Jazz Appreciation Month: The Jazz Kitchen celebrates 31 years

As the rest of the country gathers to celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month, the Jazz Kitchen is celebrating 31 years in Indianapolis.

The swanky little jazz club on College Avenue celebrated its 31st anniversary on April 1, but owner David Allee is finding ways to celebrate jazz all month, culminating in a fundraiser on International Jazz Day on April 30.

“Obviously we appreciate jazz all the time, but it’s an opportunity for maybe a bigger spotlight to be put on it,” Allee said. “It is part of a worldwide effort, I mean there’s concerts all over the world, especially on International Jazz Day … but it’s kind of neat. It’s getting everybody together; it gets everybody talking about it.”

That corner of College Avenue and East 54th Street has a history of music, Allee said. Before it became the Jazz Kitchen in 1994, the building was home to a jazz club, a rock club and a few other things. Allee comes from a family of jazz musicians — his dad was a jazz pianist and Allee picked up the trumpet himself — so opening the club felt like a way to keep the music alive.

The Jazz Kitchen does jazz very well, hosting tributes to local legends such as Freddie Hubbard and Wes Montgomery and supporting Indianapolis Jazz Fest, with Allee serving as director since 2009. However, Allee said it’s important to him and the community to offer a variety of musical genres, opening the stage to emerging and established artists as well as local and national acts.

Just last week, the Jazz Kitchen hosted a classical piano competition on Wednesday, then turned around and had Latin Night on Thursday; a Latin Jazz group played on Friday, a big band on Saturday and then Sunday saw a Freddie Hubbard tribute.

Of course, the Jazz Kitchen offers a dinner menu and a full-service bar, too, but guests tend to identify with the diversity of its offerings, Allee said. No one needs to be a “dye in the wool” jazz fan to come and enjoy a band there.

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“We know that there’s a thirst for this music, and when you look at our programming, it’s very varied,” Allee said. “It kind of transcends a lot of the audience lines jazz usually does, so you’re gonna see old and young, black and white, people that have money, people that don’t, you know, just a little bit of everybody kind of walks through the door.”

With the city’s longstanding jazz history, Allee likes to think of the Jazz Kitchen as an extension of the legacy the artists of Indiana Avenue left behind. Slide Hampton, JJ Johnson and the aforementioned Freddie Hubbard and Wes Montgomery were all artists who maintained roots in the city but left to make their mark on the world.

“Right behind them there was this whole community of people like the (Alonzo) Pookie Johnson’s and the Jimmy Coe’s, and the David Young’s, and the Russell Webster’s, that decided that they were going to be here in Indianapolis,” Allee said. “A lot of those guys were around when I was going through high school, some of them taught at IPS, through the All-City Band, so they handed that knowledge down.”

The Jazz Kitchen continues that legacy by celebrating artists who came before, while also understanding the scene is churning out the next Wes Montgomery.

However, jazz is more than just the music or the artist behind it. Jazz artist and cultural advocate Brandon Meeks has been a musician for nearly 20 years “strictly because it’s a passion” and something that resonates on a cultural level.

For Meeks, being a jazz musician is not just a career path or a way to earn a living, it is also way for him to push his heritage and identity forward as a Black American.

“It’s a way for me to show the different facets of Black culture and how each facet is very much present and relevant today and also is worthy of being preserved by Black people,” Meeks said. “A lot of times institutionally, you kind of just see predominantly white institutions teaching jazz culture in schools … But it’s important for people within the culture to carry that torch forward as well. I think that’s part of part of my life’s work and part of my mission.”

Meeks regularly performs at the Jazz Kitchen, with an upcoming show on April 11, and said the venue has done a good job of creating a space where music can be properly appreciated. Musicians of his generation — and even younger — are welcome to come in and hone their skills, work on their craft and develop as professionals in front of an audience.

“The Jazz Kitchen has kind of become an institution for jazz, you know?” Meeks said. “It’s important to have those because otherwise, we’d all just play in our living rooms and in basements, but we do have to have public spaces where the public can engage with the music and the musicians can engage with each other. So, it’s become like a very important cultural institution, not just a jazz club.”

International Jazz Day – An Indianapolis Jazz Foundation Fundraiser takes place from 6-9 p.m. at the Cabaret, 924 N. Pennsylvania St. The program will feature a live auction, an IJF Jazz Hall-of-Fame Induction, and live performances from the Indianapolis Jazz Collective, “From the 317” Showcase, and a Hall-of-Fame Tribute. Tickets start at $150 and can be purchased at eventbrite.com.

For more information about the Jazz Kitchen and upcoming performances, visit thejazzkitchen.com.

Contact Arts & Culture Reporter Chloe McGowan at 317-762-7848. Follow her on X @chloe_mcgowanxx.