Decisions, Decisions: Fests Pack the L.A. Schedule

Jazz at Drew, next weekend at the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, has neither the budget, the promotion, the venue nor the attendance of the Playboy Jazz Festival. But a quick look at the lineup reveals a schedule of programming that can easily serve as an early autumn counter to spring’s Playboy event.

Who’s on tap? Nancy Wilson and her trio, the Kenny Burrell Quartet, Louis Bellson’s 17-piece band, the Winard Harper Sextet, the Cedar Walton sextet with a 20-piece string ensemble, Norman Connors, Jeane Carne, Bobby Lyle, Bobby Rodriguez’s 23-piece Latin jazz ensemble and numerous others.

There will be, in addition, a performance by Zulu and Indian dancers from KWA Zulu Natal, South Africa, as well as an African marketplace with traditional food, crafts, arts, clothing and jewelry.

That’s an impressive lineup for a major jazz festival, the product of a remarkably successful effort to establish an important cultural event in the heart of South-Central Los Angeles.

“We started 10 years ago,” says Roland Betts, founder and executive producer of Jazz at Drew. “That first performance was a helluva show, even though we only had a few hundred people turn out for it.”

Over the past few years, the size of the audience has begun to keep up with the quality of the programming, and the concerts Oct. 7-8 will likely draw crowds of around 5,500 for each day.

The festival, whose theme is “Building Cultural Bridges Through Music,” has honored many jazz icons in the past--James Moody, Billy Higgins, Joe Williams and Harry “Sweets” Edison among them. This year’s choice will be longtime civil rights leader Andrew Young, chosen for his stellar career as well as his many years of support to the university.

Betts produces the festival with a minimal staff that includes his assistant, Toni Abdul-Hasan, his technical director, Jarmil Maupin (son of the great jazz woodwind artist Bennie Maupin), and publicist Oscar Edwards. Proceeds from ticket sales and sponsorship are, he says, an important source of funds for scholarships for Drew, a unique academic institution.

“The university is the only historical African American medical college, as designated by Congress, west of the Mississippi,” Betts explains.

Underscoring the importance of Drew as an inner-city educational entity with a remarkable record of success, he emphasizes the role that the festival has played in making it possible for more students to make full use of the facility.

“And, hopefully,” he says, “having an event like this in association with a medical university will encourage other folks in the medical community to jump on board and provide us with the kind of support that will help us take the event up to even a higher level.”

A longtime jazz fan, he originally founded the festival because of his belief in the inherent connections between jazz and medicine. And he continues to believe in the importance of that linkage.

“Music being therapeutic and medicine being medicinal,” concludes Betts, “why not join them as branches from the same tree of life? Why not celebrate the art of music and the science of medicine in a way to connects the medical community with the larger community?”

* Jazz at Drew takes place Oct. 7-8 at Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, 1720 E. 120th St., Los Angeles. Gates open each day at 11 a.m. for a noon concert start. Tickets are $25 in advance, $30 at the gate. Reserved VIP tables for four available from $250 to $500. Info: (323) 563-9390.

Way Out West Coast Jazz: Ken Poston is at it again. His Los Angeles Jazz Institute, which has been producing an impressive series of festivals for nearly a decade, is presenting a salute to big band jazz in Los Angeles. Way Out West, which runs Thursday through Oct. 8 in Redondo Beach, seems to have gathered every surviving musician who has had anything to do with large ensemble music.

“The funny thing,” says Poston, “is that we started out to do something completely different. Our last event celebrated the ‘50s, so it seemed logical to do West Coast jazz in the ‘60s next. But we couldn’t get it together, and all these ideas and possibilities for big band jazz kept coming up, and this is what we wound up with.”

Poston is being modest. What he wound up with is an impressive overview, one that encompasses the historical, the hard-swinging and the innovative. Among the many featured ensembles are the Gerald Wilson Orchestra, the Tom Talbert Orchestra, the Bill Holman Orchestra, Maynard Ferguson’s Big Bop Nouveau, the Clayton-Hamilton Orchestra and the Bob Florence Limited Edition.

“We always try in these programs to include some special events, the sort of programs you’ll probably never get to hear on their own,” adds Poston. “In this festival, for example, we have the music of Johnny Richards, conducted by Joel Kaye. I can’t imagine where else that might be heard.

“And, since we’ve been so closely associated with Stan Kenton, and so much of our core audience flows from an interest in Kenton, we’ve brought Pete Rugolo in to play many of his Kenton arrangements with vocals by the Four Freshmen. Terry Gibbs is also reviving his Dream Band; we’ve got a battle--with a lot of drum interaction--between Frankie Capp’s Juggernaut and the Louis Bellson Jazz Orchestra, and we’re bringing Toshiko Akiyoshi and Lew Tabackin back for a reunion with some of the players in the band they had here in the ‘70s.”

All that, plus a series of panels featuring such informative and entertaining personalities as Jack Sheldon, Bill Perkins, the Candoli Brothers, Terry Gibbs, Med Flory, Gerald Wilson, Buddy Collette and many others. The only problem with the event, in fact, is the scheduling, which obviously is in direct competition with the Drew University festival on the weekend.

* Way Out West, Thursday through Oct. 8 at the Crowne Plaza Redondo Beach & Marina Hotel, 300 N. Harbor Drive, Redondo Beach. Programs start at 9:30 a.m. and conclude with 8 p.m. concerts. Prices range from $10 for panels to $25 for concerts. A four-day pass to all events is $300. Info: (909) 593-4180.

More Weekend Jazz: Still haven’t had enough? As if the Way Out West and Drew jazz festival simultaneous scheduling wasn’t enough of a problem, L.A. jazz fans are going to have to make one more decision on Oct. 7, when Jazz Day L.A. offers a free jazz festival in the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles County’s plaza.

The program, which runs from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., features the Bill Cunliffe Sextet, the Charlie Shoemake Trio and Francisco Aguabella’s Latin Jazz Band. There will also be an appearance by the Spotlight Awards Alumni Band, showcasing the Performing Arts Center’s jazz Spotlight Awards winners Donald Vega, piano, Miles Mosley, bass, Tommy Catanzaro, saxophone, and Raya Yarbrough, vocals.

In addition, master classes--open to the public--will be offered in the Grand Hall of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion at 10 a.m. (with pianist Shelly Berg) and 12:30 p.m. (with saxophonist Ernie Watts). Finally, an afternoon concert featuring the Patrick Williams Big Band with special guests Eddie Daniels, clarinet, and Bill Watrous, trombone, will be presented at 3:30 p.m. at the Colburn School of Performing Arts, down the street from the center at 200 S. Grand.

Information: (213) 972-8000.

Anyone who can figure out how to be in three places at the same time should have an incredible jazz weekend.

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Don Heckman is The Times’ jazz writer. He can be reached at djh@earthlink.net.