The Cedar Beach Blues Festival will be Saturday and Sunday, September 15 and 16. The festival, presented by the Long Island Blues Society and the CDM Chamber of Commerce, will feature 35 bands, 100 vendors, a car
nival, fireworks, crafts, and other activities.
Admission is $2, with fees for such special attractions as carnival rides and a petting zoo extra. For more information, log on to liblues.org or call (631) 331-3338. Music, mostly by area blues bands, begins at noon each day on both main and acoustic stages. At press time, the lineups were as follows:
Saturday, Main Stages: Sweaty Betty, 16 Tons, JP Blues, Doghouse Blues Band, Lil’ Cliff & The Cliffhangers, Smoking Gun, Sam Taylor, Hitman Blues Band, Todd Wolfe, Nobody’s Fool, Phil Varca & The Slamjammers, Lex Gray & The Urban Pioneers.
Saturday, Acoustic Stage: Johnny Naked, Home Grown String Band, Phil Minnissale, Boom Boom Johnson, Dan Freedman, Big Joe V, Ken The Rocket & Friends.
Sunday, Main Stages: Blues Box, C&B Blues Review, Breakaway, Jacks O’Diamonds, PP & Hooch, Miles Road, Kerry Kearney, Shecky & The Twangtones, The Defibrilators, Killer Joe & The Lido Soul Review.
Sunday, Acoustic Stage: Motu, The Day-dreames, Kerry Kearney, Kane Daily, Tommy Keys, Steve Robinson, Buddy Mann.
For times and more information, log on to liblues.com.
Interplay, Prestige Records’ new five-CD set, contains early collaborative recordings of tenor saxophonist John Coltrane and serves two distinct purposes. The first is to offer a collection of music that provides an overview of the modern jazz scene during the fertile years of 1956 through1958. The other, and arguably more important purpose to legions of Coltrane fans is its delineation of the evolutionary process behind this important jazz artist.
With all great musicians, the message is fully contained in the music, and the message of Coltrane is one of powerful humanism, deep spirituality, unflinching emotion, relentless searching, and supreme love. Interplay offers a roadma
p to the early days of discovery in his unparalleled quest. One can misinterpret the astonishing focus and commitment that Coltrane had as being singular or even self-absorbed; but that is totally off base. Coltrane was incredibly multifaceted, a man of many interests in the pursuit of knowledge – both subjective and objective – who absorbed everything in his vision. In these recordings, surrounded by many of the finest musicians of the era, the listener can experience how “Trane” responds to his colleagues, transforming his own 
musical concepts to perfectly contribute to each environment in which he finds himself.
Interplay is comprised of seven complete albums and three tracks from two others. All but one of the recording sessions took place between September of 1956 and September of 1957; the final one in March of 1958. In the prevalent style of this period, the sessions all contain a certain jam session context; and in fact, five of the albums were released without any specified leader – Tenor Conclave, Interplay for 2 Trumpets and 2 Tenors, The Cats, Wheelin’ & Dealin’, and Modern Jazz Survey 2 (reissued as Dakar under Coltrane’s name). The other two – Cattin’ with Coltrane and Quinichette , essentially a jam session co-led by “Trane” and Paul Quinichette, and Kenny Burrell and John Coltrane, Coltrane’s last Prestige date not under his own leadership – retained the basic jam session feel. But actually, piano great Tommy Flanagan directed The Cats, and the brilliant pianist and composer Mal Waldron was not only musical director for Interplay and Wheelin’ & Dealin’ , but his presence on Dakar and Cattin’ also provided much of the cohesiveness to those dates (the alternate versions of “Wheelin’ and Dealin’” contained here were originally issued on Mal’s The Dealers).
The national release date for this important set is September 18.
