Long Beach Museum Tosses Rock Into Summer Show Mix

Long an eclectic pleasure of summer, the annual outdoor concert series at the Long Beach Museum of Art is adding a taste of modern rock to its usual menu of blues, progressive country, jazz and world music.

Alterna-rockers enter the picture Aug. 12, the seventh of nine weekly Wednesday night shows being staged on the museum’s lovely waterfront lawn during July and August. Scarnella, with singer Carla Bozulich and guitarist Nels Cline of the acclaimed L.A. band the Geraldine Fibbers, will share the bill with Stephen Malkmus, who is moonlighting as a solo performer from his usual gig with Pavement.

Other highlights include Tex-Mex music with Little Joe, Rocky & La Familia, New Orleans funk with Leo Nocentelli, a swinging blues night with Jimmy & Jeannie Cheatham and the Sweet Baby Blues Band, and a double bill by two roots acts extraordinaire: Dave Alvin & the Guilty Men and Chris Gaffney & the Cold Hard Facts.

Also in the offing is a higher-priced museum fund-raiser featuring second-generation Cajun and zydeco notables: Balfa Toujours, featuring Christine Balfa, daughter of Cajun fiddle master Dewey Balfa, and Geno Delafose & French Rockin’ Boogie, whose front man carries on the work of his father, zydeco accordion ace John Delafose.

After this 14th season, the series faces a temporary halt or exile during 1999. If fund-raising goes well, museum officials expect to begin a $3-million building expansion project next spring, and the concert lawn won’t be available for shows until the summer of 2000.

Kate Hoffman, who oversees the concert series’ production, said there is talk of putting on at least a few shows next year at an alternate site.

“We think continuity is very important,” she said, noting that, besides building goodwill for the museum, the concert series is a favorite with staff members, whose duties include booking and producing the shows.

This year’s nine-show schedule was deliberately pared down from the 12-week series of the past few years, Hoffman said, to reduce strain on the staff, and because museum officials found that typically three of the dozen shows didn’t draw as well as they hoped. The aim this year, Hoffman said, was to book nine solid shows that will fill the 1,000-capacity lawn, where fans can have a picnic along with an evening of music.

The schedule:

* July 1: Tex-Mex band Little Joe, Rocky & La Familia, and L.A. blues guitarist Beto Lovato.

* July 8: Big-band swing with Eddie Reed and featured singer Meghan Ivey.

* July 15: L.A.-based salsa band Charanga Cubana.

* July 22: Blues with Jimmy & Jeannie Cheatham and the Sweet Baby Blues Band and early L.A. jazz-blues singer Betty Hall Jones.

* July 29: Roots-country band the Derailers.

* Aug. 5: R&B; with Uncle Daddy featuring Diana Harris, and Leo Nocentelli, of legendary New Orleans R&B; band the Meters.

* Aug. 12: Alternative-rock band Scarnella, with Carla Bozulich and Nels Cline of the Geraldine Fibbers, plus Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus solo, marimba band Hot Tinkle, and DJ Bobb Bruno.

* Aug. 19: Roots-rock bands Dave Alvin & the Guilty Men and Chris Gaffney & the Cold Hard Facts.

* Aug. 26: Cajun-zydeco music with Louisiana bands Balfa Toujours and Geno Delafose & French Rockin’ Boogie (a benefit concert for museum programs, with table seating only. Tickets are $300 for a table of 10).

* Long Beach Museum of Art, 2300 E. Ocean Blvd. All shows $9 for members, $12 for others. (562) 439-2119, Ext. 26.