”But there`s nothing like this in New York,” said my bemused acquaintance, who happens to hail from that city.
We were near the end of a weeknight tour of Chicago`s jazz clubs, which had provided us with near-continuous, and continuously swinging, music from 5 p.m. to midnight. And by ”this” my compatriot meant several things–not only the amount, quality and variety of the swinging sounds we had managed to take in, but also the ease with which we had been able to do so.
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Without being the least bit hectic about it, we had traveled to four different clubs and heard some excellent traditional jazz, a roaring Count Basie-styled big band, a very hip neo-Coltrane tenor saxophonist and a remarkable, and remarkably young, trumpet player–all while expending less than $10 apiece in total cover charges, plus the cost of food and liquid refreshment. And as for the geographical scope of our musical odyssey, 10 minutes between clubs was our maximum amount of drive-time.
To modify an old Fats Waller expression, the joints are really jumping. And while having a bunch of jumping joints doesn`t in itself guarantee the health of an art form, one can be pretty sure that a town that has a lot of good places in which musicians can play also is a town in which a lot of good music is being made.
Now at this moment it may not be fair to compare Chicago and New York, because the latter city is laboring under a new cabaret ordinance that, in the name of making residential neighborhoods more residential, drastically limits the number of clubs in which drums can be played.
But even if that were not a factor, the relative vitality of the Chicago jazz-club scene still would be striking; for, as my friend explained, nowhere in New York can one find jazz at 5 p.m., nor is it possible there to hear four different bands in one night without trekking all over town and spending a fair amount of money.
While the Chicago jazz renaissance has passed through several stages, it should be said that we`re talking about clubs that feature so-called ”local” musicians. During the last decade we`ve had, at the most, only three venues that present ”name,” out-of-town jazz artists: the indefatigable Joe Segal`s Jazz Showcase, George Badonsky`s George`s, and Rick`s Cafe Americain, which gave up the ghost last spring when the hotel in which Rick`s was located changed ownership.
In that same span of time, though, the local scene has made several significant spurts, the first of them probably being the advent of Andy`s in the summer of 1978.
Located at 11 E. Hubbard St. and still going strong, Andy`s in turn was an outgrowth of the ”Jazz at Noon” sessions that began several years before at the old Showboat Sari-S club; for those traditional jazz-oriented bashes not only brought together a compatible group of players but also made it clear that, in a city where many office workers head for the suburbs after work, there was an audience for jazz during the daylight hours.
Extending that notion, Andy`s retained the ”Jazz at Noon” policy but made their chief effort in the 5-to-8 p.m. time slot, hoping to attract those listeners who wanted to catch a set or two and still get home in time to put the kids to bed.
An idea that worked, Andy`s was followed three years ago by the Moosehead Bar and Grill at 163 W. Harrison St., a somewhat larger venue that features much the same kind of mainstream swinging music that Andy`s does and also draws most of it patrons from the downtown office-worker crowd.
But as delightful as Andy`s and the Moosehead can be, there can be little doubt that the current burst of energy is centered around two rather off-the- wall clubs: the Get Me High Lounge (1758 N. Honore St.) and the Green Mill
(4802 N. Broadway).
Run by a genuine character named Butch Dakuras, the Get Me High is a genuine joint–a tiny and terminally funky neighborhood bar that has become a grass-roots phenomenon in the 3 1/2 years since Dukaras turned it into a jazz spot.
At once relaxed and intense, with washrooms that require one to cross the bandstand, and a blackboard ceiling upon which customers have scrawled such slogans as ”Beer is food!,” ”Love it to death” and ”Art is just somebody`s name,” the Get Me High gets a lot of its atmosphere from the 36-year-old Dakuras, who used to be, among other things, a professional stuntman and who bears a passing resemblance to the late actor Warren Oates.
Asked how he came up with the ”Get Me High” label, Dakuras explains that ”I`ve been saying it all my life.” And he adds that the name he gave the club almost prevented him from acquiring a liquor license, until one of the commissioners began to chuckle at the thought of a place called the Get Me High and laughter spread around the room.
The Get Me High would seem to be well on the way toward acquiring a certain scruffy chic. (Jazz-fan Jimmy Carter visited when he was in town last month, and one often sees a few Gold Coast types among the normal habitues.)
But the place remains very real, and so does the jazz that is played there by such musicians as veteran multi-instrumentalist Tommy Ponce, drummer Robert Barry, tenor saxophonists Lynn Halliday and Mike Finnerty and 21-year- old trumpeter Brad Goode.
Something of a phenomenon himself, Goode could stand for the musical rebirth that seems to be accompanying the rebirth of the local jazz-club scene.
Born in Chicago, Goode grew up in south-suburban Dolton and attended the University of Kentucky–from whence he returned to teach jazz part time at De Paul University and shock local fans with his facility, range and wealth of bop-rooted ideas. And as an added kick, all this musical heat and intensity is being produced by a young man who looks and acts like an exceptionally well-behaved 14-year-old choir boy.
The night before he played at the Get Me High, recording for Butch Dakuras` nascent Get Me High record label, Goode could be heard with his regular quartet at the Green Mill, which has its own version of the loose-knit atmosphere that prevails at Dakuras` club.
The Green Mill goes way back–founded in 1907, it was the place at which comic Joe E. Lewis was working when ”Machine Gun” Jack McGurn`s boys cut his throat–but it was pretty well run down when current owner Dave Jemilo took over early this year.
Jemilo got his feet wet in the jazz-club field when he opened the Vu (as in ”deja vu”) three years ago; and he bought the Green Mill ”because I wanted to expand, and it looked like the perfect spot.
”My Dad used to hang out there in the `30s, and when I went in there last September I immediately fell in love with it. I closed the place down, restored it and reopened in April, with a different attitude I hope.
”What I want, and I seem to be on the right track, is a nice-looking place where it doesn`t kill you on the money, and you can go there three or four nights in a row if you want. A dollar cover Monday through Wednesday, and two dollars the rest of the week–that`s not going to break anybody.”
Graced by a semi-nude statue of the goddess Ceres (the musicians have renamed her Stella, after ”Stella by Starlight”), the Green Mill is as comfortable as an old shoe and as friendly as your favorite roadhouse waitress. And as a setting for music, the club is just about ideal–with a long curving bar, a plethora of booths, an ample bandstand and a good sound system.
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”I wanted it to be like the old days,” Jemilo says, ”a place where everyone can get together and it doesn`t matter what you`re like.”
What you`re like does seem to matter, though, at another newish spot, the Dixie Bar and Grill (227 W. Chicago Ave.)–for as my New York friend said after taking a glance around the place, ”This is a serious yuppie
situation.”
Basically a voguish Cajun restaurant, the Dixie seems to provide music in order to ease the minds of those who are waiting for tables. But that doesn`t mean that the music isn`t very good, and on the night we dropped by, tenor saxophonist Peter Ballin`s quartet was really smoking.
Much the same could be said of both the scene and the music that prevails at Leslee`s (Sherman and Grove in Evanston), where the crowd seemed to be paying more attention to the vicissitudes of the dating game than it was to the excellent trio led by pianist Joan Hickey.
But if you do come to listen, neither the Dixie nor Leslee`s will put any barriers in the way of your pleasure–the only drawback being the potential lack of the kind of musician-audience interaction that can inspire good players to surpass themselves.
The interaction factor can vary quite a bit at Andy`s and the Moosehead, where the level of after-work revelry sometimes makes the music seem irrelevant. But on a good night these places can really jump–as Andy`s does on Mondays with the mainstream vigor of trombonist Jim Bebee and saxophonist Franz Jackson, and as the Moosehead does on Tuesdays with the music of tenor saxophonist Eddie Johnson and on Wednesdays with drummer Bob Stone`s big band. Stone`s ensemble, which really packs them in, is a particularly heartening phenomenon–a gutty, warm-toned, Count Basie-inspired group that plays that style from the inside out, not as an exercise in nostalgia. And what a kick it is to hear a shouting 17-piece big band in a venue where, if want to, you can sit an arm`s-length away from the sax section and bathe in the massed ensemble blasts.
Finally it should be said that the places and musicians mentioned are not unique, for good jazz clubs and good jazz players seem to be cropping throughout the Chicago area–in the city at Alexander`s Downtown (1100 S. Michigan Ave.), the Bulls (1916 N. Lincoln Park West), Cafe Angelo (225 N. Wabash Ave.), Kiku`s (754 W. Wellington), the Lion Bar (909 N. Michigan Ave.), the New Apartment Lounge (504 E. 75 St.), the No Exit (6970 N. Glenwood Ave.), the Other Place (377 E. 75 St.), and Oz (2917 N. Sheffield Ave.) and in the suburbs at Fitzgerald`s in Berwyn, the Flame restaurants in Countryside and Summit, Gil Simonetti`s in Burbank, the Rib Exchange in Schaumburg and Shane`s Fireside Inn in Waukegan.
It may be true, as jazz musicians have been complaining since the end of the Swing Era, that things ain`t what they used to be. But one suspects that 20 or so years from now a lot of people will have fond memories of the scene that prevailed in 1986.