussion) and Wil Blades (B3) recently invited Jeff Parker (guitar) to San Francisco to play a couple of gigs. I was lucky enough to catch the trio performing live at the Red Poppy Art House on August 12, 2007. Jeff hails all the way from the Chicago music scene, and it was a real treat to have him play with Wil and Scott in such an intimate venue in the Mission. It’s also worth noting that Wil just released his first CD titled Sketchy, so make sure to check that out sometime. Below, I’ve included a few photos from the trio’s show at the Poppy as well as one sample audio track from the first set of that night’s performance — a composition by Scott called Slow Zig, which can be found on his 1999 album The Scott Amendola Band.
