…Ashkenaz isn’t the only venue showcasing the Bay Area’s deep bench of groundbreaking women musicians. The California Jazz Conservatory celebrates the opening of its new Fiddler Annex (across the street from its main downtown Berkeley campus) with a talent-packed run of shows, including the Montclair Women’s Big Band on March 1, vocalist Laurie Antonioli and the American Dreams Band with special guest Theo Bleckmann on March 2, and Linda Tillery and the Cultural Heritage Choir on March 3.
Saxophonist Jean Fineberg, who co-leads the Montclair big band, debuts a new female-centric octet JAZZphoria on March 9, and on March 23 she and trumpeter Ellen Seeling, her Montclair partner, present a free concert marking the end of the weeklong Women’s Jazz & Blues Camp, an intensive program of ensembles and classes in jazz, blues, Latin styles, improvisation, percussion techniques and jazz history.