Patti Labelle
A musical force of nature, Patti LaBelle is celebrating two landmarks on her current “80/65” tour: The 2008 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee turned 80 on May 24 and this year celebrates the 65th year of her music career.
She was just 15 when she began singing with The Ordettes in 1959 in her native Philadelphia. The group changed its name to The Blue Bells in 1961, then was renamed Patti LaBelle & The Bluebelles in 1962.
The soulful vocal trio scored its first Top 40 hit a year later with “Down the Aisle (The Wedding Song).” Many more recordings followed, but it wasn’t until after the group was renamed LaBelle in 1971 — and assumed a glam-rock-inspired look and an edgier sound — that its star really ascended.
LaBelle’s’s 1974 album, “Nightbirds,” yielded the chart-topping hit, “Lady Marmalade,” which became a hit again in 2001 when it was jointly covered by Christina Aguilera, Pink, Mya and Lil Kim. Patti LaBelle’s solo career began in 1977 and reached nee heights with her chart-topping 1986 duet with Michael McDonald, “On My Own.”
LaBelle isn’t coasting as she begins her ninth decade. Her two-part concerts this year have been running close to 90 minutes, with a DJ interlude in between. And she still hits the high notes on her signature song, “If Only You Knew.”
8 p.m. Friday. Pechanga Theater, Pechanga Resort Casino, 45000 Pechanga Parkway, Temecula. $86. ticketmaster.com
Charles McPherson performs “Charlie Parker with Strings”
It’s been nearly 20 years since the release of “Charles McPherson With Strings,” the superb 2005 album on which this internationally celebrated San Diego alto saxophonist saluted and extended the music featured on bebop sax pioneer Charlie Parker’s classic 1950 release, “Charlie Parker With Strings.”
Today at San Diego State University, he will perform selections from “With Strings” for the first time here that I can recall, accompanied by student musicians enrolled at SDSU. It’s a rare opportunity to hear the tireless McPherson, now 85 and still playing up a storm, perform music from the songbook of Parker, his single biggest musical influence.
Better yet, the concert will also feature some of McPherson’s striking original compositions. As he handily reaffirms on his most recent album — this year’s terrific “Reverence — McPherson’s compositional chops just get better and better with age.
5 p.m. today. Main Stage Theatre, 5500 Campanile Drive, SDSU. $10-$15. sdsupsfa.edu/calendar
Sara Petite’s Americana Roundup
Multiple-San Diego Music Award-winning singer-songwriter Sara Petite created a winner when she launched her monthly “Americana Roundup” concert series at the Ken Club in March.
Friday night’s edition will salute two nationally acclaimed San Diego music mainstays, the roots-rocking Beat Farmers and the late Mojo Nixon, who died in June at the age of 66.
The concert will take on even greater resonance coming barely a month after the death of San Diego music mainstay Paul Kamanski, who wrote such Beat Farmers’ classics as “Hollywood Hills” and “Bigger Stones.” Petite will do both those songs tonight, as well as the Kamanski-penned “California Kid” and Nixon’s signature song, “Elvis is Everywhere.”
She’ll be joined by nearly a dozen musical pals, including Jeff Berkley, Shawn Rohlf, Chloe Lou, Ariel Levine, Jonny Wagon, Brenda Gail, Craig Fischer, Rick Wilkins, Ashley E. Norton, and Nathan Raney, whose father is Beat Farmers co-founder Jerry Raney. The elder Raney and fellow Beat Farmer Joey Harris will take the stage for the grand finale.
8 p.m. Friday. The Ken Club, 4079 Adams Ave., Kensington. $15 (standing room), $28.50 (seat) $132.53. eventbrite.com
Pat Bianchi Trio, with Mojo
The Oceanside Civic Center Library is the unlikely site for what promises to be one of the hottest San Diego area jazz gigs of the month. But you can expect a sizzling night of music when New York Hammond B-3 organ wizard Pat Bianchi and his band perform in the library’s Civic Center Community Room.
Bianchi’s ninth and latest solo album, “Three,” brings a welcome sense of freshness to the jazz organ trio tradition. Well respected for his work with guitar greats Pat Martino, Ed Cherry, Mark Whitfield and Peter Bernstein, Bianchi is also an astute judge of talent.
His current band features tenor sax dynamo Troy Roberts and the propulsive drummer Byron Landam, best known for his lengthy tenure with organ legend Joey DeFrancesco. Expect the joint — um, library — to be jumping when Bianchi and his group perform.
5 p.m. Saturday. Oceanside Civic Center Library, 330 North Coast Highway, Oceanside. $17.85-$33.85. eventbrite.com
