Intimate KPBS Shows Fill Niche Nationwide

In a dim editing room, two monitors bounce a television glow off the bearded face of KPBS Executive Producer Paul Marshall.

His dark eyes contemplate the videotapes he plays for a visitor: Terry Gibbs takes an awesome solo on vibes, mallets blurring as his hands race each other up and down the keyboard; trumpeter Freddie Hubbard blows up a storm.

These are images from “Club Date,” the jazz music series Marshall, a jazz fan, initiated several years ago. Suddenly, he finds himself with a hot property, one which could earn KPBS some extra cash from foreign distribution, give local musicians national exposure and give the nation a new jazzy image of San Diego.

Already, the show has received local Emmies and will pick up an award from the 1988 International Film & TV Festival in New York Nov. 9-11.

“Usually, you’ll see some great jazz artist like Dizzy Gillespie on ‘Johnny Carson,’ and they’ll have him do one short number, then talk to him,” Marshall said. “It’s not the same as seeing him in a small, intimate night club. That’s what we try to do with ‘Club Date.’ ”

The studio is made to look amazingly like a cozy club, complete with audience. Musicians in town to play Elario’s are usually the featured acts.

“Club Date’s” big boost came a few months back when KPBS sent a group of the shows to 320 public television stations nationwide. At least 55 stations have aired the shows. The public TV network subsequently asked Marshall for six new shows. Most recently, KPBS taped Gibbs with veteran clarinet man Buddy de Franco. The other four shows already finished feature guitarists Barney Kessel, Herb Ellis and Laurindo Almeida, and alto sax man Bud Shank.

Each program is recorded live. Several cameras are used, and Marshall goes back after the session and skillfully edits close-ups and other good action shots. The sound is broadcast in stereo.

“This might turn out to be our corner of public television,” Marshall said. The new package of six shows should go out to the public TV stations in January.

JAZZ ALIVE DOWNTOWN? The answer is yes, but real jazz lovers will find the scene only a mild placebo for the genuine item, judging from a recent Friday night club-hopping session. Our first stop was the Palace Bar in the Horton Grand Hotel at 4th Avenue and Island Street in the Gaslamp Quarter, with its high ceilings and Victorian decor.

The Bill Hunter Trio got off to a shaky start. Hunter was smooth on piano and played intelligent improvisations on such standards as “Some of These Days.” But he and his sax player had trouble stirring up anything consistent with their substitute bass man.

“That was like pulling teeth,” one jazz fan grumbled after the first number.

Next stop was Croce’s two clubs at 5th Avenue and F Street.

Tobacco Road, a six-piece group specializing in Dixieland jazz, filled the narrow bar next to the corner restaurant with bright music. The audience was attentive, but the band seemed only marginally enthusiastic.

Young mousse-haired types looked in occasionally from the sidewalk, but most of them ended up next door in Croce’s Top Hat Bar & Grill, listening to Daniel Jackson’s band. Jackson formerly played with Ray Charles, and his group was steaming.

The B Street Cafe, at the intersection of Columbia, is downtown’s Friday night jazz hot spot, we had been told.

And so it is, if the weekend mating game is what you’re after. For pure jazz enjoyment, though, it fell flat. The Mark Lessman Band wasn’t the problem. Their mild, “Lites Out” style of jazz was adequate if not scintillating. But the audience couldn’t have cared less. The youngish crowd gave hardly a nod to Lessman and company.

Overall, it was a disappointing evening. For comparison’s sake, New Yorkers, during a recent week, could choose from names such as Carmen McRae, Billy Eckstine, Bucky Pizzarelli, Tommy Flanagan, Kenny Barron, and Tito Puente.

INTO PIANOS. “I play ‘em, rent ‘em, move ‘em and love ‘em,” Earl Williams said. Until recently, you could hear him tickle the tusks at his own club, The Jazz Factory in Escondido. His Thursday and Sunday jam sessions included some of San Diego County’s finest musicians and attracted a small, regular following to their unfettered spontaneity.

Unfortunately, during four years in business, Williams was never able to make money. After sinking $100,000 into the business, he closed the doors early in September.

Williams may present jazz in other locations. Until then, he’ll have more time to play his 10 pianos, among them a $5,000 1916 German Wilhelm Kanabe grand, a 1912 Hardman grand and a Hardman upright from the year Lincoln was assassinated.

Keyboard player Sun Ra brings his spacey, percussion-oriented jazz to the Belly Up Tavern in Solana Beach for a single show Thursday night, Nov. 3 (tickets are $9). Ra, who appears with his Cosmo Love Adventure Arkestra, began as an arranger for Fletcher Henderson in the ‘40s and was into flashy stage shows before today’s rockers were even born. . . .

“Jazz Live,” the studio concert series broadcast on KSDS-FM (88.3), features the Al Kaye Quartet Tuesday, Nov. 1, 8 p.m., in the city college theater at 14th and C. It’s free. . . .

Jazz and blues violinist Papa John Creach appears Wednesdays through Saturdays at Elario’s in La Jolla through Nov. 13. . . .

UCSD hosts a free jazz festival Nov. 6, from 1 to 5 on the sports field at the northern end of the campus. . . .

Tenor sax player Michael Brecker, who has explored synthesized effects in recent years, headlines. Sky Walk and East and West are also appearing. . . .

The La Jolla Museum of Contemporary will sponsor a panel discussion on the local jazz scene Friday, Nov. 4, 7:30 p.m., moderated by San Diego Union music writer George Varga and featuring such local jazz insiders as disc jockey Art Good, jazz festival organizer Rob Hagey and writer Stanley Dance.