Coming up at FitzGerald's

Saturday, February 4: C.J. Chenier, 9 pm, $15 TW/advance tickets [Zydeco]
When zydeco superstar C.J. Chenier stepped onto the main stage at the 2001 Chicago Blues Festival and looked over the crowd of 60,000 eager fans, he had one thing in mind: get them on their feet and make them dance. Almost immediately after launching into their first song, C.J. Chenier and The Red Hot Louisiana Band had people young and old shaking their hips and cheering in unison. With a solo career dating back to 1987 and five previous albums under his belt, C.J. Chenier is regarded as one of the genre’s best singers, musicians and live performers. According to The Boston Globe, “C.J. Chenier attacks the accordion with the tension and drive of James Brown...creating contemporary, turbo-charged dance music.” Living Blues magazine named C.J. Chenier “the best living zydeco singer and accordionist,” and Billboard called him “the heir to the zydeco throne.” Chenier is now ready to turn the music up a notch with his new Alligator release, Step It Up!, undoubtedly his most musically and lyrically ambitious album to date.
www.alligator.com/artists/CJ-Chenier/

Sunday, February 5: Super Bowl – Club and SideBar Closed.

Monday, February 6: Club and SideBar Closed.

Tuesday, February 7: Open Mic. in the Club!, 7:30pm sign up, 8:30pm show, free [variety]
Currently hosted by Mark Bishop, our long-running open mic. is usually held in our SideBar, on the other side of the beer garden from the main club. On the second Tuesday of each month, it’s held in the main club and at a half hour earlier starting time. Acts mostly are within the acoustic singer/songwriter genres, with the sign-up sheet filling fast. Check it out!

Wednesday, February 8: Chicago Singer Spotlight, 8 pm, $10 [Variety]
Chicago Singer Spotlight is a showcase open to anyone: male or female, from the seasoned professional to the aspiring beginner. And the diversity doesn’t end there. A typical show encompasses music genres of all types including: jazz, rock, country, musical theater and original material. Each show consists of four vocalists performing a four-song set with a professional house band. To find out how to perform at the Singer Spotlight and get a professionally-mixed CD of your performance, check the website:
www.singerspotlight.wordpress.com

Thursday, February 9: Exposure, 8 pm, $5 [Variety]
Featuring Shikane, Trakan, Kimi Hayes, and Ballcock Assembly
8pm – Shikane
9pm – Kimi Hayes
10pm – Trakan
11pm – Ballcock Assembly

Thursday, February 9: Songwriters in the Round with Trevor McSpadden, Robert McShane & Andrew Combs, SideBar: 8 pm, FREE [Roots]

Friday, February 10: Becca Kaufman Orchestra, 9 pm, $12 TW/advance tickets [Pop/Rock/Dance]
Becca Kaufman, a native New Yorker, moved to Chicago in 1987 to attend Northwestern University’s renowned theatre program. She realized singing and songwriting was her true passion and quickly became one of the most sought after jingle writers/session vocalists in the city. Becca’s talents are featured on commercials for Coke, Diet Coke, Bally's, Buick and many others. Her character voices can be heard on many games and toys from manufacturers such as Konami, Hallmark and the smash CD-ROM series 'You Don't Know Jack'. In 2003, she was featured on WGN-TV as “Chicago’s Very Own” spotlighting her many successful adventures.

Friday, February 10: Blockade Runners, 9 pm in the SideBar, FREE [Rock]

Saturday, February 11: This Must Be The Band (Talking Heads Tribute), 9 pm, $15 TW/advance tickets [Rock/Tribute]
This Must be the Band is a Talking Heads tribute that has been playing to sold out crowds all over the midwest since 2006, and have recently expanded to national touring, especially in the Rocky Mountains. They are known and loved for their ability to bring Heads music alive in a new way every show. Once a year, however, they feel the need to play Heads music note for note, and they do so by re-creating the famous Talking Heads concert film “Stop Making Sense”. In 2010, they sold out the Park West in Chicago with this show, and again in 2011 at the Vic Theater. This band likes to play for many many hours, so please contact them if you feel the need to dance for many many hours.
www.thismustbetheband.com

Sunday, February 12: Leon Redbone, 7 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets, $25 Day of Show [Jazz/Blues]
Though his iconic guise of his Panama hat, jacket and sunglasses has been thoroughly satirized, it's easy to overlook what a genuinely gifted artist he remains -- a role he inevitably tries to downplay. "In some ways I've always been complacent in my approach to music," Redbone says. "So in some ways maybe I'm the pure definition of consistent."

Most folks were introduced to the man during his network debut on Saturday Night Live in 1976, where he showcased his indelible version of "Walkin' Stick." Over the course of his 30+ year, 15+ album, super-star-of-stage-and-screen-and-Madison-Avenue career, the bard has continued his love affair with tunes from the turn-of-the-century (as in the second-to-last century), flapper-era radio ditties, Depression-spawned ragtime and World War II folk-jazz. His latest album is Live At The Olympia, on Rounder Records.
leonredbone.com

Monday, February 13: Club and SideBar Closed.

Tuesday, February 14: Anna Fermin, 8 pm, $5 [Roots]
Anna performs this first in a series of 3 shows in 3 weeks at FitzGerald’s! After five years of exploring new avenues in life and music, singer/songwriter Anna Fermin unveils her penchant for pop and rock stylings, and releases a new solo collection of songs that aim her sultry voice straight to your music-loving heart. Anna releases two new EPs in March and will be previewing the pop/rock driven songs, along with a new band, at a series of rehearsal gigs in the main room on Feb 14, 22 and 28.
www.annafermin.com

Tuesday, February 14: Open Mic. in the SideBar, 8pm sign up, 9pm show, free [variety]
Currently hosted by Mark Bishop, our long-running open mic. is usually held in our SideBar, on the other side of the beer garden from the main club. On the second Tuesday of each month, it’s held in the main club and at a half hour earlier starting time. Acts mostly are within the acoustic singer/songwriter genres, with the sign-up sheet filling fast. Check it out!

Wednesday, February 15: Bill O'Connell's Chicago Skyliners, 7:30 pm, $10, [Jazz]
The Bill O’Connell Big Band was formed in 1988 for the sole purpose of prolonging the musical memory of the Big Band Era. A house band at FitzGerald’s since 1991, The Chicago Skyliners Big Band following has grown to become one of the top Big Bands in Chicagoland. Blue Birdland Jazz recording artists, besides original material, the Band features the music of Count Basie, Buddy Rich, Sammy Nestico, Stan Kenton, Artie Shaw, Glen Miller and Duke Ellington. The band also showcases the music of contemporary artists such as James Engram, Al Jarreau, Maynard Ferguson, Doc Severenson, Blood Sweat & Tears, The Ides of March and The Brian Setzer Orchestra.
chicagoskylinersbigband.com

Jazz programming at FitzGerald's is generously sponsored by public radio 90.9 FM WDCB, Glen Ellyn, Illinois.

Thursday, February 16: Jon Dee Graham plus Jon Langford, 8 pm, $15 TW/advance tickets [Rock]
Best known for his stint as a member of the acclaimed '80s roots-rock band the True Believers, singer/guitarist Jon Dee Graham was also a longtime fixture of the renowned Austin, TX music scene. Raised on a ranch located near the Texas-Mexico border, he picked up the guitar at age 12, years later dropping out of law school at the University of Texas to join the Austin punk band the Skunks. In 1984, he joined the True Believers, and although the group quickly emerged as a major critical favorite, they were dropped by EMI in the wake of their self-titled 1986 debut, disbanding soon after. Graham's gifts as a composer blossomed during his stint in the True Believers, and he went on to collaborate with X frontman John Doe on his solo debut Meet John Doe. Subsequently working with everyone from Michelle Shocked to Patty Smyth, Graham earned a reputation as a much sought-after sideman and writer before leaving the West Coast in 1995 to tour Europe with blues-rocker Calvin Russell. Upon returning to Austin the next year, he was by now so disenchanted with the music industry that he accepted a construction job; singer Kelly Willis ultimately lured Graham back to performing and in 1997 he began work on his long-awaited solo debut Escape from Monster Island. Summerland followed in 1999.
johndeegraham.weebly.com

Thursday, February 16: The Letter 3 (Scott Ligon, Alex Hall & Casey McDonough) in the Sidebar, 9 pm, FREE[Roots/Rock]

Friday, February 17: Joe Ely plus Go Long Mule, 9 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets [Roots]
Joe Ely (born February 9, 1947 in Amarillo, Texas) is an American singer, songwriter and guitarist whose music touches on honky-tonk, country and rock and roll. He has had a genre-crossing career, performing with Bruce Springsteen, Uncle Tupelo, Los Super Seven, The Clancy Brothers and James McMurtry in addition to his early work with The Clash and more recent acoustic tours with Lyle Lovett, John Hiatt, and Guy Clark.
www.ely.com

Pieced together after a series of fateful barroom encounters, Go Long Mule has created a style that is as much cheers and laughter as it is a drunken brawl. This group of multi-instrumentalists renders tales of the beauty parlor and the junkyard alike with the stylings of rag-and-bones folk, vaudevillian roots-rock, and roadhouse blues. Accessible yet indefinable, this sonic collage stitched by this wayfaring bevy is perhaps best described as nothing more than a reflection of the band’s multifarious members. Each performance with this troupe of gadabouts is a carnival where song and story rendezvous, and an adventure that delights the ears, the ribs and the hips; that thrusts and grabs and tickles the senses.
www.golongmule.com

Saturday, February 18: Joe Ely plus Kevin Gordon Band, 9 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets [Roots]
Over the course of twenty years of writing, recording and touring, Kevin Gordon has built an impressively consistent catalog of songs, a critically-acclaimed stack of albums, and a reputation for dynamic live performances that make first-time listeners life-long fans. He is currently completing his next full-length album, to be released in the spring of 2010. Gordon’s current CD, o Come Look at the Burning – climbed to the Top 10 on the Americana radio chart, and continues to receive significant airplay at XM/Sirius satellite radio. The album made several year-end Top Albums lists as well. Playboy magazine says, “Kevin Gordon’s O Come Look At The Burning may be the least classifiable of the [Nashville Underground] lot but perhaps the best, with a strange assortment of swamp rock, blues and literate lyrics.”
kg.kevingordon.net

Sunday, February 19: 5th Annual After Brunch Bash and Barn Dance with Sunnyside Up and The Teflons, 1:00 pm (Doors at 12:30), $12 TW/advance tickets Adults, $2 kids 12 & under [Country/All Ages]
Sunnyside Up is a three piece Chicago string band that draws in listening audiences with an expertly crafted mixture of bluegrass, swing, fiddle music and songwriting. At the dawn of the 21st Century when new musical labels like Alt-Country and Americana were young, these guys got the bug to put together an alt-string band. Mandolins were re-fretted, cellos were tuned up, jazz guitar players were converted into flat-pickers and new double basses were purchased. Today the musical energy continues as new songs and instrumental tunes are found, forged and arranged for your acoustical listening pleasure.
sunnysideupmusic.com

Country, doo-wop, swing, Hawaiian and rare originals from three powerful-voiced females and two guys. Welcome to the Teflons! The band members hail from theatre productions, jug bands, jazz combos, and operettas for a knock-your-socks-off composite sound that’s been heard onstage at Chicago’s Millenium Park and at festivals and clubs across the Midwest. Stir it up with Barbara Silverman's striking vocals and sock rhythm guitar, Gail Tyler's clear voice and vintage ukulele and Eugenia Elliott's rich resonance and delicious honky tonk yodel. Add the haunting fiddle of Rick Veras (who appeared with Patsy Montana and Rocky Stone) and the tasteful strains of Keith Baumann’s mandolin and dobro, and the Teflons create a musical gumbo that's zingy and contagious. With pulsing bass, washboard solos and stunning harmonies, the Teflons have become one of the Midwest’s most savored treasures.
www.silverbeammusic.com/Teflons.html

Sunday, February 19: Grandstand Big Band, 6 pm, $10 ($5 for under 17 with ID) [Jazz]
Chicago Grandstand Big Band has been an integral part of Chicago's entertainment community for over 30 years. They have performed all over the Chicagoland area, including Joe Segal’s Jazz Showcase, FitzGerald's, Joe's Be-Bop Café, Grant Park Summer Dance, and numerous street fairs. They performed at the 25th anniversary of the Sears Tower. This band has been featured on WTTW's Wild Chicago and for many years, CGBB was the featured band at O’Hare Marriott’s New Years Eve Ball. Members of the group have performed with the Count Basie, Maynard Ferguson, Tommy Dorsey, and Duke Ellington orchestras.
www.chicagograndstandbigband.com

Jazz programming at FitzGerald's is generously sponsored by public radio 90.9 FM WDCB, Glen Ellyn, Illinois.

Monday, February 20: Annual Jambalaya Cookoff featuring Roddie Romero and the Hub City Allstars, 8 pm, $15 TW/advance tickets, [Rock/Zydeco]
Celebrate "Lundi Gras" with Roddie Romero & the Hub City Allstars, a renowned, Grammy®-nominated Louisiana band who have been performing worldwide at the most prestigious festivals and venues for over 20 years. This premier Louisiana band is celebrated not only for their authenticity when performing or recording traditional Cajun and Creole music indigenous to South Louisiana, but also for their original songwriting which stays true to Louisiana inspirations. They have recently garnered a Grammy® nomination for their double record, “The La Louisianne Sessions”. They are notorious "Louisiana-Roots-Rockers" who put on an energetic show which is bound to make everyone get up and dance!
www.roddieromero.com

Tuesday, February 21: Mardi Gras Dance Party with Expo '76!, 8 pm, FREE [Rock/Zydeco]

Wednesday, February 22: Anna Fermin, 8 pm, $5 [Roots]
Anna performs this first in a series of 3 shows in 3 weeks at FitzGerald’s! After five years of exploring new avenues in life and music, singer/songwriter Anna Fermin unveils her penchant for pop and rock stylings, and releases a new solo collection of songs that aim her sultry voice straight to your music-loving heart. Anna releases two new EPs in March and will be previewing the pop/rock driven songs, along with a new band, at a series of rehearsal gigs in the main room on Feb 14, 22 and 28.
www.annafermin.com

Thursday, February 23: Country Night in Berwyn Presents: Honky Tonk Parade, Scott Lucas & the Married Men, Jon Williams and The Chandelier Swingers, 8 pm, $5 [Country/Swing]

Friday, February 24: Steve Forbert with Terry White, 8 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets (plus Free set by Cannonball in the Club after the show) [Roots/Rock]

Saturday, February 25: Eilen Jewell with Sarah and the Tall Boys 9 pm, $12 TW/advance tickets [Roots]
Boise-born and Boston-based, Eilen Jewell has quickly distinguished herself as one of the rising stars of a new generation of roots musicians. Her first two albums, Boundary County (self-released, 2006) and Letters from Sinners and Strangers (Signature Sounds, 2007) were astonishingly assured efforts, which matched Jewell's understated yet insightful songs with a rugged blend of Americana styles. They were met with a great deal of acclaim, with No Depression raving Jewell is showing she can wander with the best of them, and write riveting song-stories about her adventures along the way. Indicative of Jewell's strong following in Europe, The Word in the U.K. described her as A voice of real distinction [that] manages to transcend some powerful influences and pierce the fog long enough for her own point of view to emerge. In 2011, Jewell released her fourth full-length album of original music, Queen of the Minor Key. Eilen Jewell is the Queen of the Minor Key: sad songs are her wealth and finery. Lend her your ears, and you will quickly hear why her humble subjects admire and adore her more with each passing year.
eilenjewell.com

Specializing in original country/blues, Sarah & The Tall Boys is a Chicago-based Americana band that has been selling out venues across the country. Fronted by lead vocalist, rhythm guitarist, and lyricist, Sarah Potenza-Crossman, the band has been together for 4 years. It includes, base player, Ian Crossman, pedal steel player, Gabriel Stutz, lead guitarist, Dan Allen, and drummer, Jason Smart. Dynamic guitarist Dan Allen has been with Sarah since 2006, with her original group, The Sarah Potenza Band. Previous to that, Potenza-Crossman was featured on "Acoustic Chicago", a compilation of the best singer/songwrittters in the windy city. In 2008, Sarah & The Tall Boys released their debut album, "Shiny & New", a powerful collection of original songs, that drew attention from venues and festival producers nationwide. Within that year, the band was performing at festivals with acts like Joss Stone and the legendary Stevie Wonder. They have since participated in festivals which featured Bonnie Raitt and Alejandro Escovedo. Regulars at The Underground Wonder Bar in the heart of Chicago, the band began playing in premier hot spots throughout the city.
sarahandthetallboys.com

Sunday, February 26: John Burnett Orchestra, 6 pm (doors at 5), $10 adults, $5 for 17 and under with student ID [Jazz]
The John Burnett Orchestra specializes in '40s-style big band swing - keeping alive the sounds of Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, Count Basie and others. Each musician is highly professional and most have played with many of the top American big bands such as the Miller, Herman and Buddy Rich Bands. In addition to swing music the orchestra performs current big band jazz charts and many vocal ballads such as those of Frank Sinatra, Joe Williams, Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn.
johnburnettorchestra.com

Jazz programming at FitzGerald's is generously sponsored by public radio 90.9 FM WDCB, Glen Ellyn, Illinois.

Tuesday, February 28: Anna Fermin, 8 pm, $5 [Roots]
Anna performs this first in a series of 3 shows in 3 weeks at FitzGerald’s! After five years of exploring new avenues in life and music, singer/songwriter Anna Fermin unveils her penchant for pop and rock stylings, and releases a new solo collection of songs that aim her sultry voice straight to your music-loving heart. Anna releases two new EPs in March and will be previewing the pop/rock driven songs, along with a new band, at a series of rehearsal gigs in the main room on Feb 14, 22 and 28.
www.annafermin.com

Wednesday, February 29: Leap Year Jazz Show with the West End Jazz Band! 7:30 pm, $10 [Jazz]

Friday, March 2: The Malone Brothers plus Paul Cebar Tomorrow Sound, 9 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets [Roots]

Friday, March 9: Dave Alvin and the Guilty Ones plus Kristi Rose and Fats Kaplin, 9 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets, $25 Day of Show [Rock]

Friday, March 15: Tab Benoit, 9 pm, $20 TW/advance tickets [Cajun/Blues]

Fri, March 23: Chuck Prophet with special guest Miles Nielsen, 9 pm, $15 TW/advance tickets [Rock]