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Author: John Chacona

Saxophonist Diego Rivera Makes Up for Lost Time Saturday at Bop Stop

Published 5 April, 2022 By John Chacona

 

Saxophonist Diego Rivera‘s 2020 gig at Cleveland’s Bop Stop is one that he’ll never forget, but not for the usual reasons. The Michigan saxophonist’s engagement at the Hingetown club was the first event to have been canceled as the darkness of the COVID pandemic descended on a terrified world.

“We actually canceled the morning of the gig,” Rivera said in a Zoom interview. “This was going to be my first performance under my name at the Bop Stop, and we talked for quite a while trying to make this happen. I was really looking forward to it, but Gabe [Pollack, the club’s director] was incredibly professional, very gracious, and really supportive. He was like, ‘You know, it’s the right thing to do. Don’t worry about it. We’ll do this again.'”

Pollack was as good as his word and so this Saturday Rivera will bring a hard-charging quintet to Cleveland for a concert that’s been 25 months in the making.

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“Perpetual” Motion: The Venerable Organ Trio of Larry Goldings, Peter Bernstein and Bill Stewart Come to Tri-C

Published 31 March, 2022 By John Chacona
Larry Goldings, Peter Bernstein and Bill Stewart
Peter Bernstein, Larry Goldings and Bill Stewart

On the surface, Perpetual Pendulum, the new release by the trio of organist Larry Goldings, guitarist Peter Bernstein and drummer Bill Stewart who will appear Sunday at Tri-C follows the comfortingly familiar path established by generations of organ trios. But spend some time with this recording and a world of subtleties reveals itself.

Read more“Perpetual” Motion: The Venerable Organ Trio of Larry Goldings, Peter Bernstein and Bill Stewart Come to Tri-C
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Dafmark Goes “Under the Great Ice Sheet” for Its Spring Performance

Published 28 March, 2022 By John Chacona

Under the Great Ice Sheet cover

It might be tempting fate to create a piece called “Under the Great Ice Sheet” to be performed in Erie’s maddeningly capricious late-winter climate. But fate and its consequences are among the themes of Dafmark Dance Theater’s spring season presentation April 1 and 2 at the company’s State Street studio.

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Re-Birth: The Iconic Cleveland Improvising Trio Returns to the Happy Dog

Published 27 March, 2022 By John Chacona
Birth Josh Smith, Jeremy Bleich Joe Tomino
from left: Josh Smith, Jeremy Bleich, Joe Tomino

If you were born any time after 1975, you couldn’t avoid Jefferson Starship’s spectacularly dreadful “We Built This City on Rock ‘n’ Roll.” Even if that lyrical flex were true, it pales before the real-life exploits of the band Birth, who built the stage at one of the city’s great rock landmarks, literally. Next Saturday, the Cleveland-born band will return to that stage for the first time in many years, not with power tools, but with their instruments, for a long-overdue homecoming gig at the Happy Dog.

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