Chicago has just lost perhaps its greatest living link to its earliest jazz history with the death of reedist Franz Jackson, who passed away yesterday at the age of 95.

Jackson got his start as a musician back in 1929, playing with the great barrelhouse pianist Albert Ammons, and over the decades he played with Jimmie Noone, Roy Eldridge, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Benny Carter, James P. Johnson, and many others too numerous to mention. His career was nearly 80 years long, but he didn't make many records under his own name in that time--his last, I Is What I Is, was released in 2005 by Pinnacle. Still, thanks to his easy flexibility, which allowed him to bridge the gaps between traditional jazz, swing, and bebop, Jackson was a steady presence on the local scene--particularly at venues like Andy's, Dick's Last Resort, Joe's Be-Bop Cafe, the Green Mill, and Pops for Champagne--and he was reportedly in good form when playing at his 95th birthday celebration last November.

Jackson was chosen to receive the 2008 Theodore Thomas History Maker Award for Distinction in Performing Arts from the Chicago History Museum prior to his death, so his daughter Michelle Jewell will accept the award during a May 15 ceremony. A memorial service is planned for Saturday, May 24, from 1-3 PM at the Apostolic Lifehouse Church in Dowagiac, Michigan.

Today's playlist:

Yoko Ono, Approximately Infinite Universe (Rykodisc)
Larry Ochs: Sax & Drumming Core, Up From Under (Atavistic)
The Revolutionaries, Drum Sound (Pressure Sounds)
United Brassworkers Front, In Between Stories (Evander)
Haco, Happiness Proof (P-Vine)

I didn't listen to much from young composer and musician Jonathan Chen, who graduated from Northwestern with a master's in violin performance in 1999, until after he left Chicago in 2004. But since then I've been repeatedly impressed by the consistency and rigor of his work. He's occasionally sent me pieces of music from Middletown, Connecticut, from Karlsruhe, Germany, and most recently from Athens, Georgia--all places he's lived since leaving. The recordings usually come in advance of return visits like the one he's making this week, and every time they reveal new facets of his output.

Tuesday Chen performs at Elastic and on Wednesday he's at Heaven Gallery. On both nights he'll play solo and with his project Patterns of Affect (pictured; the lineup currently includes Jamie Kempkers, Joe Mills of Haptic, and Peter Rosenbloom of Tiny Hairs).

The two pieces that Patterns of Affect will perform at each show push minimalist precepts to the breaking point, avoiding the usual incremental development of such music in favor of rich stasis. The piece that gives the group its name opens with loose banjo arpeggios, spinning and spinning, and then suddenly opens up with the addition of violin, cello, hurdy-gurdy, and electronics, all working over the same simple pattern and creating a luxuriant thicket of harmony. On "To Be Continued" Chen repeats the same series of chords on an acoustic guitar "for as long as he can make them meaningful (to himself)," accompanied by a music box that uses player-piano-like rolls that unspool onto the floor; the melody is never in sync with the guitar, and the slippages create lovely and unexpected juxtapositions.

Both nights Chen will also perform "Three Switch-Hitters," a pure electronic piece built from feedback created with a computer program for real-time sound synthesis called Supercollider. I don't know enough about the software to guess how he created this music, but I do enjoy the violent but balletic ebb and flow of its writhing, wriggling sounds.

Today's playlist:

Information, Biomekano (Rune Grammofon)
Noah Creshevsky, To Know and Not to Know (Tzadik)
Afrirampo, Kore Ga Mayaku Da (Tzadik)
Jacob Sacks, Eivind Opsvik, Mat Maneri & Paul Motian, Two Miles a Day (Loyal Label/Yeah-Yeah)
Vladislav Delay, Whistleblower (Huume)

I've only had a chance to listen to it a couple of times, but Look Around (Innova) by the Minneapolis-New York combo Fantastic Merlins immediately worked it way into my head. The superb production by tenor saxophonist Nathan Hanson shows how electronics can brilliantly enhance the sound of an acoustic group--they give the music a huge wallop from the bottom and a pleasing plumpness all the way around.

The album finds a wonderful halfway point between jazz and chamber music, reveling in a thick, elegant atmosphere with slow-moving tunes and carefully intersecting and overlapping lines. Hanson, cellist Jacqueline Ferrier-Ultan, and bassist Brian Roessler are a tight unit, often playing either monolithic unison lines or intricate contrapuntal constructions where the pieces lock together like parts of a puzzle. Italian drummer Federico Ughi alternately caresses and throttles the dense frontline activity.

I'm not sure how this big sound will translate in a live setting--a few live tracks on the record lose some of the atmospheric beauty--but the record is so strong I have to imagine that there's more than enough substance to easily survive the transition. The group plays tomorrow night at Elastic. The superb trio AAT--bassist Josh Abrams, vibist Jason Adasciewicz, and drummer Nori Tanaka—share the bill.

Today's playlist:

Andrew Bishop, Hank Williams Project (Envoi)
Tubby Hayes and the All-Stars, Return Visit (Fontana)
Bobb Trimble,  Iron Curtain Innocence (Secretly Canadian)
Arthur Russell, Springfield (Audika)
The Cats and the Fiddle, We Cats Will Swing for You, Vol. 2 (Fabulous)

The great Japanese drummer Nori Tanaka had lived in Chicago for a decade when immigration authorities forced him to return home last July, and at the time I wrote about his struggle to stay. Now he's back in town, but sadly it's not for good--though he's playing a slew of gigs over the next couple weeks, after that he'll be leaving again.

Wednesday night Tanaka will be at Heaven Gallery to take part in a record-release celebration for The Art of Dying (Delmark), a surprisingly swinging session led by bassist Jason Ajemian early in July 2007, as Tanaka's departure loomed (and Ajemian prepared for his own move from Chicago to New York). Billed as Smokeless Heat for this show (after the album's lengthy closing track), the group is basically the trio of Tanaka, Ajemian, and superb tenor saxophonist Tim Haldeman, with support from guitarist Matt Schneider, trumpeter Jaimie Branch, and vibist Jason Adasiewicz (playing marimba).

Though both Tanaka and Ajemian seem to favor settings where the rhythms and textures mutate rapidly and  kaleidoscopically, on The Art of Dying they maintain a hard-swinging pulse. Such a sensibility is at the root of Tanaka's style--he only ventured into more abstract terrain after nailing the basics earlier in his career--but you'll rarely hear Ajemian laying down so many walking lines. I've also never heard him put his penchant for weird vocal incantations to better use--on the spooky, spellbinding "Machine Gun Operator," a simple ascending figure keeps rising into a falsetto cry.

Ajemian wrote many of the album's catchy and often pretty themes, but lots of the credit for the record's success should go to the three guests, who add wonderful harmonic detail and extra melodic lift. The performances are a little rough around the edges here and there--likely due to lack of rehearsal, a persistent problem with folks who don't make enough scratch with their music and have to spread themselves a little thin with various projects--but that's easy to overlook given the lyrical, tender playing and sharp tunes.

For many years Ajemian, Tanaka, guitarist Jeff Parker, and video artist Selina Trepp got together every Tuesday night at Rodan as A Cushicle, shaping rising and falling grooves with purely improvised materials--their shows became one of the most fun and reliable weekly events in town. Parker has kept the gig going (if not the name) with bassist Josh Abrams and drummer John Herndon, but unfortunately the original lineup isn't reuniting while Tanaka and Ajemian are both in town. At least it's finally possible to hear A Cushicle recorded: Ropeadope recently released Introducing the Freakadelic Sessions (available only as a Ropeadope Records digital download), which captures the first set of the group's Rodan show on April 25, 2006. It kicks off with a version of Thelonious Monk's "Think of One," certainly an apt point of departure, but after that the trio's stream-of-consciousness flow never returns to composed material. This approach works because these players know how to think on their feet--though the recording is raw, with the murmuring of the audience audible, the loose electricity that A Cushicle made seem almost routine is on full display.

Tanaka's got more gigs coming up--I hope to highlight some of them later this week.

Today's playlist:

Mick Barr, Octis: Iohargh Wended (Tzadik)
Dewey Redman Quartet, The Struggle Continues (ECM)
Neil Young, Hawks & Doves (Reprise)
Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps, Blue Jean Bop! (Capitol)
Notekillers, Notekillers (Ecstatic Peace)

The husband-and-wife team of Johnny Irion and Sarah Lee Guthrie (Woody's granddaughter) return to town on Saturday night, opening for the glib jam band ukulele whiz Jake Shimabukuro at the Old Town School of Folk Music. Together and apart the pair traffic in California-style country from the early 70s, steeped heavily in the cosmic twang of Gram Parsons via the Jayhawks, whose Gary Louris produced their most recent album, Exploration (New West, 2006). Last year Irion (a former member of the forgettable alt-rock combo Dillon Fence) issued his second solo album, Ex Tempore (Rte 8), and let's just say the absence of Guthrie on all but two tracks makes the heart grow fonder--her harmonies soften Irion’s occasionally strident, high-pitched cry. He advantageously works within his limitations when he lets his intonation wobble a la Neil Young, another clear influence, but I’m glad his wife will be around (and get to sing some of her own stuff as well) here. They're due to release a new album together next year.

Last night I watched the limber free jazz quartet Engines rip through a set of new-ish tunes at Elastic, fine-tuning them for a Sunday-night performance at the Hungry Brain, where those pieces will be recorded for a forthcoming Okka Disk release. The rigorously organized riffs and rhythmic inspire tough improvisation from trombonist Jeb Bishop, reedist Dave Rempis, bassist Nate McBride, and drummer Tim Daisy, but the quartet also generates extra improvisational meat using visual cues, altering the background and rhythmic accents bubbling behind other parts or solos. The group will play two sets on Sunday.

Although the Dagar family remain the most brilliant performers of dhrupad, the purest and most austere form of Indian classical music (it dates back to the 15th century), over the last decade or so brothers Umakant and Ramakant Gundecha (pictured) have been contenders. (Here's a link to a Critic's Choice I wrote for a 1999 show.) They play tonight, with Chicago’s own acclaimed Indian dance troupe Kalapriya, at International House on the campus of University of Chicago.

Last month when I spoke with George Lewis he expressed hope that someone would soon write the history of Chicago jazz in the 50s. Whoever takes on that task, it got a little bit harder last Wednesday, when pianist John Young died at South Shore Hospital from multiple myeloma. He was 86.

Although he released only six albums under his own name during a career that spanned as many decades, he was a crucial presence on the city's bop scene. (Sadly, only his excellent 1959 album, Serenata, on Delmark, is currently in print.) He was a product of Du Sable High School, under the leadership of the legendary Captain Walter Dyett, and he got his first serious professional experience as a member of Andy Kirk's orchestra in the early 40s. By the decade's end he was back in town working with everyone from saxophonists Eddie Chamblee and Von Freeman to blues guitarist T-Bone Walker to singers Lorez Alexandria and Nancy Wilson. In the liner notes to his 1963 trio album, A Touch of Pepper (Argo), Jazz Showcase proprietor Joe Segal observed, "He is constantly sought for all types of live and recording dates; from preferred anonymity on rock 'n' roll gigs to 'elite' pleasing fashion and club dances."

Letting Segal's characteristic tweaking of rock slide for now, this touches on a key trait of so many Chicago jazz greats: To make a living they needed to be able to play in any context, and that range inevitably bled back into the work that mattered most to them. Young's own music was thoroughly within the bop tradition, fusing a deep feeling for the blues with a lyrical elegance and a genuinely effervescent touch, but it couldn’t help but be informed and strengthened by knowing how other styles functioned.

Here's hoping that his passing will prompt the reissue of some of his records, because he'll certainly live on through their contents.

Today's playlist:

Davy Graham, Midnight Man (Fledg’ling)
Comus, Song to Comus: The Complete Collection (Castle Music)
Drive-By Truckers, Brighter Than Creation’s Dark (New West)
Lone Ranger, On the Other Side of Dub (Heartbeat)
Kelis, Kaleidoscope (Virgin)

According to his current label, Yep Roc, the ultra-prolific Jim Lauderdale plans to release three stylistically disparate albums in nine months. Two are already out: last fall he issued a fine bluegrass outing called The Bluegrass Diaries and in February he released Honey Songs, which doesn't fall neatly into any category. (The third will be a collaboration with Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter, their second effort together.) The dominant feel on Honey Songs is the cosmic vibe of chill 70s country, but Lauderdale's songs embrace and transcend just about every style of American music. Bluegrass, honky-tonk, soul, rock 'n' roll--they all collide and coexist with little fanfare.

Cut with a crack band that includes James Burton, Garry Talent, and Al Perkins (and backup vocals from Emmylou Harris, Kelly Hogan, Buddy Miller, and Patty Loveless), the new record is packed with Lauderdale's typically catchy melodies. The powerful tunefulness of his songs is what defines them, far more so than any genre signifiers he might happen to use, and Honey Songs includes some of his strongest. On a ballad like "It's Finally Sinking In," an otherwise roiling Crazy Horse grind contrasts with Lauderdale's dolorous melody (and Perkins's sublimely liquid pedal steel), which is so gorgeous it's easy to miss the pain.

Lauderdale's consistency might be his biggest enemy, since it makes it so easy to take him for granted. He doesn't make bad records, and aside from organizing albums around relatively benign themes like "bluegrass," he refuses to dabble in conceptual bullshit. He just puts his stuff out there. Ignore it, though, and it's your loss.

Lauderdale plays solo on a diverse roots-music bill dubbed "The American Beauty Project" Saturday night with Ollabelle, Larry Campbell, Catherine Russell, and Teresa Williams at Dominican University in River Forest.

Today's playlist:

Kay Adams, Wheels & Tears (Sundazed)
Rashim, Suns.Shadows (Mosz)
Dells, It's Not Unusual: The Very Best of the Vee Jay Years 1955-1965 (Charly)
Dead Meadow, Old Growth (Matador)
Jane, Berserker (Paw Tracks)

Thursday evening visual artist Rose Lazar and her husband, artist and musician Robert A.A. Lowe (Lichens, Singer), present a one-night show of work from their recent book-and-music project Gyromancy, the third in Thrill Jockey's series book/CD combos. The event runs from 6 to 9 PM at the Hejfina Boutique.

The book is a four-by-six-inch paperback limited to 1,000 copies, and it includes a three-inch CD of music by Lowe called "Psygning Off." The 15-minute piece is the perfect accompaniment to the couple's simple ink drawings, which run the gamut from abstract geometrical doodles to mushrooms and raindrops, among other things, all rendered with an appealing mix of the whimsical and the psychedelic. Lowe and Lazar each get half of the book, and some of Lazar's images include bits of text, reflecting her work making letterpress greeting cards under the name the Great Lakes Goods. The music, made with a synthesizer, has a similarly childlike simplicity and playfulness--with swirls of cascading music-box tones that evoke a horrible magic show and flanged-out long tones that sound like meteors hurtling through space, it's like a fantastical redux of early Tangerine Dream.

Today's playlist:

Volapük, Where Is Tamashii? (Orkhêstra)
Glenn Branca, Lesson no. 1 (Acute)
The Techniques, Queen Majesty: The Best of the Techniques 1965-1974 (Trojan)
Lina Nyberg & Magnus Lindgren, Brasil Big Bom (Caprice)
The Sword, Age of Winters (Kemado)