Winning Season

August 28, 2005

Pat Metheny, René Marie and others ready to knock ‘We Always Swing’ Jazz Series out of the park.

By Seth Ashley
Columbia Tribune
Sunday, August 28, 2005

It’s difficult to pinpoint the moment when Jon Poses got his start as a producer of live jazz concerts.

Was it in 1976 in Switzerland at the Montreux Jazz Festival, where Poses made a deal with the organizer to help clean the festival grounds in exchange for admission to the next day’s show? That’s where Poses would discover players he would follow forever, such as Herbie Hancock.

Or it could have been a decade later, when Poses began networking at New York’s famous Bradley’s jazz club, where the greatest jazz musicians would congregate for late-night performances and the signs on the tables read, "If you need to talk, you should be somewhere else."

Or perhaps it was after another decade, when Poses found himself in Missouri, working as a jazz agent and booking entire tours just so he could bring talent to Columbia.

For whatever reason and against all odds, Poses, who is also a Tribune columnist, has made Columbia a jazz town. Now in its 11th year, his "We Always Swing" Jazz Series continues to offer the best in well-known and obscure jazz players. At a time when interest in jazz continues to wane, Poses brings a mix of music that aims to keep audiences satisfied.

"I think people like Jon are really local heroes," said Ben Roe, music director for National Public Radio. "Because what he’s saying is, ‘If I bring you Pat Metheny or René Marie, it’s like, "Come on in; the water’s fine." ’ What people like Jon are trying to do and what we try to do at NPR is say that if we’ve built up the credibility of the brand so that you trust us, we can help offer you a way in."

This year, Poses and NPR are working together to offer a way in. One of the highlights of this year’s Jazz Series is a special New Year’s Eve show at Murry’s that will feature jazz vocalist Marie. Columbia will represent the entire Central time zone on NPR’s "Toast of the Nation," a live broadcast on 165 stations that rings in the new year all night with midnight performances in time zones around the world.

"In essence, we do a linkup to give people something to do besides listen to Dick Clark on New Year’s Eve," Roe said. "We hope it’s a great, fun night, but it’s also a chance for us to explore and celebrate all sorts of musical styles centered on jazz. It’s a showcase for great artists, but also, we don’t want to bring our listeners to just the usual suspects."

Last year, the broadcast’s reach ranged from New York’s famous Lincoln Center to the tiny Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Miss.

"We like to have both a national spotlight as well as a regional club that you might not otherwise know about," Roe said. "And this year, that’s where Jon fits in. There are so many amazing cities and towns across the country that have some excellent, first-rate artistic achievement, and part of what we do at NPR is we want to find those places. It’s easy to go to Carnegie Hall every year. It’s a lot more challenging for us - but it’s a richer experience - when we can also bring people to Clarksdale or to Columbia."

Another highlight of this year’s Jazz Series is an evening at The Blue Note with the Pat Metheny Trio on Sept. 29. Metheny is often hailed as the world’s best jazz guitarist and has three gold records under his belt as well as 15 Grammy Awards in a variety of categories, including Best Rock Instrumental, Best Contemporary Jazz Recording and Best Jazz Instrumental Solo.

In March, the Jazz Series will bring composer Maria Schneider and her 18-piece orchestra to Jesse Auditorium at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Schneider’s sweeping compositions represent the next wave in jazz, just as her approach to marketing and distributing her music - online only - denotes a new way of doing things. Praised by audiences, Schneider’s "Concert in the Garden" album won a 2005 Grammy and became the first Grammy-winning recording with Internet-only sales. The sales were through Schneider’s ArtistShare Web site, which helps artists receive fair shares of their royalties.

In addition to her Columbia performance, Schneider will offer three days of clinics and workshops as the artist-in-residence component of the James Williams Jazz Series Education Program. Schneider will discuss the basic skills of composing that apply to musicians of all genres.

"Most people who become players need to know something about composing," Schneider said. "First of all, with improvisation, you’re composing on the spot all the time. It’s really an important thing for jazz musicians to develop some compositional skills, and the greater they are as composers, the greater their career is gonna be. Because if they can bring their own voice to the music that they play and also to the way they play it, that’s a powerful thing because you’re coming up with something that’s really uniquely your own."

For Schneider and other jazz artists, that’s often a challenge, but the rewards make it worth it, she said.

"It’s a tough life with the biggest reward," she said. "It’s probably like anything. I don’t think any path you choose in life is easy. The thing I love about this kind of a life is you cannot continue without pushing yourself to a new limit, which ensures your personal growth. Your life is never gonna get stagnant; your work is never done. There’s always something new to learn, so it gives you this perpetual, endless path, and that’s a great thing."

That "endless path" also represents the struggle jazz players must endure to get their music heard, NPR’s Roe said.

"To me, one of the tragedies of jazz is how many excellent artists there are out there - I mean people who are just first-rate, astonishingly proficient musicians - and they don’t get enough bookings," Roe said. "It’s really hard to make a living as a jazz musician in this country, and even for the people at the very top of their profession, it’s harder than it should be. We have this great supply, and I wish there were more demand."

That’s why jazz lovers and players alike appreciate the work of Poses and other jazz promoters.

"There’s definitely people that will bust their butts to present art and music and things they love," Schneider said, "and those people are gems. They are important, important people."

Brant Houston, who heads the Jazz Series’ 12-member board of directors, helps Poses raise money and organize the program.

"We provide Jon with advice and support," Houston said, "but Jon is the leadoff hitter and he’s the cleanup hitter when it comes to putting the program together and making arrangements and having the vision. It’s a jewel to have here in Columbia. It’s one of the things that makes this community special.

"If it were only a commercial venture, then it would be very different. I think Jon achieves a really good balance. I mean, you’ve got Pat Metheny, and then you’ve got the World Saxophone Group. That stretches the boundaries, and I do think each year he achieves a mix. There are those who are a little more accessible and those who are pushing the boundaries.

"I can’t say enough good things about how great it is to have something like this, and that’s why I support it," Houston said. "No one wants Jon to burn out or for this not to be here. It’s one of those things that makes Columbia unique."

Reach Seth Ashley at (573) 815-1704 or sashley@tribmail.com.