New music, venues and a thriving genre

It’s the middle of April and daylight saving time has returned, casting bright light into all the crevices where snippets of information, overlooked CDs and unexplored story lines have dwelt too long in the shadows.

So let’s open them up, check them out and clear the decks for the inevitable rush of new material that accompanies the impending arrival of summer.

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Clubs in transition

Here’s an interesting development. Change is an essential fact of life. Take jazz clubs, for example. The stereotype has been around for decades: a combination restaurant-nightclub, busy waiters, a noisy bar and, until recently, a smoky atmosphere. Patrons pay the cover and nurse their two-drink minimum purchases throughout a set or two.

Despite a few refinements and an out-and-out transformation or two (as in the case of the theater-like Jazz Bakery), it’s a model that still remains central to most folks’ view of what a jazz club is.

But for many years new templates have been emerging. Hotels have elected to transform existing bar and restaurant rooms into jazz venues such as Fitzgerald’s at the Woodland Hills Hilton. Restaurants such as Spazio in Sherman Oaks have opened up jazz performance spaces.

These are moves that can make financial sense, given the fact that hotels and restaurants already have rooms and service help available, avoiding the start-up costs and overhead associated with starting a completely new jazz room.

Even more intriguing has been the appearance of one- and two-night-a-week jazz venues: the Westin LAX Hotel on Wednesdays, Jazz at the LAX Crowne Plaza on Thursdays, Clancy’s Crab Shack in Glendale on Fridays and Saturdays, the Four Points Sheraton LAX on Tuesdays, the Howling Monk Jazz Coffee Bar in Inglewood on Fridays and Saturdays, the Vic in Santa Monica on Thursdays.

In some respects, venues such as these and numerous others are comparable to the pop and dance club practice of making space available to outside producers. In effect, it opens the opportunity for dozens of other similar venues throughout Los Angeles.

The net result of this potentially important trend is that new jazz-performance outlets are opening at the very time when more established traditional rooms such as Pearl’s in San Francisco are occasionally closing down. There’s still ample space -- and need -- for those traditional rooms, places such as Catalina Bar & Grill, Charlie O’s, Steamers, La Ve Lee and Lunaria, most of which are still thriving despite predictions of the music’s demise.

The growing enhancement of choices -- as well as the added performance opportunities for musicians provided by the one- and two-night venues -- suggests, to the contrary, that jazz is alive and well. It’s the performance places that are changing.

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Jazz and protest

A few weeks ago I wrote a column noting the relatively modest amount of jazz activism, especially in recent years. As it turns out, my comments were a bit premature.

A new album by multi-reedman Gilad Atzmon, who has performed with, among others, Paul McCartney and Sinead O’Connor, takes a strong stance regarding issues dividing his homeland of Israel.

“Exile” (Enja/Justin Time), scheduled for release on May 6, is an effort, Atzmon writes in the booklet notes, “to emphasize the similarity between the two peoples that have lived in perfect harmony for hundreds of years.” He reaches beyond that relatively modest statement, however, by adding that the album tells “the story of Palestine, a beautiful and historically ecumenical land that was suddenly stormed by radical Zionist zealots.”

The music, performed by his group Orient House Ensemble, embraces everything from passionate, Coltrane-esque free playing and tango textures to Middle Eastern rhythms occasionally peppered with the sound of oud and wooden flutes.

Occasional lyrics in Arabic address the issues more subtly than the leader’s essay. On its own, without activist references, the album is an entertaining collection of music led by a first-rate saxophonist and composer.

But Atzmon, a secular Jew who was raised in Israel, obviously has more far-reaching goals, and accordingly will surely be greeted with criticism.

Besides the remarks he makes in his liner-note commentary (“How is it that a people who have suffered so much and for so long can inflict so much pain on the Other?”), he underscores his points by positioning Jewish traditional songs and Israeli melodies within Arabic interpretations.

Agree with Atzmon or not, “Exile” is a persuasive example of jazz and world music’s too-infrequently explored activist potential.

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Disc re-checking

It’s impossible to cover all the albums that continue to pour out of the record companies, but here’s a random look at some of the last few months’ arrivals and developments.

Marian McPartland’s “Piano Jazz” series has long been one of the pleasures of public radio. In February, she marked 25 years as host of the NPR program and 25 years with Concord Records via the reissue of three titles from the series. Her guests on the three albums are Dizzy Gillespie, Rosemary Clooney and Dave Brubeck.

“ScoLoHoFo” isn’t really as odd a name as it seems. It’s simply a combination of syllables from the surnames of the participants on the Blue Note release “Oh!” -- John Scofield, Joe Lovano, Dave Holland and Al Foster. That’s an all-star lineup by any definition, and the music, which ranges in all directions stylistically, thoroughly reflects the excellence of the players.

Trombonist Slide Hampton’s revival after 20 years of his group the World of Trombones in “Spirit of the Horn” (Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild) will be a joyful experience to every fan of this versatile instrument.

Hampton has always been a first-rate arranger, and he brings a brilliantly colorful palette to his charts for a 12-trombone and rhythm-section ensemble that also features his own first recording in the company of another brilliant trombonist, Bill Watrous.

Delmark Records in Chicago deserves kudos for its continued dedication to presenting a full gamut of jazz reaching from avant-garde to traditional. Its February releases included a thorny new Anthony Braxton CD, “Four Compositions 2000,” a spirited collection of pieces from Ernest Dawkins’ New Horizons Ensemble, “Capetown Shuffle,” and a stomping set of traditional jazz tunes from the Bay City Jazz Band, “Alligator Crawl.”

Mosaic Records, the company that produces high-quality, limited-edition collections, continues to produce invaluable items for dedicated collectors as well as fans of individual artists. Two recent releases chronicle the work of Jack Teagarden (“The Complete Roulette Jack Teagarden Sessions”) and Lou Donaldson (“The Complete Blue Note Lou Donaldson Sessions 1957-60”).

The four-CD Teagarden collection, which dates from 1959-61, includes 21 newly discovered tracks. The six-CD Donaldson set covers the period in which the hard-swinging alto saxophonist transitioned from bebop into the funky organ, guitar and saxophone sounds of soul jazz. (Mosaic limited-edition releases are available only from Mosaic Records, 35 Melrose Place, Stamford, CT 06902, [203] 327-7111.)