Jeff Ballard pours some Jive Coffee

Some nice playing today from drummer Jeff Ballard, featured with Brad Mehldau on piano, Peter Bernstein on guitar and Larry Grenadier on bass.

I notice that on footage such as this (and many other jazz concerts that pop on youtube) that it was recorded for a television station labled 3 Sat. I'm assuming that this is a European cable network (?) Props to them for producing such wonderfully recorded concerts featuring the modern jazz masters of our time at work. I think that the CBC and other Canadian television networks could take a page from their book and follow their example and feature Canadian jazz on network television like this.

In two parts, here's Ballard in action on Peter Bernstein's 5/4 swinger, "Jive Coffee":





And here's another great performance from that concert- a spirited jaunt on Thelonious Monk's "We See":