The Ars Nova Workshop makes the Boot & Saddle an official clubhouse.
With the passing of guitarist and local mainstay Monnette Sudler still fresh in our collective memory, jazz Philadelphia feels like a sadder and lonelier place. There are many players, producers, and scribes, still, who prescribe to America’s classical music in this area and will for some time. Still, Sudler was a quiet presence looming over all that was this city’s jazz vibe, in a very sacred and secular sense. She was the Pope – all due respect to Philly saxophonist Odean Pope, that is. With that, it is interesting to note that Ars Nova Workshop’s early September-due takeover of Broad Street’s Boot & Saddle and its iconic neon shoe will come, not with a big bold bang, but with a quiet whisper – much in the spirit of Sudler – with live shows from the likes of Wilco guitarist Nels Cline and the War on Drugs’ drummer Charlie Hall’s Miles Davis tribute on the immediate horizon, a menu of food and wine from the people at Franklin Porter, a happy lot of jazz vinyl on the turntable and for sale.
It should be interesting, for those keeping score, that last night, August 23, under the Ars Nova Workshop banner, the Chiu and Honer duo played Johnny Brenda’s with saxophonist Ashley Paul and percussionist Booker Stardrum opening. From casual conversations with Ars Nova’s Mark Christman, over 90% of all of his Ars Nova Workshop live and event bookings will take place at the Boot & Saddle, making the Boot & Saddle, an official Ars Nova clubhouse. Yet, that won’t, at all, exclude any outside-the-Boot bookings as Ars Nova has built up a wealth of physical and financial partners during its time presenting the best of free, avant-garde jazz and contemporary new and classical music in Philadelphia.
So, like the blink-and-you-might-miss-it quiet opening of Boot & Saddle, watch the skies and the internet for any Ars Nova Workshop live events to just pop up. Sometimes, a whisper is way more provocative than a loud bang.
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