E. Doctor Smith's Blog

One of my biggest musical influences was drummer Bill Bruford and the late '70s and early 1980 albums, "Feels Good To Me", "One of A Kind" and "Gradually Going Tornado", featuring his amazing-sounding Remo Rototom kit. Originally developed by Al Payson and Michael Colgrass, it was Bruford who really put them on the map when he first started using the rototoms during his stint with the prog-rock super-group, U.K. I was fortunate to see that band, featuring bassist John Wetton, keyboards/violinist Eddie Jobson and guitarist Allan Holdsworth in 1978, at the old Painter's Mill in Maryland when they opened for guitarist Al DiMeola. Bruford only used a 14" and an 18" rototom with that group, however their power and ability to cut through guitars and synthesizers were quite evident. They were amazing, however the band was short-lived, with Bruford and Holdsworth leaving after only one album. After Bruford left U.K. he began his own group, ...

Well gentle readers, another year has gone by, so it’s time to take a peek back at some of my favorite musical albums and shows of 2014. This list is by no means complete, but these shows were truly memorable, and these albums have been in my steady rotation and showing no signs of abating. So without further ado, here are twelve of my favorites from the world of jazz, world and rock… 1. Kai Eckhardt’s “Zeitgeist” One of the greatest bass players on the planet, the Liberian/German expatriate Kai Eckhardt, has made his home in Berkeley, after thrilling audiences around the world. His resume features a veritable who’s who of the fantastic jazz and world musicians; guitarist John McLaughlin, drummer Billy Cobham, percussionist Trilok Gurtu, Stanley Clarke, Wayne Shorter, Patrice Rushen, Dewey Redman, Donald Byrd, Bela Fleck, Victor Wooten and his band Garaj Mahal, to name but a few. Eckhardt’s latest album “Zeitgeist”, is jazzy blend of funk, Indian ragas and straight-up, butt-kickin...

Saxophonist Jeff Coffin and his “Mu’tet”, truly defy musical categories, and obliterate musical boundaries with their take-home-with-you compositions, their mind-bending solos and their swirling, danceable odd rhythms and exotic world music influences. Their previous effort, 2012’s “Into the Air” and 2011’s “Jeff Coffin & the Mu’tet Live!”; (a double CD described as “over the top funky and burning with energy and killer tunes). Coffin & the Mu’tet throw down and bring out the music lover in everyone. The album was released on the Ear Up Records label, and recorded live at SPACE (Chicago/Evanston, IL) and at MOMO’S (Austin, TX) in 2010/2011. Coffin and the Mu’tet, (last seen at Yoshi’s on Fillmore a few months ago with special guests George Brooks on saxophone and bassist Kai Eckhardt joining for the encore), returns with a new album, “Side Up”, featuring his fellow Flecktone bandmate Roy “Futureman” Wooten, (replacing drummer Jeff Sipe from the previous album), Felix Pastoriu...

San Francisco saxophonist Charles Unger, fresh from a recent tour of Sweden has re-emerged with a new album entitled, “Around the World”. Unger and jazz group, “The Experience”, featuring bassist Ben Luis, drummer Tony Coleman, and keybordist Sue Crossman, will debut the music from this latest effort at the Peacock Lounge tonight in the Lower Haight. Special guest performers will include a talented array of vocalists; Beverly Al-Kareem, Darlene Roberts and Unger’s longtime musical muse, Valencia Hawkins. A major force in the music scene of the San Francisco Bay area for the last 40 years, saxophonist Charles Unger is a musical institution. He is known for his exuberant style and talent, and for a stage show that is unforgettable. A regular performer at various San Francisco clubs, Unger is an innovator in the genres of Jazz, R&B and World Beat. Unger, who plays alto, tenor and soprano saxophones, was deeply influenced by the seminal works of artists such as Coleman Hawkins, ...

The new album by The Paul & John has been dubbed “an exciting new collaboration between two of the Bay area’s best musicians; guitarist/vocalist songwriters Paul Myers and John Moremen”, and they wouldn’t be far wrong. Inner Sunset proudly carries the Mystery Lawn Music imprint and is released on three formats, including 180-gram vinyl, last July. Myers & Moremen both sing and play all the guitars on the recording, while John plays the drums and Paul plays the bass and wrote all the lyrics. On Thursday night, October 29th, The Paul & John debut their new album at the Bottom of the Hill, alongside the Orange Peels and Felsen. The two wrote all the songs together over three years at John’s studio in the Inner Sunset district of San Francisco, and then recorded and mixed the best of their collaborations with co-producer Allen Clapp (leader of The Orange Peels) at his Mystery Lawn studio in Sunnyvale, California. Once in the studio, Clapp proved to be a vital third ear in the...

Bay Area saxophonist and composer Rent Romus will premiere The Otherworld Cycle, a culmination of over 14 years of research into intersection between modern composition, improvisation, The Kalevala, and Finno-Ugrian traditions in music. The Other World thematic abstractly reference the Uralic “Body of Memory” embedded in Romus’ musical psyche refracted through the multi-faceted lens of improvisation and postmodern jazz. The Otherworld Cycle will make its premiere at theCommunity Music Center located at 544 Capp Street in San Francisco, starting at 8pm on Saturday, October 25 with a matinee show on October 26 at 3pm. Supported by the Musical Grant Program of the San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music and community support from Outsound Presents, admission ranges from $8 to $15. The Community Music Center welcomes patrons of all ages and is ADA accessible. The first elements of the Other World Cycle took hold after Rent Romus returned home from touring in Northern Europe in the m...

Resonance Jazz Ensemble, the Bay Area’s one-of-a-kind jazz octet premieres new works pushing the jazz envelope in their “Fearless Force” concert at the SF Jazz Center’s Robert A. Miner Auditorium this Saturday night at 8:00 pm. The band will introduce new compositions by band members with arrangements of jazz and rock standards by Pianist and Bandleader, Steve McQuarry. Acknowledged by jazz reviewers for “offering a rich fusion of orchestral and big band sounds, with emotional character blending textures and colors of jazz that creates a harmonic canvas of pure delight,” Resonance Jazz Ensemble breaks ground adding strings to the traditional jazz sound. Unusual Instrumentation With an unusual blend of instrumentation that includes violin, viola, cello, sax, flute, piano, bass and drums, the band melds classical with jazz artists and styles into new compositions as well as works from their CD “Introductions”. Reviewers describe this unusual texture of sound explaining: “RESONANCE...

Saxophonist, flautist and composer, Dann Zinn is without a doubt, one of the Bay Area’s best musicians. When he isn’t backing up some the best names in jazz, (like Joe Henderson, Taylor Eigsti, Russ Ferrante, Jeff Tain Watts, Freddie Hubbard, Chuck Findley, Mary Wells, Martha and the Vandellas, Barry Finnerty, Frank Martin to name just a few), he’s leading his own groups, or can be found teaching big bands at Chabot College. With four albums under his belt, Zinn emerges once more with another stellar outing and alongside the legendary drummer Peter Erskine and guitarist Chris Robinson. Zinn’s website aptly describes his latest effort, “Although scholars don’t all agree on the origin of the word, dictionaries are united in their definition of Shangri-La: a remote, beautiful, imaginary place where life approaches perfection. Dann Zinn’s new trio release, Shangri La, like that mystical world, takes the listener far from the familiar humdrum and into a place of wonder and newness. Zin...

Upon meeting guitarist Robert Fripp for the first time, the late, great Jimi Hendrix asked him to shake his left hand, because “It’s closer to my heart…” Fripp, like others who were similarly inspired by that mercurial genius, would go on to much deserved critical acclaim as the founder of the prog-rock entity known as King Crimson. Now in its 45th year(!), Fripp and his latest incarnation of King Crimson roll into the Warfield in San Francisco on Friday and Saturday night for two of their final three shows to end an incredible tour that began in New York last June. For those in the know, “Crimso”, as it is affectionately known, began in England, during the heady days of the late 1960s, alongside groups like Genesis, Yes, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull, and the Soft Machine, to name but a few. My earliest experience with the group came during their 1974 tour at Washington, D.C.’s Kennedy Center, featuring now retired drummer Bill Bruford, bassist John Wetton and violinist Dav...

"Keyboardist Steve McQuarry, bassist Craig Kleinman and drummer E. “Doc” Smith brought their brand of electric jazz and fusion to the Cadillac Hotel on Friday, September 19th @ 12:30 pm. The MKS Trio performed some of the music of Herbie Hancock, Weather Report, Catalyst, Jaco Pastorius and Billy Cobham. Concerts at the Cadillac is a free concert series open to the public. The purpose is to provide high-quality music for the residents of the Cadillac Hotel and San Francisco’s Tenderloin District. Everyone is welcome. Dedicated to the power of music to uplift and inspire. The Cadillac Hotel is also home to the Patricia Walkup Memorial Piano, a meticulously restored 1884 Steinway Model D concert grand piano. The case is of Indian Rosewood and the old growth spruce soundboard is the piano’s original. The piano spent its first 70 years or so in a castle in Holyoke, Massachusetts. It was shipped from New Haven, Connecticut, to the Cadillac Hotel in June, 2007. This beautiful ins...

For the past 15 years, the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival (SFEMF) has brought internationally acclaimed musicians to the Bay Area, becoming the premiere festival dedicated to the genre. The festival began last night at the Exploratorium with the Kanbar Forum, David Dunn, Headboggle + Caitlin Denny, and continues from September 12th–14th. SFEMF will present artists working with analog synthesizers, home-brewed electronics, laptop-generated sound, processed live acoustic instruments, amplified found objects, projected video, improvisation, and performance art. This year’s festival opens at the Exploratorium with field recording maverick David Dunn and antic keyboardist Head Boggle with live visuals by Caitlin Denny. Interested in site-specific interactions and research-oriented activities, David Dunn creates a new view of the environmental world through music. He has received over 35 grants and fellowships for both artistic and scientific research, including the Alpert Award (20...

Allan Holdsworth, one of the world’s best known guitarists returned to Yoshi’s in San Francisco last Tuesday and Wednesday, before wrapping up his amazing 3 day stint at Yoshi’s in Oakland on Thursday. Holdsworth has been thrilling audiences the world over for several decades; I first saw him with the legendary Tony Williams Lifetime band of the mid-seventies, and months later with his fellow Brits in the celebrated prog-rock super group U.K., featuring Roxy Music’s Eddie Jobson, and King Crimson’s John Wetton and Bill Bruford. Holdsworth would soldier on with his own groups like I.O.U and assorted trios, displaying the genius he has become known throughout the world for. Many critically acclaimed albums would follow; his guitar synth forays with “Atavachron”, “Road Games”, “Metal Fatigue”, “Sand”, “Secrets”, “Wardenclyffe Tower”, “Hardhat Area” and “Sixteen Men of Tain” in 2000. Fans of the guitarist will no doubt recall his tribute to the late Williams, “Blues for Tony”, culminating ...

One of the world’s best percussionists, Ranjit Barot has joined forces with bassist Etienne Mbappe and U. Shrinivas on mandolin, to create a fabulous new album, due to be released on September 10th. “The word chingari literally means ‘a spark’ in Hindi,” explains Barot. The internationally renowned, Mumbai-based composer and drummer has taken the word as the name for a new trio featuring himself, Southern Indian mandolin virtuoso Shrinivas, and Cameroonian bassist and vocalist Mbappe. “My thought behind the name was a spark, yes,” he adds, “but one which lights a big fire.” “On their debut album Bombay Makossa – available September 16, 2014 on the Abstract Logix imprint – the three musicians mine their richly divergent experiences to create a dynamic, fluid hybrid sound that fuses the rhythmic intricacy and improvisational fervor of South Indian Carnatic music with the infectious buoyancy of Cameroonian sounds, bridged by a shared love of jazz, second-line funk, and the shimmering text...

Organist Wil Blades returns to the Boom Boom Room at Fillmore & Geary this Friday and Saturday night, with a stellar band in tow. On the heels of his wonderful album “Shimmy” with Medeski, Martin and Wood drummer Billy Martin, and his newest release “Field Notes”, Blades rolls in with the amazing saxophonist Skerik, (fresh from a reunion in Austin with Seattle’s Critters Buggin’); Mike Clark, (Herbie Hancock’s drummer from his original Headhunters band), and guitarist Jeff Parker. Parker joined Blades and drummer Simon Lott on the aforementioned Field Notes. If you saw and enjoyed the Shimmy show last year with Martin, (and with a horn section to boot), you will love this line-up. Blades’ Field Notes Released on the Royal Potato Family label, his latest effort as described on the their website, states, “When Wil Blades sits down at the Hammond B3, count on inspired music to follow. The 34-year old, Chicago-native, Berkeley-based artist is a cornerstone organist of his generation—a ...

One of the most prolific drummers to ever grace the skins, Dave Weckl has played with a veritable who’s who of musical greats; alongside bassist Victor Wooten in Chick Corea’s Elektric Band, the late, great saxophonist, Michael Brecker, or Contra-bass master Anthony Jackson, guitarists George Benson and Mike Stern to name but a few. Weckl returns to Yoshi’s in Oakland, this time leading his own, all-acoustic quartet in support of his newest album. Dave Weckl, Modern Drummer’s Hall of Fame-er and among the top 25 drummers of all time, launches his first band, tour and recording in over a decade. With Makoto Ozone on piano and keys, Tom Kennedy/bass and Gary Meek/saxes the Dave Weckl Acoustic Band is charged with riveting chemistry, ebullient communication and rare telepathy that engages audiences to their rapt delight. Early on, it was Peter Erskine who recommended Dave for French Toast, a Michel Camilo band. Next legendary bassist Anthony Jackson suggested Dave for the Simon and Garfun...

One of the Bay area’s best music festivals, The 13th Annual Outsound New Music Summit, July 27–August 2, 2014, returns to the Community Music Center at 544 Capp Street in San Francisco. The New Music Summit is co-presented by KFJC 89.7 FM. Featured during the annual festival will be poets collaborating with unique electro-acoustic settings; a night of experimental guitar solos and duos; a cue-led improvising orchestra, vocal and student workshops, the “Touch the Gear” Expo and acoustic/electric ensembles pushing the edge of sound. Sixteen performances will take place throughout the week, and will include the first poet to experiment with jazz, Ruth Weiss. Dubbed by writer Herb Caen as “the goddess of the beat generation,” Ruth will collaborate with buchla synthesis pioneer Doug Lynner. The Summit will also feature world premieres by the Emergency String (X)tet, the Deconstruction Orchestra; Pitta of the Mind; the world-renowned Henry Kaiser; and the Teddy Rankin-Parker/Daniel Pearce Du...

The new album by The Paul & John has been dubbed “an exciting new collaboration between two of the Bay area’s best musicians; guitarist/vocalist songwriters Paul Myers and John Moremen”, and they wouldn’t be far wrong. Inner Sunset proudly carries the Mystery Lawn Music imprint and is released on three formats, including 180-gram vinyl, on July 15, 2014. Myers & Moremen both sing and play all the guitars on the recording, while John plays the drums and Paul plays the bass and wrote all the lyrics. The two wrote all the songs together over three years at John’s studio in the Inner Sunset district of San Francisco, and then recorded and mixed the best of their collaborations with co-producer Allen Clapp (leader of The Orange Peels) at his Mystery Lawn studio in Sunnyvale, California. Once in the studio, Clapp proved to be a vital third ear in the arranging and presentation of the songs. Upon completion, Grammy nominated mastering engineer Myles Boisen gave the project its final s...

Legendary Bay Area artist Jim Ryan celebrates his eightieth year on planet earth with two performances this Sunday evening beginning with his “Mindless Thing”, a collaboration between drummer/composer Jordan Glenn and saxophonist/band leader/poet/artist/sage Ryan. “The music, composed and conducted by Glenn, takes malleable material and filters it through a unique ensemble of strings and percussion. The result is used to create a backdrop for Ryan’s surreal and haunting poetry…” “Poet, writer, philosopher and musician, Jim Ryan is an original member of the exploratory family of artists of the 20th century. His powerful playing style and truly original voice permeates the San Francisco Bay Area with vibrant spirit. Jim Ryan was born in St. Paul, Minnesota and began listening to bebop at age 15. In 1958 after obtaining a degree in philosophy from the University of Minnesota, Jim was drafted into the army and sent to Europe. After serving for 21 months, Jim found himself attending the Sor...