Tuesday Night Music Club

Tuesday, October 1

Local bassist Andrew Downing and his group The Great Uncles of the Revolution, at a nice little church in west London.

I’m familiar with Andrew from his stint with Lenni Jabour, and have become a fan of his (and his fellow Uncles Jesse Zubot, Steve Dawson and Kevin Turcotte). Nominally a jazz quartet–bass, guitar, violin and trumpet–they did a full set of original music, followed by a version of Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf that was just plain cool.

Tuesday, October 8

Local folk(?) trio Sirens, at the dedication of the Wolf Performance Hall at London’s new central library.

I’m still not sure just how I got invited to this, but I’m not about to complain. Donna, Amber and Jo-Ann did a short set, followed by speeches from the various donors and officials involved in getting the hall built, followed by a Sirens finale. It’s a beautiful location, and there’s no better group than Sirens to have christened it officially. More money in the room than I could count, from Norton Wolf (the hall’s namesake) to the Jefferys (local benefactors) to Lindsey Elwood (the head of the downtown business association) to lots of other names and families I can’t recall.

Tuesday, October 15

Dayna Manning at the newly-painted Club Phoenix.

This is going to happen in about half an hour, along with Holly McNarland and Wide Mouth Mason. I’m not going to be there… something about picking up my parents after their three-week holiday in Slovakia… but I did buy her sophomore CD this evening, and it’s good. Hope she’s going to be back in the area sometime soon. (Dayna, if you’re out there, soon means before another five years pass!) The last time I saw her was when she opened for Colin James on a rainy afternoon at Harris Park–I stayed through the rain to listen to her, then left before James took the stage–so a solo show in her hometown, which is only an hour away, would be just the ticket.