Just like the music of a forgotten era drifting from our memories, it’s easy to forget that there is life outside of the Downtown music circuit. So much of this column is spent on fighting the good fight by trying to get people out of their easy chairs and into the many live music venues that Downtown has to offer.
That makes it all too easy to forget, for instance, the awfully comfortable music room in the Martini Grille. Though live music hasn’t always been standard fare in the red and leopard print rooms, a certain local songbird has changed that recently. At the same time, she also brings back that aforementioned forgotten era.
For the past few Saturdays, and the next few or more, Bernadette Seacrest (late of the rockabilly act The Long Goners) performs at Martini Grille with a revolving cast of sidemen. Not just any sidemen mind you, but jazz guitar virtuoso and the Wes Montgomery-influenced Greg Ruggiero.
Other gigs find the lovely Seacrest alongside bassist extraodinaire David Parlato, who has performed with the likes of Barbara Striesand, Henry Mancini and Burt Bacharach among many others. Parlato also serves as director of The Outpost Repertory Jazz Orchestra.
Seacrest also began working with a unique jazz group called The Yes Men, which includes bassist Michael Grimes and drummer Dan Stouffer (late of Mulvalina Voo Voo) and able trombonist Paul Bossert.
Seacrest performs standard jazz classics such as “Summertime”, “Stormy Weather” and “Dream a Little Dream.” Her sultry, silky voice spreads across the room like a lush, warm blanket of velvet and ably pays homage to the composers and performers who made those songs so unforgettable in the first place.