Jazz Central, Syracuse’s concert jazz venue, is ramping up its activity as a tour stop for national artists. Two ambitious projects will soon be featured in the cozy downtown 75-seater for intimate closeup concerts.
First up on Nov. 1 is “Yokai! Songs of the Japanese Supernatural,” pairing Japanese art and live jazz by the Fumi Tomita Quartet. Yokai are spirit beings in ancient Shinto animism, strange, unexplained or supernatural.
Tomita is internationally known as a bassist, composer, collaborator and academic, presently teaching at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Tomita’s range of interests are wide, encompassing recordings and studies of bebop progenitor Charlie Parker, modern jazz bassist Charlie Haden, and early jazz…