Charles Lloyd & the Marvels (7:00 only)

Six decades blowing sax includes blues bands in Charles Lloyd’s native Memphis, backing the Beach Boys, composing for drummer Chico Hamilton, and becoming the first American jazz musician to play the Soviet Union. After wowing the Paramount Theatre in 2016 with his Marvels, featuring guitarist Bill Frisell and steel guitarist Greg Leisz, the tenor titan returns to far more intimate digs in the hills just minutes from Downtown Austin.

“Bill and I have such a simpatico feeling for a song,” explains Lloyd by email. “We never have to say anything verbally. It all comes out in the notes. When Greg came into the fold a couple of years ago at a UCLA concert, the Marvels were formed. He and Bill have such a tight relationship – two sides of a coin.”

Pedal steel in a modern jazz band?

“When I was a kid in Memphis, I played with a lot of different bands, and in one was a great pedal steel player, Al Vescovo,” writes the bandleader. “He and I became good friends, so it was natural to have Greg join us.”

The reedsman’s free-flowing creative ease echoes his Southern California life off the bandstand.

“I hike the mountains, swim in the sea, and all the while I am thinking about music,” he reveals. “I read a lot and meditate daily. Each of these things and the now 80 years of my life are reflected in the music that comes through me.”

Read more with Charles Lloyd. – Michael Toland