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Tag: Zaire Darden

Nathan-Paul’s Age of Aquarius Dawns At Edwin’s

Published 27 January, 2026 By John Chacona
Nathan-Paul Davis at RCB&J
Nathan-Paul Davis at Rubber City Jazz and Blues Festival

Nathan-Paul Davis makes this statement at the top of his Linktree page:

"I play energy, not notes!" Nathan-Paul calls his music SOUND MEDICINE.

Anyone who has heard Davis play will recognize that he is simply stating facts. No cap. No flex. The energy in a typical Nathan-Paul performance could power a dozen AI server farms for a month.

Thursday night finds the saxophonist in an unusual setting: playing a birthday gig, in this case, his own. The setting, Edwin’s Leadership & Restaurant Institute, is at once familiar, but different.

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In The Heart of CVNP, Happy Days Is Here For Jazz

Published 20 January, 2026 By John Chacona

Jazz is an unmistakably urban phenomenon.

New York’s 52nd St., c. 1946

Just saying the word summons images of a New York street teeming with swells in their snap-brim fedoras, cigarette rakishly dangling from their mouths with evening gown-clad women on their arms. A noir film come to life with the soundtrack of half a dozen bands beckoning from the doors of basement clubs. The last place you might expect to find jazz might be a place deep in the woods, maybe in the middle of a national park in the dead of winter.

Yet that is exactly where, on four nights between now and April, top-shelf jazz can be heard thanks to an innovative and welcome partnership between the Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park and the Rubber City Jazz and Blues Festival.

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A Big Week In NEO For Little Big Bands (And A Big Big Band)

Published 29 July, 2025 By John Chacona
Bobby Selvaggio and Stephen Philip Harvey

Why are these men smiling?

At the poker table a pair of eights is nothing to get excited about, but on the jazz calendar it’s a winning hand. And NEO is holding it this week thanks to a pair of concerts–both tied to upcoming recordings–featuring dynamic octets led by Stephen Philip Harvey and Bobby Selvaggio.

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Friendly Fire: Two Saxophones Lift A Battle Cry Of Respect

Published 3 June, 2025 By John Chacona
Nathan-Paul Davis and Johnny Cochran, Jr.

The billing of Sax Battle Cry, the pair of concerts that Nathan-Paul Davis and Johnny Cochran, Jr. will present this week, evokes the classic two-saxophone tussles of the past: Dexter Gordon and Wardell Grey, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis and Johnny Griffin, the various cage matches that were a trademark of the Jazz At The Philharmonic road show. But don’t believe the hype. The meeting of Davis and Cochran is more friendly competition than mano á mano combat.

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