Tosca at Opera in the Baseball Park June 5; Sacramento Jazz Jubilee and when good musicians go bad

Summer means not only Porgy & Bess but a new tradition of Opera in the Baseball Park,  with Tosca on Friday, June 5 at 8:00 pm.  Summer also means the Sacramento Jazz Festival which I attended for the first time over Memorial Weekend.  There in Old Sac I discovered the Ophir Prison Marching Band amid the cajun, zydeco, traditional jazz and Dixieland.  Ophir Prison Marching Band, so that's what happens when good musicians go bad?
 

Taking the plunge . . .

Similarly Tenor Pedro Rodelas sends me a Youtube video of Lego Tosca this morning before he and I attend the dress rehearsal of SFO's Tosca on Saturday.

It’s 1785 in Legoland.  Queen Maria Carolina of Italy has just reclaimed Italy from the French, imprisoning all French supporters. Angelotti escapes from prison and seeks refuge with Cavaradossi in the church where the painter has been working. Sacristan, an assistant priest, has used a pretty girl who comes to the church to pray as inspiration for Mario to paint a picture of Mary Magdalene.

Mario! exclaims the exhausted convict, God has sent you to help me! Do you remember me? Middle School, class of 1785? He urgently beseeches Mario to hide him from the evil and sadistic police, headed by Scarpia.

Meanwhile Tosca the opera singer comes to visit her lover Mario in the church and notices the blue eyes of Mary Magdalene in the painting. Tosca’s eyes are dark as coal and burning with jealousy. Mario says he loves only Tosca, “you wild soprano . . . “.

However Mario has promised to hide Angelotti from Scarpia  . . . what will happen to Angelotti, Mario and Tosca if Scarpia finds out?

Meanwhile.  Moving on to a recap of the Memorial Day weekend, what happens when good musicians go bad?

Ophir Prison Marching Band Kazooist/Trumpeter and the writer warm up on Memorial Day

So I drove the two hours from the East Bay past Budweiser and Jelly Belly to Sacramento for the Jazz Jubilee.  On a beautiful day riverside, in Old Sac, a member of the Ophir Prison Marching Band asked me, Are you the newest member? You do know this is a prison band, he asked me. Gender is relative I answered. Testosterone is a funny thing he said. I must have said the magic word since another band member handed me a rubber duck. The band peforms a song from Sesame Street called (and here's the link to the lyrics) . . .

You gotta put down the ducky if you want to play the saxophone. 
 

Here's the video from 1988 Sesame Street and Ernie and Hoots the Owl and some faces you will recognize like Madeline Kahn and PeeWee Herman.

Part of Ophir Marching Band’s opening sequence, after marching in from various entry points to the stage, goes something like “Up Yours!”. They launch into a rousing “Get Ready” followed by “Just a Gigolo” which blends into “I Ain’t Got Nobody”. The big band’s characteristic sound would be stripper music, with lots of triangle and tamborine, the latter played by the bandleader. Interspersed, the band leader tells marriage jokes, such as

I just bought a mood ring for my wife. When she’s happy it’s green, when she’s unhappy it leaves a red mark on my forehead.

Here’s a bullit list of a few acts I saw over the three days, from New Orleans zydeco and Cajun to traditional and even some country western and Tower of Power style rock/funk. My companion Kent Coddington helped me with this list since the jazz jubilee has been a family tradition.

Moreover Kent and I were invited by Sac native Carter Krizman to join him uptown near the Capitol at Zocalo’s, an upscale Mexican place where we sat outside under an umbrella. Carter rode from home on his bicycle and we had a mojito and a Bud light with lime. Carter recommends the smaller venues at the festival, the more intimate venues such as the Firehouse Courtyard although Kent noted those places fill up. Carter likes the Railroad Depot, Riverfront Refuge and Turntable Junction (get the music/railroad tie?).

• Zydeco Flames. Charismatic lead vocal who plays rubboard.  Lloyd Meadows.
• Bayou Boys.
• Benny Goodman Centennial Tribute. Kent says mellow sound with a vibraphone.
• Ophir Prison Marching Band. Novelty band with kazoos.
• High Sierra Jazz Band. Kent’s favorite. Classic Dixieland, high energy. They play on jazz cruises going to New Zealand and the Sea of Cortez.
• Cornet Chop Suey. Strong trumpet section (tribute to Louis Armstrong).  This band comes from St. Louis.  Said Louis Armstrong had to leave New Orleans when the Navy shut down Storyville for corrupting the sailors, putting the musicians out of work. He went to Chicago and took classical music lessons from the symphony, learning to perform pieces correctly first then improvising. 
• Sacramento Blues Revue. Party music. Played at Freeway Gardens, bizarre venue underneath the freeway.
• Gator Beat
• Golden Gate Rhythm Machine. Easy listening Dixieland. They played at the Firehouse Restaurant courtyard with a fountain, red bricks, twinkle lights wrapped around the oaks.  New Orleanian and a real firehouse once.
• Big Tiny Little Jazz Band. Master piano player. Also played the Firehouse Courtyard with a female lead singer who plays sax.
• Mumbo Gumbo. High energy young good looking band with two female leads, one in cowboy hat and baseball shirt; the other with a guitar, country dress and cowboy boots; Kent says "non Cajun sound".  It's blues and zydeco but they do have a squeeze box.  Gordy Langstaff tells me one of the singers comes into his little Thai restaurant in Davis a few times a week.  I had lemongrass calamari among other things along with a vanilla apple cosmo, the rim of the glass dipped in sugar.
• Billy Mata and Texas Tradition. Old fashioned country western sound.
• Aftershock. Tower of Power style rock/funk.
• BSR Jazzinomic Stimulus Package. High school group with mellow voiced lead singer and trumpet player Katie Greenstein. She sang “Sweet Substitute” . . . He’s mighty cute, talkin’ bout my substitute . . . The also performed Yo Ho Yo Ho the pirate song from Pirates of the Carribean in the style of Louis Armstrong; and If I Didn’t Have You from Pixar’s Monster’s Inc.  Pictured below, Katie center on trumpet.  Note the young people play for free; no passes required.

Sunday just before the closing ceremony I ran into Kevin Tansey, the cameraman for KGO TV who posed with me and my rubber duck (on the lense).  I put down the duck just long enough to write this article.