Jim Snidero is about to hit the road, and he’s doing it the old-fashioned way—loading up the van and driving through the Midwest, playing night after night, city after city. And when he rolls into BOP STOP for a Friday, March 7 performance, he’ll bring the kind of musicians who turn heads: Peter Washington on bass and Jason Tiemann on drums.
These late winter—nah, let’s be optimistic and call it early spring—visits have become a tradition at BOP STOP; Snidero played to enthusiastic audiences in 2021, 2023 and last year (I previewed the last two here and here respectively). But Friday’s show represents a leap of faith for the saxophonist, despite his decades in the business.
The power of three
“I’ve played trio gigs here and there, but never an entire tour like this,” he said by phone last week. “Playing without a chordal instrument brings freedom—but it also brings challenges,” he said. “It takes a lot of sensitivity. It takes a lot of maturity, too, because it’s really easy to try to fill up all the spaces when you’re playing in trio, and that can be a little unmusical.”
That’s where Washington comes in. If you’re playing with him, you don’t have to worry about the harmony—it’s there, always. Snidero knows this firsthand. “We recorded together in 1987,” he recalls. “It was my second album as a leader, and his second record ever.” That’s almost 40 years of history between them, and together they make the kind of music that demands deep listening.
Flying with the Bird
Snidero’s recent run of Cleveland appearances have come in support of acclaimed recordings on Barney Fields’ Savant label. The latest, Bird Feathers, which features liner notes by Cleveland’s Chris Hovan, was released last Friday. It’s a collection of five Charlie Parker compositions, both canonical (“Ornithology” and “Confirmation”) and deep cuts (“Charlie’s Wig” and the title cut). Yet the apex of the trio’s artistry my best be heard on the program’s four ballads, “The Nearness of You,” “These Foolish Things,” “Embraceable You” and “Lover Man,” all of them touchstones in Parker’s discography.
Like every jazz saxophonist—every jazz musician, really, Snidero has a story about an epochal encounter with Parker’s music. It came with a record, The Washington Concerts (Elektra Musician, 1983).
“It sounded like someone from another planet, really, the way he played the saxophone, the musicality, the spontaneity. I mean, he was sitting in with the band. They didn’t rehearse. I just couldn’t believe how complete it was. I spent at least two years just listening to that record and a couple of others and just trying to figure out as much as I could.”
It’s not possible to get to the bottom of a Promethean genius like Parker’s, but Snidero has done okay. Three of the tunes on that pivotal record show up on Bird Feathers and with luck Snidero will call them Friday night.
“I’m in a sweet spot in my career right now,” the saxophonist said, “being at the top of the [Downbeat] critics’ poll and getting lots of nice gigs and playing with my friends, long-time friends.”
Snidero has made a lot of friends in Cleveland, too. On Friday, that sweet spot will have an address: 2920 Detroit in Hingetown.
Jim Snidero, Friday., March 7, 8 p.m., BOP STOP, 2920 Detroit Avenue, Cleveland, Tickets $20, available here. Snidero will also appear Thursday March 6, 8 p.m. at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Erie, 7180 Perry Highway, Erie Pennsylvania. Tickets at the door.
NOTE: This article was written by a real human being. No artificial intelligence or generative language models were used in its creation.
Red beans and ricely yours,
jc
