Dixieland Jazz Included in Thanksgiving Fixin’s

Dixie, not turkey, will be the traditional Thanksgiving feast for San Diego jazz fans, courtesy of the 11th annual San Diego Thanksgiving Dixieland Jazz Festival.

Thursday through Sunday at the Town & Country Convention Center in Mission Valley, 25 bands from throughout the United States will keep 10 stages hopping with music. Last year, 14,000 jazz fans attended, roughly 60% of them came from distant locations.

“We’ve grown from a little over 1,000 people the first year,” said Len Levine, who has been on the board of the America’s Finest City Dixieland Jazz Society since 1982, when it was formed to take over the festival started by the Town & Country. “Sacramento was the original Dixieland festival, and they’re way beyond everyone. They draw 150,000. After that, out of about 150 festivals, we are among the top few in attendance, and, based on what we hear from musicians and in fan letters, quality.”

Dixieland encompasses several forms of jazz from the period between the 1890s and 1930s. Bands at the festival represent a variety of these styles. Local groups appearing include: High Society, South Market St. Jazz Band, Tami Thomas and her Jazz-Ma-Tazz, the Chicago Six and the Yankee Air Pirates. Out-of-town bands include Buck Creek, the Golden Eagle Jazz Band and the Rent Party Revellers.

How to decide what to hear? A few highlights:

* Uncle Yoke’s Black Dog Jazz Band from Kissimmee, Fla., combines music with a canine sense of humor. Led by Steve (Hot Dog) Yocum, and including members with other doggish names, the group purportedly prefers woofing and howling to applause. In addition to a fetching sense of humor, band members are sound musicians.

* Buck Creek is known for strong ensemble and solo work, plus a selection of tunes other bands don’t play.

* The Rent Party Revellers is composed of musicians from all over the country who only get together a few times a year.

* The 9-year-old High Society band, led by cornet player Larry Channave, concentrates on Chicago-style jazz, which peaked in the late 1920s and early ‘30s. Characterized by a four-beat format (as opposed to two), this is the upbeat swing music originally popularized by bands like Eddie Condon’s. Channave’s 13-year-old nephew, Matt Lair, will make guest appearances on cornet.

* Led by Dominic Addario, the Yankee Air Pirates is a 12-piece ensemble fronted by four banjos.

* Sunday morning at 8:30, Night Blooming Jazzmen--the only group that has played the festival every year--opens the day with religious hymns in the Presidio Room.

* South Market St. is celebrating its 25th anniversary. Since 1965, about 20 musicians have passed through the eight-piece band. Original band members reunited for a set at 5:30 p.m. Saturday in the Presidio Room.

“We don’t make very much off the festivals,” said the band’s banjo player Carol Dendle, whose husband, Bill, started the group. “We did 10 this year, and the main reason is they’re so much fun. It’s great to have a full audience that wants to hear what you play. It’s not like when we get hired to play conventions, and we’re just background music.”

* Mission Bay High School, which offers a Dixieland jazz program within its music deparment, is sending a band, as is Escondido High School.

Festival hours are 7 p.m. to midnight on Thanksgiving; noon to 1:30 a.m. Friday; 10 a.m. to 1:30 a.m. Saturday; and 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. Badges good for the entire four days cost $55; $45 gets you a Friday-through-Sunday badge; $20 admits you for the day Friday or Saturday, and $15, on Thursday or Sunday only. For more information: 297-JASS.

Local 325, the musicians union, regularly locks horns (or basses or drums) with players who don’t live by its rules. One of the most frequently violated bylaws prohibits union members from playing dates with non-union members.

San Diego bassist Bob Magnusson and drummer Jim Plank, both union members, are on probation with the union because of two incidents earlier this year. In April, they invited non-union saxophonist Daniel Jackson to join them behind fluegelhorn man Art Farmer at Elario’s, and the union warned them not to work with non-union players again.

After backing saxophonist James Moody with non-union pianist Harry Pickens a few weeks later, Magnusson and Plank were each fined $100, with the fines “in abeyance for one year pending future conduct,” according to a letter to Plank from Earl J. Smith, Local 325’s secretary-treasurer.

Elario’s talent coordinator Rob Hagey can’t be faulted much. His top priority is top talent. Jackson is an under-utilized local saxman with excellent skills, and Pickens, a former New Yorker, is nationally recognized.

But the union has other priorities than just talent.

“Our members make the rules,” said Local 325 president Joe Pallazola. “Our prime purpose is to stick together to make conditions better for our lot in life.” Benefits include low-premium medical, dental and instrument insurance, credit union membership, access to contract forms, $1,500 in life insurance, and use of the union’s rehearsal hall.

That’s still not enough to entice Pickens, Jackson, and such local jazz fixtures as drummer Chuck McPherson and saxophonist Joe Marillo to join.

“It has good points and bad,” McPherson said. “If you have a monetary discrepancy (with a club), they’re a good intermediary. But the bad side is that most jazz rooms here, including Croce’s, are non-union. If you work with non-union musicians, they fine you. How are you supposed to make a living? What are we supposed to do, not pay our bills? Not eat? To me, the bottom line is music.”

RIFFS: The Timeless All-Stars, featuring pianist Cedar Walton, vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson, saxman Harold Land, trombonist Steve Turre, bassist Buster Williams and drummer Billy Higgin open five nights at Elario’s Wednesday. . .

Guitarist Art Johnson plays Words & Music bookstore in Hillcrest Saturday night at 8. . .

Guitarist Joe Pass is featured on KPBS-TV’s “Club Date” program Saturday night at 8:30, with a repeat showing Monday afternoon at 1:30.