MJF/52 All-Stars (soundcheck): Kenny Barron (piano), Regina Carter (violin), Russell Maone (guitar), Kurt Elling (vocal)
Kiyoshi Kitagawa (bass) & Jonathan Blake (drums) are back there, too.
Esperanza Spalding on the electric bass...
...& the upright bass.
I already forget who the trumpet player was.
Monterey Jazz Festival All-Stars for real this time.
The pictures don't come out quite as good at night.
See?
Look, Regina Carter disappeared!
There's a shot of the whole stage with the video screen in the background.
This may have been where I got the hang of taking pictures.
Kurt Elling singing "Soul Food"
Then Kurt Elling disappeared, too.
& reappeared. I don't know why I took so many pictures of this.
Moving on to the next act... I guess this is Conrad Herwig's Latin Side All-Star Band with Special Guests Randy Brecker & Joe Lovano.
There's Joe Lovano. I don't actually remember watching these people...
...Probably because I didn't watch them for very long. This is the last picture.
Saturday afternoon: Pete Seeger
Pete Seeger plays the banjo & everyone smiles.
Pete's grandson Tao Rodriguez-Seeger did most of the singing for him, but that's okay.
Not all of it, though.
According to the program, the people who are not Pete Seeger are: Mike Merenda (banjo), Ruth Ungar Merenda (guitar), Tao Rodriguez-Seeger (guirar), Laura Cortese (fiddle), & Jacob silver [not shown] (bass). That doesn't really explain who the other two people in this picture are.
I guess most of those people are part of Pete Seeger's family.
As far as old people go, Pete Seeger's doing better than Dave Brubeck.
Ruth sang "Wartime Blues", which Blind Lemon Jefferson wrote but which Pete Seeger (& Woody Guthrie?) changed the lyrics to: "I know killing's wrong".
Then Pete played the Banjo some more.
& everyone switched instruments.
Until, of course, "This Land is Your Land".
The arena holds 6500 people; all of them were singing & clapping along.
Pete Seeger also did a children's show later in the afternoon...
...which ended with "This Little Light of Mine".
John Scofield...
...with Joe Lovano (tenor saxophone), Brian Blade (drums), & John Patitucci (bass).
Brian Blade is a pretty awesome drummer.
Hank Jones was supposed to be there on piano, but he wasn't.
This is Dee Dee Brigewater.
She's not my favorite, but I took some pictures anyway.
She kept fussing with her necklace, which drove me nuts.
She also did a lot of dancing & speaking in a fake Spanish accent.
& sang "Four Women" because Nina Simone is awesome.
The other musicians were Edsel Gomez (piano), Ira Coleman (bass), Vince Cherico (drums), & Luisito Quintero (percussion).
The last act of the night was the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis.
I don't have any good pictures of the band because I was working during most of their set.
...& by "working" I mean "backstage". That's the top of Wynton Marsalis's head (directly under the microphone).
This is a slightly better picture from backstage.
Moving on to Sunday night, this is Jason Moran & the Bandwagon. I've never heard of Jason Moran & the Bandwagon.
Berklee College of Music gave Dave Brubeck an honorary degree.
The guy on the left is Clint Eastwood. Chick Corea is the guy without the funny doctoral robe.
I don't know why they put the music stand at the same level as Dave Brubeck's head.
Then Dave Brubeck came out to play the piano. Hooray!
It's too bad the gigantic saxophonist (Bobby Militello) is blocking both the bassist (Michael Moore) & the drummer (Randy Jones).
I moved to the other side of the arena, so I have lots of pictures of the back of Dave Brubeck's head...
...like this one.
I tried to take pictures when they were showing Brubeck's face &/or hands on the video screen.
I got pretty good at timing it.
&, conveniently, you can see Michael Moore through the open piano.
Take Five <3
He looks like such a happy old person.
Then came Chick Corea with Stanley Clarke (bass) & Lenny White (drums)...
...which was confusing because I was tired & wanted to call at least one of them Lenny Clarke. Lenny Clarke, to the best of my knowledge, is not a jazz musician.
Chick Corea isn't my favorite, but Stanley Clarke is amazing.
His extended solo was definitely one of the highlights of the festival.
& he's equally amazing with the bow.
So I took pictures of him instead of of Chick Corea.
Okay, so I took some pictures of Chick Corea.
Then we went to the Hyatt.
So did a lot of other people.
There were some people playing music there.
& you could see them better with the flash on.
It's a lot harder to caption pictures when you didn't take them yourself.
