New Jazz / Fusion Bands Get Chance to Jam Room Upstairs

On a recent Wednesday evening in the small Room Upstairs at Le Cafe in Sherman Oaks, HAMS--a quartet composed of Gary Meek (saxophone), Steve Bach (piano), Bob Harrison (bass) and Michael Shapiro (drums)--played acoustic post-be-bop jazz music to a handful of ardent, enthusiastic listeners.

The following night, former Doobie Brothers drummer Chet McCracken led a jazz/fusion group that featured Randy Strom and Danny Pelfry, and the 60-seat joint--which sits at the rear atop the Ventura Boulevard restaurant and has a ring of tables within arm’s length of the performers--was jammed.

While Le Cafe’s general manager Dale Jaffe certainly prefers packed rooms to sparsely filled ones, he’s also in favor of giving new bands such as Meek and company a chance.

“Obviously, we want to fill the club, but our main goal is to have the highest quality music possible,” said Jaffe, 33. “That could be a new band that’s breaking in, and we’re trying to give people entering the scene a place to play. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn’t.”

Overall, Jaffe and his booking associate, Patrice Landers, 30, tend to go with more established jazz/fusion talent like McCracken, bassist John Patitucci or saxophonist Brandon Fields in the room. Keyboardist “Gregg Karukas, Brandon, Wishful Thinking, people like these are our bread-and-butter acts,” Jaffe said.

Jaffe’s musical background leans more toward the straight-ahead and Brazilian or Latin music he heard while growing up, but Landers--wife of bassist Tim Landers--introduced him to the contemporary sound of jazz/fusion.

Together, they’ve found that this modern stylistic stance fits the Room Upstairs. “Contemporary works because we can get great players who are studio or session players or are people who tour but who want to play their own music, and they can get together here with their friends,” Jaffe said.

Because of the club’s small seating capacity and covers that range between $5 and $10, musicians don’t make a lot of money.

“Monetarily, forget it,” Jaffe said. “There’s a reason why there aren’t a lot of jazz clubs this size. If it’s bigger, it really becomes a business.” Then the musicians “are working a gig. This really isn’t a gig, it’s a comfortable environment where people won’t make a lot of money, not like they would if they played the Universal Amphitheatre or a day in the studios, but they are happy to work under those circumstances.”

Although the music at the Room Upstairs is “basically fusion,” it wasn’t always. Singer Lois Boileau, who is also Jaffe’s mother and Le Cafe’s owner, started to present music eight years ago.

“At first, it was just weekends, mostly with straight-ahead singers like Ruth Olay, Sue Raney, Bill Henderson, Mark Murphy and Lois, who did all the booking,” Jaffe said. “Then, after about a year, she started booking Thursdays, with more contemporary singers like Jude Swift and Julie Kelly.”

Eventually, with Landers’ help, Jaffe turned it into a seven-night-a-week nightspot, one that, due to its size, is still ideal for vocalists. The regulars include Greg Walker, Shelby Flint, Kenia and Boileau, who works her own club about once a month.

“When you put singers up there, it’s really an experience,” Jaffe said. “They’re basically unmiked and right there in front of you. You can really hear the wonderful quality of the voice.”

Jaffe has but one caveat for his performers, whether they are singers or instrumentalists: “I don’t want to tell these people what to play. I just tell them, ‘Please don’t play too loud.’ We’re really de-emphasizing loud music. We feel we can appeal to more people if it’s not blasting, driving music.”

Jaffe likes to point out that the club and the restaurant below are not separate entities.

“We were a restaurant before we were a club,” he said. “The food part of our business is really our No. 1, so we take it very seriously.”

Because of its name, many people think that Le Cafe is a French restaurant, but “it’s a contemporary eatery that offers an international menu that focuses on fresh, light foods, with lots of salads, as well as fish and chicken,” Jaffe said.

Food is served from 11 a.m. until 1 a.m., and prices for entrees average about $12. Music in the Room Upstairs begins at 9 p.m., and there is a two-drink minimum per show. Beverages from the full bar range between $2 and $5. The Room Upstairs is open from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. Mondays through Fridays and 9 a.m. to 2 a.m. Saturdays and Sundays.

Although his hours are long, Jaffe thinks that he has a terrific job. “I’m learning a lot about music, meeting good people and looking to get more involved in the music business in some capacity. Ultimately, I see this as a very romantic thing to be doing.”