The 44th Clearwater Jazz Holiday
with Gladys Knight, Los Lobos, Gipsy Kings, Kenny Wayne Shepherd
Clearwater, Florida • October 19-22, 2023
by Bob Pomeroy
The Clearwater Jazz Holiday is a Florida institution bringing an engaging program of jazz and related music to Coachman Park every October. 2023 marks the 44th edition of the Jazz Holiday and the first to be held at The Sound, a covered outdoor music facility that’s been added to the Holiday’s traditional home. The event is produced by a non-profit foundation dedicated to music education and presenting performance opportunities for local jazz musicians.
I missed the opening night of the Jazz Holiday, where the Beach Boys performed with the Good Vibrations Orchestra. The rest of the weekend was spent grooving to old favorites and discovering new (to me at least) bands.
Friday Night Vibes
Friday night was full of good-time nostalgia. The evening started with a New Orleans institution, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. I was a little surprised to see that the band on stage was not the version of the band I’m used to seeing. The band that has been recording original music and guesting with the Foo Fighters was playing in California on Friday night. Preservation Hall is dedicated to keeping the flame alive for New Orleans music, and a big part of the Hall’s mandate is providing a place for older musicians to pass on the tradition to younger ones.
From visiting New Orleans, I knew there were several versions of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. The version of the band that played The Sound was made up of younger musicians playing mainly well-loved songs from the New Orleans cannon. They may not have been the people I was expecting to see on stage, but they still put on a great show.
Gladys Knight was the Friday night headliner, but she played the middle slot of the evening’s program. When you’re a legendary soul singer, you can pretty much do what you want. She opened her set with “Taste of Bitter Love” and proceeded to work through other highlights from her career with the Pips. She added some choice covers like Johnny Otis’s “Every Beat of My Heart” and Lee Ann Womack’s “I Hope You Dance.”
At 79, Gladys is still able to put across her songs in fine voice. Toward the end of her set, Gladys took a seat while her backup singers, who had been sitting, stood up to sing “Neither One of Us” and a moving version of “The Way We Were,” and closed the set with “Midnight Train to Georgia.”
The Average White Band closed out the evening with their Scottish take on soul and funk sounds. The band are on their Let’s Go Round Again One Last Time tour with original members Alan Gorrie (bass, vocals) and Onnie McIntyre (guitar) carrying on the band’s sound. The band played fan favorites, like “This World Has Music” and “School Boy Crush,” before wrapping things up with the instrumental hit “Pick Up the Pieces.”
Saturday and Sunday in the Park
Saturday and Sunday inaugurated a new feature of the Clearwater Jazz Holiday: free afternoon concerts in the park and downtown Clearwater. These free shows are in keeping with the foundation’s goal of spreading jazz awareness and fostering young performers. Graduates of the foundation’s jazz education program were featured, along with some up-and-coming acts, like Grace Kelly and Roosevelt Collier.
On Saturday afternoon, I caught Grace Kelly on the Waterfront stage. Kelly has been recording and leading bands since she was 15 and played for awhile in Jon Batiste’s Stay Human. She played an enjoyable blend of jazz and funk. She played a song called “Queen,” which was inspired by the writings of Maya Angelou. Grace seemed to have the most fun with her version of Walk the Moon’s “Shut Up and Dance.” Kelly didn’t shut up, but she did go out into the audience to dance with the fans.
On Sunday afternoon, I hung out at the Young Lions stage watching some of the best local talent. The Schaff Wall Collective played a nice set of jazz standards. Alex Malkovich played guitar and saxophone. Malkovich’s set is part of the foundation’s program to give young musicians a place to play and a chance to work with older, more experienced players.
Saturday Night World
Buddy Guy was slated to be the headliner on Saturday night but had to cancel due to health issues. To compensate, they added Roosevelt Collier and Friends to the evening program and pushed up Los Lobos and Gipsy Kings.
Disappointment was replaced with pleasant surprise when Roosevelt Collier ripped into his second set of the day. Collier is a pedal steel guitar player who comes out of the Sacred Steel tradition in Southern churches. Collier’s set was high-energy blues with gospel and jazz overtones. About halfway though the set, Los Lobos sax player Steve Berlin just appeared on stage and jammed with the Miami-based band. Their set reminded me a lot of Robert Randolph and the Family Band.
Roosevelt Collier set the bar high, and Los Lobos were up for the challenge. Their set leaned heavily on their roots rock material, starting with “One Time One Night.” They played a lot of my favorite songs from their early albums, including “Come On, Let’s Go,” “Will the Wolf Survive,” and “Evangeline.”
Los Lobos pulled some surprises on us. At one point they asked the audience “are there any hippies out there?” After the expected cheering, they launched into a blistering rendition of “Cinnamon Girl.” Another highlight was the Sublime cover “Pawn Shop” featuring guest Roosevelt Collier on slide guitar. I was glad when they broke out the accordion and did a few Mexican folk songs. Of course the crowd went wild for the set closer, “La Bamba.”
The Gipsy Kings featuring Nicolas Reyes closed out Saturday night with an energizing set of Catalan rumba and flamenco based tunes. The focus of the band is Reyes and the four other guitarists who provide the band’s signature strum. The songs are all sung in Catalan, Spanish, and French dialects. I couldn’t understand a word, but that didn’t matter. Music is an international language.
Nicolas Reyes sang lead on most of the songs in his gruff tenor. Toward the end of the set, other members of the band stepped up to sing, showing that the Gipsy Kings’ sound is safely being passed on to another generation. The crowd sang along to the band’s best known song, “Bomboleo” before Reyes closed out the show with “Volare.”
Sunday Night Blues
The final night of the Jazz Holiday was a night for all shades of blue. The first act up was Christone “Kingfish” Ingram. Ingram was one of the acts I absolutely could not miss. There’s a big buzz about him being the future of Blues, making me wonder if he could live up to the hype.
The “Kingfish” lives up to the hype. He’s a monster on the guitar and a soulful singer. He grew up in the heartland of the Blues, Clarksdale, Mississippi. I can hear the history of the Blues in his playing. He celebrates his Mississippi Delta heritage in “662.” In the social commentary on “Another Life Goes By,” I can hear the influence of Gill Scott Heron. His soloing sometimes reminds me of BB King. And, just to give people something to talk about, he played his guitar with his teeth on the last song of the set.
Trampled By Turtles won a score of new fans on Saturday night. The band from Duluth, Minnesota, played a hyper-energetic form of Bluegrass that really got the crowd going. This was really foot stompin’ music. When a song required a thumping beat, it came from cellist Eamonn McLain’s foot pounding the stage. Singer Dave Simonett is the quiet center of this storm, with impressive soloing coming from Ryan Young on fiddle, Dave Carroll on banjo, and Erik Berry and his flying hair on mandolin.
When their set was over, there was a general buzz in the crowd about how great they were. A lot of people came to the show not knowing who Trampled By Turtles were and left as fans.
The Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band closed out the 44th Clearwater Jazz Holiday with a set of blistering Blues. They opened the show with rhythm guitarist Noah Hunt singing “Woman Like You” and “Mr. Soul.” Then Kenny took over the vocals on “Long Time Running.” He and Noah traded off on lead vocals throughout the set.
Kenny took the audience back to the beginning of his career with a pair of songs from his first album, Ledbetter Heights. Noah sang on “Deja Voodoo” and “Shame, Shame, Shame,” while Kenny did his talking through his guitar. The band finished their regular set with Joe Walsh’s “Turn to Stone,” then launched directly into the “encore” of “Blue on Black” and the Hendrix classic “Voodoo Chile.”
The lights went up with the last notes of “Voodoo Chile” still ringing in our ears, and the 44th Clearwater Jazz Holiday came to an end. The foundation will be active in the community throughout the year with their education programs and planning for the next Holiday.
See you next year.
https://www.clearwaterjazz.com
