Jazz Pianist Donegan Seeks Career Change to the Classics

Dorothy Donegan is a virtuoso pianist whose influences range from the greats of jazz to such classical composers as Scriabin and Rachmaninoff. Besides being a serious pianist, Donegan has a lighter side. She does crowd-pleasing vocal impersonations of such legends as Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, Della Reese and Eartha Kitt.

Donegan, who last played San Diego in 1983, opened five nights at Elario’s on Wednesday, backed by Los Angeles musicians Sherman Ferguson on drums and Jim DeJulio on bass.

At 68, Donegan believes she is at the peak of her game.

“I guess the more you do something, the better you learn it. You learn how to cover your mistakes.” She laughed.

Not only does she feel good about her playing, but she hopes to embark on a new career as a classical concert pianist, not out of the question considering the extensive classical training she received as a youngster growing up in Chicago.

“If Andre Watts can learn one concerto and live off it for a year, it’s better than doing 20 jazz shows a week for less money,” she said. “There’s a lady who’s going to train me for the classical stage.”

Donegan is an aggressive jazz pianist who can play circles around most of her peers. Jazz piano legend Art Tatum heard about Donegan in the 1940s, and helped her get her first breaks.

“He came to my house to meet me. I always said I could do what Tatum did, but I could play a little louder.”

Her prowess frightens people, she said. “A lot of the men don’t want me on the same stage with them.”

Donegan’s new CD is a trio project recorded in Europe. Her live sets generally include melodic standards by Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hart and others, plus several of her own compositions, all stitched together by ingenious improvisations.

In the early 1970s, George Benson was “Bad Benson,” a jazz guitarist with few peers. Then he discovered singing. And, in 1976, his career took a radical swing with the hit song “This Masquerade.”

Those who know Benson only by albums that followed during the 1980s probably think of him not as a jazz guitarist but as a pop-soul crooner. Benson returns to jazz on his new album “Big Boss Band,” released this week and featuring the Count Basie Orchestra.

In San Diego for shows at 7 and 9 tonight and tomorrow night at Humphrey’s Concerts by the Bay, he will focus not on big band music, but on his best-known pop-jazz from the late 1970s and 1980s. Friday night’s shows are sold out.

Jazz has long had ties to spirituality. The back-and-forth dialogue between players that occurs during improvisations, for example, has its roots in the call-and-response ritual of gospel services. And musicians, notably John Coltrane, have used jazz to explore personal sentiments about God.

So its not at all farfetched that Malou (she doesn’t use a last name), an experienced jazz musician and composer, also an Episcopalian, uses jazz as the musical vehicle for a service containing biblical lessons. Last year, she presented a jazz liturgy drawn from the biblical book of Exodus. This Sunday evening at 5 and 8, she returns to All Souls Episcopal Church in Point Loma to perform a jazz service inspired by nine chapters of Genesis.

Each section will begin with stories told by San Diego State University speech professor Alan Nichols, from texts composed by local children’s books author Wilanne Belden. Malou will sing about the emotions experienced by characters in these biblical tales, and local musicians Charles McPherson (alto sax), Gunnar Biggs (bass) and Frank Collett (piano) will play improvised responses.

Malou has found that her liturgies have a broad appeal. Those with a spiritual orientation but little jazz experience warm up to the music. Jazz fans who don’t know the Bible find themselves spiritually moved.

Drummer Chuckie McPherson, son of local sax great Charles McPherson, unveils his Modern Jazz Disciples this Saturday night from 8 to 11 at Barnett’s Grand Cafe & Bistro in the Embassy Suites Hotel downtown, with a repeat performance next Saturday night. McPherson promises blues-based jazz from a quartet including Alan Eicher on keyboards, Dave Marr on bass and Dave Fielder on alto sax.

“I like blues more than jazz,” the young McPherson said. “I love jazz, don’t get me wrong. But, when you stray too far from the blues, you lose most of the people. I’m going to go back to the roots: B.B. King, Charlie Parker, Ray Charles, James Brown, as opposed to real technical straight-ahead jazz.”

RIFFS: Saxophonist Joe Marillo brings a seven-piece band to D.G. Wills Books in La Jolla Sunday afternoon from 4 to 6 for a concert presented by the La Jolla Cultural Society. . . .

Tonight from 8 to midnight, the Kingston Hotel downtown continues its regular Thursday night “Let The Goodtimes Roll” New Orleans jazz program, featuring locals Tobacco Road and the Hot Jazz Band. . . .

The U.S Grant Hotel downtown serves up jazz Friday nights through September with Tobacco Road, Monday nights with South Market Street, and Tuesday nights with Pieces, the a cappella trio. . . .

KIFM is helping to soothe U.S. Navy personnel assigned to duty in the Persian Gulf aboard the destroyer tender Acadia, a medical, dental and repair vessel. The ship left San Diego Sept. 5 with a generous supply of taped “Lites Out San Diego” programs on board. The station is also letting families and close friends use its production facilities to tape messages for the midshipmen.