Click here for more information on pre-orders and Micropatronage.

Thanks to all who have participated in the Micropatronage Program so far. Your contributions will be used to pay the band and the studio today. I couldn’t have done it without you. If you haven’t yet participated, now would be a great time.

I’ll post an update later to let you know how it’s going.

Once again Lucid was standing-room-only most of the night. This time there were more unfamiliar faces in the crowd, which is always cool. And I even had two people there sign up for the Micropatronage Program! The “Parker’s Mood” cocktails were flowing liberally and everyone had a great time.

We were also fortunate to be joined by some good friends throughout the evening. Saxophonist Cynthia Mullis played three tunes with us in the first set; our mash-up of George Gershwin’s “Summertime” & Wayne Shorter’s “Footprints”, Tatum Greenblatt’s “Mance’s Dance”, and Duke Pearson’s “Idle Moments”, all of which we’re going to record with Cynthia on Wednesday. Vocalist Connor Desai sang a spirited version of the classic “Since I Fell For You” in the second set. And the third set featured both saxophonist Jacob Stickney and drummer Adam Kessler playing on another Wayne Shorter composition “Adam’s Apple, and saxophonist Hal Rose guesting on “There Is No Greater Love”. Thanks to everyone for adding to the festivities.

And thanks to Ashwin Rao for coming out and getting some great shots of the band, including the one in this post. Check out his blog for some amazing photography!

We’ll be back at Lucid in ealry May. This is quickly becoming my favorite club to play and I hope you’ll come check it out.

I have been humbled and overwhelmed by the outpouring of support from my family, friends and colleagues. With this support we will be able to make the record I’ve always dreamed of making, and document my amazing band two years into our development. I can’t tell you how much this means to me, and I hope you will feel a great deal of ownership and pride in the project, as do I.

If you haven’t yet become a Patron, believe me when I tell you that every $10 makes a huge difference. One patron at a time we will reach our goals and by the end of the summer I will present to you the fruits of our labors. I can’t wait to share the new music with you and show you exactly what your support will allow us to accomplish.

My deepest love and gratitude goes out to you. Thank you.

Even before we started playing the room was starting to fill, and by the time we finished our first set it was standing room only! The vibe in the room was warm and friendly, the drinks were flowing liberally, and the band was ON.

We ran through some of the new tunes we’re working on for the recording and dusted off some old favorites as well. The new stuff went over well and our arrangements worked great in the live setting. It was fun playing “Dos Gardenias”, “Three Hours” and “Idle Moments”. And “Bashert” was particularly inspired, perhaps because Darrah and her family were in the house.

It was also nice to be able to invite some friends up to join us, including Richelle Gay, who sang beautifully on our mash-up of “Footprints/Summertime”. My soon-to-be-cousin Keith Beesley joined us on soprano sax on “If I Were a Bell” and tore it up. Harold Rosenkrans brought is signature tenor style to Wayne Shorter’s “Adam’s Apple”. And Randy Powers busted out his flugel for an inspired version of Miles Davis’s “All Blues”.

It was a beautiful night of music and the love in the room was palpable. David has created the kind of club that every musician wants to play and I hope you’ll go check it out when you get the chance (we’ll be back at Lucid on April 4th). And I can’t thank him enough for creating our new signature cocktail, “Parker’s Mood”, and donating $1 from each sale to the Micropatronage program.

And as always, it is inspiring and a true joy to play with my incredible band. Thank you Josh, Evan and D’Vonne for bringing your fire, your spirit and your love to the JPQ.

But you can pre-order your copy of the CD today! Every pre-order will receive their copy one week before the release to the public. Read on for information on how you can also receive bonus goodies.

I am financing this record in all the usual ways: my own money, grant money, the kindness of friends, etc. But I’ve decided to try something new this time around: micropatronage.

Micropatronage is a system in which the public directly supports the work of others by making donations through the Internet. It relies on the premise that it is easier to find many “patrons” to donate small amounts, rather than a small number of patrons making larger contributions.

To entice you to become a patron, I have come up with some packages that are all unique to this program. Once the CD is complete it will be sold through all the usual channels, but none of these packages will be available after the release date. It is my hope that you will find one of them interesting enough to be willing to donate a small amount of your hard-earned money to help me complete this project.

I’ve set up PayPal buttons to make it easier, but if you’d rather send a check just scroll down to the end of the post and you’ll find the mailing address.

PARTICIPATION PACKAGES

Solo Package
Participants in the Solo Package will donate $10.00 to the project and will receive:

• High-quality audio files one week prior to the official release date of the CD
• Files will be in your choice of 320k mp3s, FLAC or Apple Lossless