Chris', going jazz plus, vows to keep the beat

When Chris' Jazz Cafe announced in November that it would host comedy nights, musical purists groused. How dare Center City's only for-profit jazz club bring another art form into that hallowed space? Chris' booking agent, Alan McMahon, joked that the event would be a welcome change.

"The club presents over 500 jazz shows a year and will continue to," McMahon wrote in an e-mail at the time. "A little comedy will be good for all." That first stand-up show was packed, and in December McMahon sent a second e-mail saying that Chris would expand into different sounds that complemented its jazz aesthetic.

Now the time has come. Chris' expansion into blues, funk, singer-songwriter acts, and comedy starts in March, and it has jazz aficionados concerned that their music will become a second-class citizen. A recent blog post at Philadelphia Magazine talked about a possible format and name change at Chris', and asked whether Philly's jazz scene was dead.

"No," states Chris' co-owner and chef Mark DeNinno. "I didn't change the name 12 years ago when we" - he and co-owner Glenn Gerber - "bought the space from the original 'Chris' Dhimitri, and we're not changing it now. The place is internationally famous."

Chris', a six-night-a-week venue, is changing its staff uniforms and its linens, but "as for jazz being dead, not at all," DeNinno says. "We're not kicking the jazz guys out. We love them and want to see them supporting the music, the scene, and the shows."

What DeNinno and McMahon did notice last year was that weekday shows, mostly featuring young, local musicians, were lightly attended. Though Chris' "overall numbers in 2012 were the same as the year before," DeNinno says, "we saw a decline in the numbers of covers paid."

DeNinno believes younger audiences aren't always into Chris' conservative jazz acts ("kids don't always want to hear 'Autumn Leaves,' he jokes) and his diners don't dig the avant-garde stuff. For a restaurant/live venue business model, all cylinders must be firing.

"We're dinner and a show," DeNinno says. "Plus, we've been evolving for 12 years. We've hosted spoken-word nights and tap-dancing events along with the jazz forever."

McMahon assures fans that local jazz ensembles and jazz jams will still be featured, along with a jazz-only weekend booking policy. "In March I booked 30 jazz bands so far, two blues, one comedy night, and one late night of funk/rock. That'll be the pattern of the bookings."

The jazz community in this city of John Coltrane and McCoy Tyner has mixed feelings about the change.

"I don't like it," says trumpeter Wallace Roney, a Philly native who'll play Chris' for the first time Friday and Saturday. The progressive jazz man's 2012 album Home is dedicated to Philly, to his current domicile in New York City, and to jazz itself.

When it comes to what Chris' should be, Roney believes the club should tough it out. "It should stay all-jazz. Look, I love Philly but I've not been fully accepted there. Not many gigs. The people on my old block in North Philly accept me, though," he says with a laugh. "Hopefully they'll come out."

Philly avant-jazz guitarist and promoter Nick Millevoi believes Chris' isn't interested in his kind of sound ("it's not good dinner music"), but hoped the changes might open it to a more expansive booking policy.

Jazz will survive - there will always be someplace to play, whether it's Chris' or rooms like the Painted Bride, the Blockley, and Ortlieb's Lounge (formerly Jazzhaus). That sense of pragmatism is best expressed by Philly jazz radio legend Bob Perkins. The WRTI on-air personality believes Chris' must do what it can to thrive.

"Whatever they'll do for Philly's jazz community is better than nothing," Perkins says. He knows from experience - WRTI hosts classical music as well as jazz. "What else can we do for Chris' save to give them money?" Between the wealth of electronic entertainment options and the rough economy, he says, Chris' is to be applauded for its continued dedication to the music. "I appreciate what they're doing, period."

Some may argue that jazz is difficult to profit from. Yet one restaurateur with experience in Philly's jazz and restaurant biz is betting otherwise. Chef Al Paris was a part of Zanzibar Blue, Robert and Benjamin Bynum's Broad Street jazz club, from 1995 to 2001. "I'm disappointed Chris is expanding from just jazz," says Paris, who owns a restaurant, Heirloom, in Chestnut Hill, but says if the decision strengthens it, "they'll be fine."

Then again, Zanzibar Blue benefited from its heritage. "Robert and Benjamin were second-generation jazz guys," says Paris, referencing their father, Ben Sr., a live-music legend who owned and booked Germantown Avenue's Cadillac Club with jazz and soul greats.

Paris says he and Robert Bynum are readying their own live jazz-booked spot in the Chestnut Hill Hotel, a French eatery named Paris Bistro and Jazz Cafe, to open by midsummer. "Between Chris' and my place," Paris says, "we'll make sure jazz never dies."