Saturday afternoon belongs to the festival’s Jazz ‘n Families Fun Day at the National Mall’s Sylvan Amphitheatre (behind the Washington Monument on the south side). From noon till 6 p.m., the Mall offers jazz events you can take the kids to: music for both adults and the little ones, plus food, drink, crafts, storytelling, and facepainting.

Esteemed drummer Winard Harper, who also plays the balafon (an African marimba-like instrument), is holding down the stage at the Atlas Performing Arts Center. He’ll be performing with a sextet that includes DC favorite Ameen Saleem on bass. That’s at 7:30 tonight, 1333 H Street NE. Tickets are $25 apiece.

Tonight’s main event is the NEA Jazz Masters Concert at the Lincoln Theatre at 8:00. The double bill features the current incarnation of the Duke Ellington Orchestra, with Paquito d’Rivera sitting in, and the DC Bass Choir featuring the legendary Christian McBride as special guest. The Lincoln Theatre is at the corner of 13th and U, next door to Ben’s Chili Bowl; tickets are $25.

There’s a movement (so to speak) of Israeli jazz musicians in New York, and clarinetist/saxophonist Anat Cohen is at the forefront of it: in addition to the instruments, she’s a prolific composer and owner of her own label (Anzic Records). All this meant she would be a formidable presence at the National Museum of Women in the Arts last night, but concertgoers actually ended up awestruck.

The concert featured Cohen’s quartet (pianist Jason Lindner, bassist Joe Martin, drummer Daniel Freedman) performing songs from her just-released Notes from the Village album. Alternating between her two axes, Cohen portrayed her different styles on each: the clarinet on Fats Waller’s “Jitterbug Waltz” was gleeful, relaxed, and rhythmically agile, but always with a hint of gravitas below the surface; on tenor sax (”J Blues”) she exerted a surprising amount of muscle, but was more intent on a strident conversational sound. The band stood her in good stead, too, particularly Lindner (whose big band album Live at the Jazz Gallery was by far the best of 2007). He veered from dreamy cascades on “Jitterbug Waltz” to sharp but wistful blues on “Until You’re In Love Again,” and even plucked the strings in a good impression of African mbira on “Washington Square Park.”

The extraordinary moment, however, came on the final song, the Cuban standard “Siboney”–when Cohen invited DEJF musical director Paquito d’Rivera to join her onstage. “He’s the reason I play clarinet,” she explained. “So, thanks dude.” Together they launched into a duet that became more of a mighty showdown: he played light, sprightly and high; she played mid-range, somewhat slower, and always with that somber edge. Their playing was a tangled network of calls-and-responses, thrust-and-parry, harmonies, unisons, counterpoints, and even a few setups and punchlines.

“Well,” said the emcee after the performance ended. “That was sort of unforgettable.” He was putting it mildly.

Jazz does better when it’s not Debate Night–this based on the enormous audience at the Sculpture Garden last night at 5:00, and they didn’t come for the food. This was a Frederic Yonnet crowd.

The French harmonica player has a fat, meaty sound with a bluesy edge and lots of chords, in contrast to the clean-but-shrill sound that usually characterizes jazz harmonica. Festival CEO Charlie Fishman introduced him as “the Mick Jagger of Harmonica” (Jagger actually plays harmonica, but never mind), and that somewhat odd description turned out to be dead on: playing covers of R&B artists past and present (Isaac Hayes‘ “Welcome Back,” Dionne Warwick’s “Walk On By,” Stevie Wonder’s “Visions”), Yonnet displayed the swagger and come-get-me attitude of the Rolling Stones, but also the lyricism that evokes the vocalists he’s saluting.

Which is a good thing, since the band was cheese. They were all more than proficient, mind you, but it was smooth-jazz: repetitive, groove-based, and bland. Not until their funky take on Al Jarreau’s “Use Me (’Til You Use Me Up)” (with singer Brandon Combs sitting in) did they show any teeth. But it didn’t matter: Yonnet was the show, and he delivered.

7:30 PM, JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER
For better or worse, it was an intimate evening at the Goldman Theater – less than 20 people in attendance. “Isn’t it terrible? I’m competing with Sarah Palin!” chanteuse Yardena lamented with a grin. Indeed, it was so uncrowded that the profanity from the tech booth echoed through the room. (”I was good with this shit, man! What the fuck?!”)

Yardena killed anyway. She drew from her unique repertoire: 500-year-old Sephardic folk songs with Latin jazz arrangements. Her clear, steady alto and impeccable rhythmic phrasing alone built a compelling performance, but Yardena’s onstage charisma is something else again. It’s difficult to describe: sultry and magnetic, but in a more sophisticated, mature sense than those words might suggest. The key lay in her control: On “Noches, Noches” and “La Vezina Catina,” she pulled off melodrama without exaggeration–a skill so difficult, it never occurred to me that it even existed.

Her sextet was (mostly) aces: Bassist Pedro Girando played with great sensitivity; trumpeter Jonathan Powell’s lovely, flamenco-like solos had a languid, liquid tone (particularly on the torch-ish “Adio”); and Tony De Vivo and Neil Ochoa’s percussion had a canny grasp of both subtlety and power. The weak link was pianist Pablo Vergara, whom Yardena called “my favorite.” Though he had great chops, he was a bit to anxious to show them off and did so without regard to taste or propriety. Speedy harmonic whirlwinds are great…but in the middle of the sad love song “Yo Me’namori D’un Aire”? It doesn’t play.

10:00 PM, BLUES ALLEY
Monty Alexander is an underappreciated pianist: He has a heavy, percussive touch; a love of thick chords; and a vast rhythmic sense encompassing swing, funk, and the Caribbean islands (Alexander is Jamaican). But last night at Blues Alley he was practically a sideman in his own trio.

His drummer was Herlin Riley, a New Orleans native and alumnus of Wynton Marsalis‘ bands. And on the Georgetown bandstand, he was a star. On the first song (which Alexander didn’t name), Riley drove the trio—also featuring Hassan Shakur on bass—through a stormy swing that soon dissipated into firm reggae–and back again–with crisp, precise sound. Then he let loose with a thunderous flood of drums. It was a performance by what Miles Davis would call “a bad motherfucker.”

It didn’t stop there. On “Hope,” he shivered the cymbals on the minor-key melody, then tattooed the funk break with bass-drum heartbeats. “No Woman, No Cry” got a soft march; by the closing number, an unnamed blues, Riley was doing tricks to great applause, twirling one stick on the offbeats and never missing the ons.

Not to take away from Alexander, mind you—he played beautifully, in particular a winning rendition of Tony Bennett’s “Good Life.” Shakur was a monster, too, dueling with the others on grooves of his own design and laying down nice solos on the opener and “No Woman, No Cry.” But Riley had the crowd in his hands; it was his night and everybody knew it.

The Monty Alexander Trio will play two shows nightly (8 and 10 pm) to October 5 at Blues Alley, 1073 Wisconsin Ave. NW. Tickets are $27.50

So just in case you’re at your computer…post-debate…wondering whether or not to show up fashionably late for tonight’s second French-American Jazz Quintet performance at Bohemian Caverns: don’t.

Though the DEJF schedule had announced shows at 9 and 11, in fact they went down at 8 and 10.  I showed up at 10:55 to find the bar dead and the band packing their bags.

So stay in, rest up, listen to something like this, and get ready for tomorrow’s lineup (highlights forthcoming).

I’ll be at the 9:30 Club checking out La Timbistica & Chopteeth.  Assuming all goes according to plan.

After Paquito d’Rivera’s phenomenal set at the Inter-American Developmental Bank, I hurried over to Blues Alley to catch Jamie Broumas‘ second show. It’s hard to imagine a better home for Broumas than Blues Alley, and easy to imagine the scene in black and white—3 a.m. drunks slumped astride their chairs with their ties loosened and their hats tipped back, watching this beatific chanteuse through tired eyes, remembering (if they can) the one that got away.

Jamie and her band are very much the tight-knit combo, and—despite the late hour and inevitable second-show fatigue—few rough edges were on display last night. Marshall Keyes struck a delicate balance on sax, matching Jamie’s fluid grace with his muted, plaintive leads. Steve Rudolph, looking very professorial at the piano, spun out trillingly elegant solos and played niftily off Harold Summing’s high-hat patterns with silvery little cascades in the upper octaves. This classic quartet approach is eminently suited to Jamie’s voice, which sails (cf. “Small Day,” “Fair Weather”) with sophisticated ease over the group’s delicate swing.

Last night’s thrilling moments were always slow and deliberate—Jamie’s gentle triplets in “Come Fly with Me,” Michael Bowie’s syncopated double-stops, Keyes’ slow-mounting solo in “What Are You Doing The Rest of Your Life?” Their motion as a group rarely swerved off-center, and their center was the soft purity of Jamie’s voice—retreating always, at the end of the phrase, into the supple dreaminess of the mix. Her scats and ethereal high notes are the ribbon on the package, and if at times the package is a little precious, a little too clean, don’t despair: they’re sure to mix it up on “What a Little Moonlight Can Do.”

My favorite moment came at the close of the latter song, when a simple miscommunication sent half the band to the coda before the other half was ready. “A terrible way to go out,” Jamie laughed afterwards at the bar. But I loved it. Even while righting themselves, the band were smiling and laughing. It was a moment for which they hadn’t planned. And, during their stylish, giddy recovery, it became one of their best.

Tonight I’ll be at Bohemian Caverns to see the French-American jazz quintet. Read about it tomorrow.

With over 100 performances happening throughout the District from now until Tuesday, picking the best of each day isn’t easy. Still, here are two good bets for tonight:

Yardena has a hard time categorizing even herself: the vocalist was born in Israel and has performed the music of her homeland, but also mixes in Spanish folk songs, Middle Eastern music, Afro-Cuban jazz, and the American torch songbook. Her next album, she promises, will be “the fusion of Jewish, Middle Eastern music combined with Afro-Cuban rhythms as well as flamenco into what can be called true ‘world music.’” All you really need to know, though, is that she’s got a warm, rich alto voice that genuinely can handle anything. See for yourself tonight at the DC Jewish Community Center, 16th & Q Streets NW, at 7:30. $25.

At Bohemian Caverns tonight, American bassist Paul Steinbeck and French tenor saxophonist Pierre Menuau show off their aptly named French-American Jazz Quintet tonight. Inspired by Steinbeck’s research of The Art Ensemble of Chicago’s popularity in France, the Quintet has a similarly eccentric and diverse musical approach “ranging from free jazz to hip-hop, full of percussion and improvisations.” There are sets at 9:00 and 11:00, for a $15 cover.

Washington’s Duke Ellington Jazz Festival kicks off each year with a private gala and concert for the sponsors and friends of the festival. Last night’s, held at the Inter-American Development Bank, was one act, scaled back from last year’s triple-bill spectacular. But its size was more than made up for by the quality of its performers: clarinetist Paquito d’Rivera (the festival’s musical director) and the Turtle Island String Quartet.

Though they’ve got the standard classical lineup–two violins, viola, and cello–the “Turtles” concentrate on more diverse, contemporary genres, primarily jazz. They began the concert with tunes from their Grammy-winning A Love Supreme: The Legacy of John Coltrane — starting with a sublime take on Coltrane’s “Moment’s Notice” and capped off with a beautifully dissonant reading of Stanley Clarke’s “Song to John” (with a lovely violin solo from Mads Tolling). Despite the repertoire, this prologue had a conservatory-like seriousness about it.

Of course, that was all over the moment Paquito d’Rivera joined them onstage. Festival chair Charlie Fishman had noted in his introduction that he called d’Rivera “the Latin Dizzy Gillespie” for his clownish personality, and he played it to the hilt: “We started out as the Turtle Island Symphony Orchestra,” he told the audience after his first number. “This is what the Immigration Department has left us.”

Their set together was short, but magnificent. Highlights included a swooping arrangement of Frank Sinatra’s setpiece “Angel Eyes”; “Wapango,” a piece Rivera wrote for the Quartet, here featuring a ukulele-like pizzicato break on Tolling’s violin; and a fun Gillespie tribute that centered on “A Night in Tunisia,” but had d’Rivera frequently inserting a riff from Dizzy’s bebop classic “Salt Peanuts” and demanding the audience give the vocal response. The performance set an incredibly high bar for the rest of the festival.

Fortunately, there are other opportunities to see Rivera perform this week. He’ll be sitting in with the Duke Ellington Orchestra at the NEA Jazz Masters concert at the Lincoln Theater Saturday night, and with Conrad Herwig’s orchestra at the National Mall’s free concert on Sunday. (Full festival schedule is here.)

The Duke Ellington Jazz Festival has annually featured an NEA Jazz Masters Concert, headlined by its newest inductee. In the case of 2008, that was to be Ramsey Lewis, the gospel-drenched pianist who scored a huge hit in 1965 with “The In Crowd” (recorded at D.C.’s Bohemian Caverns).

Alas, no more. Lewis, who was scheduled to play the concert on Saturday night, October 4, at the Lincoln Theatre, is having some health concerns and has had to withdraw from the festival. It’s a terrible shame, particularly if you were unable to attend his wonderful concert at the Kennedy Center this spring.

On the brighter side, however, this does free up the NEA concert bill to include the new-fangled Duke Ellington Orchestra. Or, if that doesn’t tickle your fancy, you can see Monty Alexander at Blues Alley; Sonny Fortune at Twins; or up-and-coming cellist Dana Leong at Busboys and Poets, all happening on October 4 as well. Yay jazz festival!

Terence Blanchard sure does spend a lot of time in D.C. The New Orleanian trumpeter has, since August, appeared at Blues Alley to promote his album A Tale of God’s Will (A Requiem for Katrina), at the Kennedy Center for a presentation of his music for Spike Lee’s films, and at Strathmore as part of the Monterey Jazz Festival’s 50th Anniversary Ensemble.

Not that that’s any reason not to see him again this week. He’ll be at Blues Alley from Thursday through Sunday night, with two sets each night priced at $27.50 per set.

Blanchard also has big plans for D.C. in 2009, if you can hold out for it: the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival has announced that their ‘09 lineup will feature Blanchard and his band, and very possibly a full orchestra, performing the Tale of God’s Will in its entirety.