Just typing the title is thrilling.  We have seen our friends pictures and heard their stories and somehow it never seemed reachable.  In June, with our townhouse on the market and plans to lease  an apartment beginning August 1, it seemed perfectly reasonable to plan an adventure for the latter half of August.  The fact that Carol has a show to hang in October seemed beside the point.  We did not know where we wanted to go even.  We started with Ireland, but none of the trips with openings seemed appealing.  I remembered that Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT) had a fine reputation and we had drooled over their catalogs in the past, so I started to search their site.
There it was, a Serengeti Safari in Tanzania with pretrip to the Kilimanjaro area and even an option of a dawn balloon ride over the Serengeti.  So August 16 we disembarked from a KLM/Delta flight at Kilimanjaro (JRO) International Aiport about an hours drive from Arusha.  I must admit that before planning this trip I was not aware of the existence of Arusha with a population of over 1,500,000 and two traffic lights.  In the airport parking lot we sorted ourselves out realizing that fellow travelers we had been talking with were on other OAT trips departing at the same time with different itineraries.  Eventually we found ourselves in Eli’s “Bush Limo” in convoy with Luca headed for Oliciti Lodge.  Before we got there we were to witness a collision in which Luca’s vehicle was rear ended by a drunken driver with no damage to his vehicle or to his passengers.  However the drunk did not get off so easy.  His hood was doubled and steam poured from his radiator.  He had hit the two spare tires mounted on a roll cage on the back of the Toyota Landcruiser.  We were to learn that these vehicles are among the strongest we have had the joy of riding in.

Carol and I thought we ought to have one for our tow’d.  Base price $78,000, too much to drag behind us over good roads where its capabilities are not really needed.

After a night at Oliciti Lodge  we set out for Sinya Tented Lodge near Kilimanjaro.  We made a stop to see the manufacture of water filters out of ceramic. 
 The only place in East Africa where these household filters are made.  The process is primitive yet very sophisticated.  Clay is mixed with sawdust and colloidal silver.  When it is fired with appropriate changes in firing temperature, the sawdust is burnt out leaving fine passages for the water to flow through and a charcoal layer to serve as another filter medium along with the silver to extract heavy metals.  We bought two to deliver to a family we would visit later in the trip.  On to Kilimanjaro.  Eventually we left pavement behind and got our first African Full Body Massage.  Later we were to experience the Deep Massage as the roads deteriorated.

As we approached the tented lodge we saw some zebras 
off the road.  A little later we saw giraffes.  Then we saw a lot of giraffes (a tower of giraffes) and then a dazzle of zebras.  As so it went.  We arrived at our first tented lodge and marveled at the open air main lodge and our “tent”
 
which really was a tent under a permanent roof with a complete bathroom at the back with mostly solid walls, the whole is raised on piers to keep the animals out.  As we approached ours with our Masai Warrior guide we saw a zebra peering around the brush just feet from our stairs.  Our instructions were clear, from sundown to sunrise we were not to leave a building without our warrior guide.  After dinner we were escorted to our tents and our instructions were to wave a flashlight from the deck if we wanted an escort to another part of the facility, such as the bar.  This became the theme for the trip whenever we were in a tented lodge or mobile tent camp (more about that later).

Our first day at Sinya we went on our first game drive with the roof hatches removed and we added elephants and wart hogs and Thompson and Grant Gazelles to our growing list of sightings.  We saw congresses of baboons, Yellow Tail, and many birds.  We were way in the north of Tanzania, so far north that we eventually came to the border with Kenya where we got out and took a nice long walk which brought us to the border, you could tell, there was a marker.

After lunch and siesta we resumed our drive headed to a Masai Boma, a household consisting of a husband and several wives and their children.  Several Boma constitute a village, but each is independent.  We were in for a special treat as the Masai circumcise their males children between the age of 13 and 20.  This is only done every seven years, which accounts for the age variance.  This day was the day for the Masai in the region and we were invited to a pre circumcision ceremony.  The boys were in seclusion for the cutting the next morning, but the rest of the tribe gathered to dance and sing.  We joined a small group in the kraal where the cattle are penned at night with the women singing and dancing and eventually the men arrived to begin their singing and dancing. 

As we were encouraged to participate it became more and more crowded and it became clear that Masai from  neighboring bomas were walking in to join the party.  Eventually the women set up a small market of their bead work and after some intense shopping and bargaining we were on our way.

Eli, our guide, talked about a meat eating ceremony that follows the circumcision.  All the men gather in the bush and slaughter a meat animal (domestic cow, goat or sheep) and make a stew with herbs that are said to encourage an appetite for meat.  This goes on for a month!  As we were on our game drive the next morning, Eli spotted a group of men in the brush and made an approach to see if we could see what it was like, he had never participated himself as his tribe is Pare not Masai.    After an initial rebuff we were welcomed in.  This was an opportunity to taste the concoction.  I don’t need to do that again and it certainly did not make me ravenous for more meat.  The drive across the dry lake bed we were on gave us a chance to get really close to the elephants.

and

There are more pictures on my Picasa Web Album which is open to the public to view.  To my new friends from the trip please let me know if you are having a problem reading this or viewing the album.

I will be writing and posting pictures from the rest of the trip soon.

Whew, we are really here!

This wll be telegraphic as the keyboard is dreadful and the connection very slow.

After landng in Kilimanjaro airport we drove to Arusha for  our first night.  The only excitement was watching a drunk drive into the rear of our other Bush limo.  Totally destroyng hs own front end and not leavng a mark on our other car.  We drove on without incident.  The next day we drove to Sinya Tent Camp in the Kilimanjaro district.  On our way into the camp we saw towers of Giraffes and dazzles of Zebras.  They were practically in the camp.  Oh yes Roughing it Smoothly, applies here too.  More when  I have time. 
The next day we went on an early morning game drive and then we went to a Masai Bomba (village) where we witnessed a precircumcsion ceremony.  The boys 13 to 20 were not present as they were in a secluded cabin awaiting the surgery in the morning. 

By the time we left Sinya we had seen giraffes, zebras, elephants, yellow tail baboons, warthogs, and too many birds to recount.  Oh, I missed Grants Gazelles, Thompson Gazelles, Impala, and many monkeys.  Next we stopped back in Arusha and then on to Tangira National Park where we added Cheeta and Lion  and waterbuck and baboons and . . .

Add another Masai vllage where we delivered water filters we had bought to provide clean water for the family and on to Tloma where we are now.

The meter is runnng out and the day is hot so more the next time I fnd a live connection.  I have 600 pictures and Carol has over 1,000 and who knows how many mnutes of video.

It is Sunday morning, our last Sunday as residents of 1482 East Ave.  Carol is in the kitchen baking!  I have been clearing things up and cleaning in preparation for an open house this afternoon.  Maybe the buyer, who must be out there, will come through today.  We have so much going on it is hard to fathom.

Carol has put together a show for October, all the parts are at Lumiere.  In September she will begin the final assembly of frames.  We are moving out of this wonderful townhouse after 21 years on Thursday to a glorious apartment on St Paul St, two blocks north of Main in the Warner Building.  This building is a cast iron and brick building put up in 1869.  For more about the history click here.  We hope to get settled fairly quickly as we are leaving for Tanzania, traveling with Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT) on August 15, returning August 31.

The trip includes Kilimanjaro, Ngorogoro Crater, and Serengeti.  Hopefully it will include many large mammals and birds we have never seen before outside of Discovery Channel and books that date to my childhood which we have unearthed in the preparation for moving.

We will stay put for at least 18 days on our return, through Rosh HaShana and then leave for a local Tiffin Rally in Bath NY.  We don’t know where we will find ourselves for Yom Kippur yet.  Could be back in Rochester (the drive is only 90 minutes) or . . .

Things we have found in the preparation for packing:  Letters from my maternal grandfather, Abe Levey to Mildred during courting and later as he made his rounds as a traveling salesman.  The originals of the v mail my father sent Mom from England, apparently they returned the uncensored letters after photographing them for transport.  Every letter I sent Carol from 1962 to 1964, mostly from Brown.  Just think what we have lost.  Email, Skype, phone are wonderful tools for keeping in touch, but they don’t leave of record that you can hold in your hand and laugh and shed tears over 48 years later.  The record of our history comes to a halt when we stop writing on paper.  I know emails can be saved, as long as you retain backups, and FaceBook posting will haunt you 3 years later, but will FaceBook, and its timeline, exist and the means to access it 30 years from now.  How many memories have I recorded on reel to reel and then transcribed to cassette only to find that my last cassette player is being left behind and the tapes are oxidizing and virtually unplayable?  Where are the photos I saved to floppy disk and to Iomega and to – I can’t even remember the names of the ever larger memory devices that became obsolete as soon as I adopted them?  Carol’s bread cookbook, published on 5 1/4 floppies for IBM (!) and Apple //e is coming with us, but there is no equipment to read the disks and the format was proprietary and the publishing company was gone after the second royalty check.  She never made a complete print copy, just proofs.  She does have the recipes and photos in a box.

I could become maudlin (have become so?) We are giving up four stories of home with a five step entrance, not because it is a problem for us, but it has become problematic for some friends to even gain entrance to our living room coming up those five steps.  Who is to say we will always be able to negotiate them?  In the mean time we choose demanding trips and are clear that our cross country motorhome travel will continue in G Whiz so long as we can  mount the stairs and find the life a pleasure.

I had thought to post some pictures I took of the apartment, but decided not to.  The place is empty and the wall plates are off and it was being prepared for paint.  Later when we have moved in and put up some art.

Now to post and be off so the Realtor can show the house.

It’s over!  We heard the last note at 11:15 last night at Max.

We started last night with a walk down East Ave as usual.  When we approached Alexander Street, the stage for Thunder Body and Trombone Shorty was up and as we walked past, Trombone Shorty was on stage doing his sound check.  That was all we heard of him.  By 4:15 we were in line to get into Hatch Hall, where we had heard our first performance of this festival.  This last night we waited for the 5:45 performance 90 minutes in line to hear JoAnne Brakeen solo on the piano.  It was worth the wait.  She played over an hour of straight piano jazz that left us breathless.  It is really good to be reminded that there is still great classic jazz being performed.

We left there and picked up dinner on the street.  Carol went to Ludwig’s for her usual salad and I ran to Java Joe in hopes that they hadn’t sold out yet.  They hadn’t and I had a great sandwich, this one was called “Dark Horse” and it had roast beef and their wonderful chipotle mayonnaise.  Don’t order the chipotle if you don’t like really hot.  After eating we walked over to Lutheran Church to hear Hakon Kornstad.  He plays Tenor Sax, Operatic Tenor, Flute, Flutenette and a great looping machine.  He is one of the few performers we heard who made great use of the electronics without letting it get in the way of the performance.  He laid down a couple of rhythm tracks and some background melodies, as many as a total of four or more, and then played over them.  He used the wind sound from the sax and the flapping of the keys to make rhythm.  He sang over the loop a couple of times.  His flutenette is actually a flute with the mouthpiece replaced with a Clarinet mouthpiece.  It was a wonderful performance and we were sad to hear it end, but it was time to get back in line. . .

We wanted to hear Chic Gamine at Max and it seemed clear from the 6:15 show that getting in would be restricted to those who were in line when they opened the door.  As we approached the line was already at Main St at 8:30 for the 10 PM show!  One last 90 minute wait.  This wait too paid off.  The four woman sing, play a variety of instruments and entertain along with their percussionist, the only male in the group.  Between his broken English, he is French Canadian, and there jokes it was difficult to stop laughing when they were singing.  Sing they can.  They did one acapella number, this was the source of a joke, as they said someone in the audience at another show had asked them to do an Acapulco number (type acapella into a document and run the spell checker).  They sang and played with much energy.  We would both love to go to another performance by them.


Sadly, we began our last walk home on East Avenue from the Jazz Festival.  This years festival is over and next year, all things going as planned, our walk will be from St Paul St and much shorter, only 1/2 a mile at most instead of 2 1/2 miles.  It was a great festival and the weather could not have been better.  I am not sure when I will post again.  We are not going out on the road this summer as we have a household to move and things to sell.  We are going to Tanzania from August 15 to 31.  I do not expect to be able to post from that trip as we will have limited electricity and doubtful internet availability in the Serengeti  and other places we will be going.  There will be a major posting of photos and maybe some stories when we home.

I cannot believe that we are approaching the last night of the 2012 Jazz Festival in Rochester.  In a year with more cancelled shows because of weather and air traffic delays than I can remember, there have been terrific shows every night.

Lat night we started in Kilbourn Hall with Roy Hains.  He is over 80 and a superb drummer.  As is typical of many older performers, he would as soon talk as play.  He started his introduction with some soft shoe tap and some story telling and give and take with his group and the audience.  Someone shouted out “play some music.”  Roy asked who that was, he shouted back “your producer”, it was John Nugent one of the two producers of the festival.  Roy then hit the drums and except for one more verbal exchange he played some wonderful standards and it was a pleasure and a joy to hear some great standards well played.

We moved on after picking up some food to Abilene where Peter Karp and Sue Foley were playing some wonderful country music.  Peter played on a National Steel Resonator Guitar when he wasn’t on the keyboard and I won’t pretend to know what Sue was playing on, although it was shaped like a Fender with some interesting patterns on it.  The sound was great and not overbearing as it can sometimes be.  The show was marred for us when a clutz in a Volunteer Green shirt banged into me sloshing some of my beer onto Carol.  He smirked and kept on moving without so much as an “oh sorry”.  The gal behind the bar gave Carol some napkins to do a preliminary cleanup.  From there we moseyed over to Christ Church for some way too mellow trio work by Orlando LaFleming.  We were still jumping from Abilene and it was hard to slow down, especially since the Church has no AC and inadequate airflow, it was HOT in there.

We decided to move on to Montage.  This was hindered by the set up of another free stage  on Chestnut Street which is the street one needs to take to get to Montage.  We worked our way through the crowd and the loud sounds coming from the stage provided by Jimmie Vaughn & the tilt-a-Whirl Band Featuring Lou Ann Barton. In Montage we saw the stage set for way too many people.  Carol counted to 21 as the group kept entering in front of us.  This stage seems packed with a quintet on it.  These were all Eastman students performing under the leadership of Ryan Truesdell playing the music of Bill Evans.  Some of the music came from two of his recordings, but much of what they played had been rearranged by Evans for a concert at the Apollo in 1959 and has never been recorded.  The group was really good and once again we were hearing some classic jazz even if the particular arrangements had not been heard since 1959.


Tonight is another mishmash and I may report tomorrow, if I have the energy, on what we actually get too.  We are planning on starting at Hatch, which is the acoustic only, solo venue. JoAnne Brackeen is reputed to be a superb pianist and this is the venue for that kind of performance.

Night 7 was another night of late shows and no shows.  We had really wanted to hear Mark McKnight at Christ Church, but read early on that Bill Dobbins would be substituting for him with no explanation on the FaceBook page.  We like Bill Dobbins a lot, but can hear him most any week, someplace in the area.  We got in line early at Harro East to hear Ruthie Foster and the Family Band and the rumor had it her flight from Austin via Chicago was delayed.  There was no word on the FaceBook page so we waited outside then we waited inside.  Fortunately we were having fun at the table so the wait inside was sort of OK.  Then her band started playing and keeping us updated with her flight status which by then I was tracking on Flightview App.  She came in an hour late and played three numbers and took a break.  Although they did not clear the hall and we could have stayed on we elected to move.  


After eating some really bad street food (I should not have gotten on the scale this morning) we went to Abilene to hear  Pokey laFarge and the South City Three.  They were a hoot, right out the mountains of the Carolinas and really very good.  We stayed to the end of the set and then moved on to Terje Rypdell at Xerox.  The hall was an icebox, Carol put on all the extra covers she had and shivered.  I just shivered having brought nothing with me since the outdoor temps never got below 80.  We did not understand the music.  The group was huge, some 18 people on stage, with keyboard and Hammond B3 two drum kits, four reeds, at one time all of them were playing bass clarinet! (I don’t remember ever seeing more than one of them in a group).  There was overdub audio vocalizations and one of them was “lets all get together” which was the antithesis of what was happening, as each group of musicians seemed to be headed in different directions.  Palle MIkkelborg  wandered about the stage playing his trumpet through exaggerated electronic effects to little apparent purpose.  We wondered, as we left, why we had stayed so long.   I think it was in hopes of hearing some resolution.  If there was, we left after 70 minutes without hearing it.  We got into Max to hear Taurey Butler Trio at the recommendation of Linda and Ken Graci who we finally saw for the first time.  Butler is huge and the piano seemed to quail in his presence, but oh can he play and his sidemen were also wonderful.


Tonight our route looks rather simpler although you never know.  The plan is Ray Haynes at Kilbourn, Peter Karp and Sue Foley at Abilene, Orlando Fleming at Christ Church and Gil Evans and Ryan Truesdale at Montage. No Lutheran Church tonight as one Rypdell performance is sufficient. Check back tomorrow to see what we actually do.

Can that be right?  Day 7 already, where did this week go?  Last night was OMG!!!

Our grandson Josh met us outside Montage where we waited, and waited, and waited – well it was our fault we waited so long, Carol got there a little after 4 and no one was in line for the 6PM performance yet, they started arriving 2 minutes later.  Eventually we got seated with plenty of time to get a snack and a beer before the group, Kneebody, took the stage with Sax, Trumpet, drums, keyboard and bass.  Four of the five are Eastman graduates and we really enjoyed their music.  I would refer you to City Newspaper for a good review of the show with which I agree.  Josh told us he enjoyed it as well.

After sandwiches from Java Joe for Josh and me and a salad from Ludwig for Carol we found our way into Kodak Hall for Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers.  Josh marveled as I greeted Matt, one of the ushers who is a neighbor on East Ave and fellow gym rat at World Gym and then met a high school classmate, Ted Voll in the upper lobby.  I think Josh is convinced we know everyone in Rochester.  I am not sure how to write about the show.  The Blue Grass was marvelous, Steve Martin is a superb musician and the entire company was on a very high level of professionalism.  We laughed til it hurt, we cheered until our hands hurt and our throuts were raw and they came back for an encore that rivaled anything they had done until then with the fiddler taking off like a man possessed.  If anyone reading this has not attended a performance and is anywhere near where they are performing, don’t miss the chance.  We bought our tickets late on the “secondary market” at box office prices and got lucky with 2 front row Loge seats and a center row MM in the Orchestra.


Before we even had a chance to process the Steve Martin show we found our way into Max where Sherantha Beddage was performing some very straight jazz with his Baritone Sax and Quartet.  We stayed through.  I am not sure Josh has heard much straight jazz, but when I suggested, at 10:45, that we didn’t have to stay he said he wanted to hear the rest.  Maybe he was just being polite, but he seemed to be as engrossed in the music as we were.  


Haven’t had time to process what we will hear tonight, but we will be down early since we have to be out of the house by 3:15 so the real estate agent can show it.  Next year our walk will only be half a mile instead of 2 1/2 as it has been since we started attending.

Midpoint, already? Didn’t this just start?  We are already tired and thoroughly into the mood.

Last nights journey started at Harro East with Jeff Lorber Fusion.  I am not sure what fusion means in this case, it was just great music with Lorber working with a piano and keyboard, sometimes one with each hand and a great group with him.  They passed the music around featuring the each instrument numerous times.  We stayed for about 45 minutes and then left to catch the Mike Cottone Trio at The Rochester Club.  This was a double win for us.  Once we got in after wait that did not seem brief we really enjoyed Cottone and his trio.  The music was well performed straight Jazz with no electronic monkey business.  The menu had attracted Carol because it seemed to include some reasonable veggie choices.  It being Jazz Fest food is food for me, just fuel to keep me going, but the fuel at Rochester Club was a cut above, really enjoyable along with the music.  Now they just need to get the air conditioning under control, brrr.

After the set was over we went to Lutheran Church to hear Sunna Gunnlaugs Trio, don’t ask me to pronounce the name, I can barely type it.  She plays a very controlled and expressive piano and her bass and drums provide wonderful support.  We stayed for the entire set before leaving to continue our ritual journey to Christ Church where Fraser Fifeld was playing on Scottish Pipes.  Actually he only did a small bit with a bellows driven bagpipe.  The rest he played on whisltes that looked like small chanters.  He and his guitar support spent rather more time then we cared for twiddling knobs to get just the right loops going.  I am not opposed to the use of electronic enhancement and modification, I rather enjoy it, but it should be seamless and seldom is.  We left early to get in line to hear Terence Blanchard in Kilbourn.  When we got there at 9:50 the doors were closed and the sold out sign was up.  We settled in to wait for enough people to leave so they could admit those waiting in line.  Unfortunately we were forced to experience Calle Uno on the Jazz Street Stage.  I cannot say whether they were good, bad or indifferent, they were painfully loud from  a block away.  Our ever ready earplugs were useless against the onslaught of loud discordant noise.  Why does every group on that stage think that louder is better?  why do they have to cause physical pain?  We endured and got in to Kilbourn and enjoyed an hour of Terence Blanchard and company even though we were 30 minutes late.  I will admit that when he doubled the trumpet line electronically he sounded more like a locomotive whistle then two trumpets and I could have done without that.  But that is a quibble, the total performance was transfixing and we didn’t want it to end even though we were exhausted.  We missed Eldar, who by all accounts was the best of show so far.  People waited in line to get into Hatch Hall, the smallest venue from 3 PM until show time at 5:45.

– – – –

Bill Towler commented last night that he couldn’t keep up with these posts and apparently neither can I.  I never got to post the 4th nights experience above and now it is time to talk about night 5 and what we are doing tonight, Wednesday night 6.

We got to Max way too early last night, like 4:10 for a 6:15 show.  We were impatient to leave the house and walked faster than usual.  Jayme Stone Group features Jayme on the 5 string banjo backed by violin, cello, string bass and tabla.  The music ranged over even greater diversity than the instrumentation would lead one to expect.  It was wonderful and very few left during the performance.  At one point Jayme was bowing the banjo and  the cello was being plucked, go figure.  He also performed a Bach Invention with the Banjo taking the right hand and the cello taking the left hand.  Mix in some Bulgarian folk and mountain folk and you get the idea.  On from there to Lutheran Church for a couple of numbers by IPA, not the beer, which carried discordant to a new high (or is that low).  Two numbers was all we could take before moving on to Abilene where Clinton Curtis was heavily into country, although the volume was high, it was not into earplug range and we really enjoyed it until we decided to move on to Christ Church where the “Made in the UK” event was featuring NeWt.  Three men in kilts making funny noises on guitar drums and trombone!  We were not really in to it and left half way into the second number to get in line at Kilbourn to hear Benny Green Trio.  This piano jazz trio really was wonderful playing straight Jazz mostly written by Benny.  They wrapped the show at 11:20 and then came back to play a jazz standard for an encore.  The hall was half empty and those who left missed out.

Tonight our grandson Josh is meeting us to hear Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers at 8.  We hope to have him join us at 4 or 5 and we will wait in line to hear either Eliane Elias Quartet at Kilbourne or Shirantha Beddage Quintet at Max unless we go someplace else.  After the Steve Martin show it is an open question as to what we will do.  If it runs late, past 10, we will head home early otherwise we may take in whatever we missed earlier depending on what we hear.  We will be paying to take Josh in with us where ever we go as we do not have a spare club pass – anyone have one to loan? (joke!)

We are at Day 4 and just barely warmed up.  Well the weather has actually cooled off.  We were at George Eastman House for a couple of hours yesterday and as we prepared to walk the rest of the way to the Festival (GEH is about a third of the way from our townhouse to the Festival) it started to rain.  We turned around and headed for the house to get the car while calling our friends the Goldman’s who live inside the Festival area for permission to park in their driveway.  Permission received and we had our car as close to the venues as it is possible to park.  Although it rained again, it happened while we were in Max listening to Brandi Disterheft and it cleared before we left to walk to the car.

Last night we heard Ninety Miles at Kilbourn and had no desire to leave even when they ran 20 minutes over.  Great performance and wonderful sound.  Look for the disk by that name if you are interested.  The name refers to the distance from the US to Cuba where the disk was recorded.  On from there to Hatch where Kristian Blak played a straight through set on the solo piano, drawing on Faero Island hymns and folk tunes as well as his compositions for Yggdrasil.  Had he taken a break, we might have left, but we were sitting front row center maybe 10 feet from him.  We enjoyed the music and the performance,  but it was a bit esoteric (that is saying a lot coming from me).  On from there to Christ Church and Breach.  After the guitar player got to twiddling his knobs and playing with his delay lines and loops we had had enough.  There was not much music in what he was doing to keep us interested.  On to Max, finally!  We arrived about 40 minuted before the show and they had already let people in.  There was no line and we were able to walk right in and find seats to hear Brandi Disterheft give the bass a real workout.  The jazz was pretty straight and the performances were a pleasure to listen to.

Only four shows and only two that were really a joy to listen to, but hey where else can you get to make so many choices in an evening and get two of them right?

Tonight looks like a bit of a mixed bag.  We are going to start at Harro with Jeff Lorber Fusion and maybe jump to either Kilbourn, Terrence Blanchard Quintet or Rochester Club – we are bringing winter clothes to stay warm there – Mike Cottone Quartet.  After that Lutheran Church, Sunna Gunnlaugs, Christ Church, Fraser Fifeld (he plays bag pipes and saxophone among other instruments) and we are still undecided whether to go to Kilbourn, see above, or Abilene for Kim Lenz & the Jaguars.  We might end up doing all of the above, in which case we may try to sleep in tomorrow – until 7 – really late for us.

On to day 3!  Last night we tracked our plan pretty well.  Started at Harro East with Mike Stern Group and never left until the last note stopped ringing. We enjoyed sitting with Marla and Frank.  Ran over to Kilbourn for Tom Harrell Chamber Ensemble.  He is a nut (really) never looked at the audience and had his head down until he picked up his trumpet and then oh boy! We only stayed for one number, thought it was the last because he was over time and were out the door when the he started the last number.  We stopped for food on the street and went into Kodak Hall for Esperanza Spalding Radio Music society.  We were enthralled at her performance of a major work she wrote and performed with the very large group.  She talked, sang, played both string bass and bass guitar (not at the same time) for close to 90 minutes.  After she resolved that work, she continued on with work by others for another 30 minutes or so.  We wanted to hear Gerald Clayton Trio at Max, but the line, after they had let everyone in, seemed like too long a wait so we went to the Big Tent for Sultans of Swing a Canadian Quintet who were very good.  Had not heard a 6 string violin before, that we could remember.  He was able to reach down to Viola range with his lower strings.  Plenty of gypsy style and other styles mixed in.  It was great fun and did not require the level of concentration on our part that Spalding’s work had.

Tonight’s plan 90 Miles at Kilbourn, Eivr Paldottir, at Lutheran Church, Breach Trio at Christ Church and maybe finally Max where Brandi Disterhoff is playing.  Of course as always there are plenty of other performances that are interesting including Kristian Blak in Hatch and even Ha Ha Tonka at Abilene.  I think we will give the Big Tent a miss as it is yet another Canadian Group playing Gypsy style folk.

I cannot list all the people we stopped to chat with along the way, too many and I fear my memory will fail me anyhow.  I do not keep notes.