Dan DeLuca's Mix Picks: Coltrane week, music of 'The Deuce,' and Alison Krauss
Willie Nelson's Outlaw fest in Camden, an HBO porn drama, and a week's worth of jazz, plus a talented Texas songwriter, and the all-time Grammy queen on a bill with David Gray.
Eric Church and Nathaniel Rateliff. Willie Nelson's annual Outlaw Music Festival has grown into formidable phenomenon, with a rotating, star-studded cast. Last weekend in Hershey, it featured Van Morrison. This week in Camden, in addition to Sheryl Crow, the Avett Brothers, and (Willie's son) Lukas Nelson & the Promise of the Real, it will welcome Colorado soul man Nathaniel Rateliff and Nashville outlaw Eric Church, who's popular enough to sell out amphitheaters on his own. Sunday at the BB&T Pavilion.
The Deuce. David Simon and George Pelecanos' porn drama is set in New York in 1971. And the prestige TV series, which features The Roots' Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter and Wu-Tang Clan's Clifford "Method Man" Smith as pimps, is full up with soul and funk sounds from that era. Curtis Mayfield's fabulously titled "(Don't Worry) If There's a Hell Below, We're All Going to Go" is the weekly theme music, and the first week's episode was loaded with early '70s gems from James Brown, Al Green, Marva Whitney, Jackie DeShannon, the Guess Who, Marvin Gaye, and more. Sunday at 9 on HBO.
Celebrating Coltrane. The Philadelphia Jazz Project's annual week in honor of the late, great jazz saxophonist who died in 1967 and who is the subject of a new Mural Arts Philadelphia mural at 29th and Diamond that's gone up to replace the nearby one destroyed in 2014. Events begin Monday with the Mysterious Traveler 4 Concert at the Free Library's Central Branch, and the daily events include an Odean Pope Quartet show Saturday at the Hatfield House. Full schedule at philajazzproject.org.
Hayes Carll. The witty and wise Houston-area songwriter known for such clever twists on country truisms as "Drunken Poet's Dream" and "She Left Me for Jesus," was back in fine form on his heartsick 2016 album, Lovers and Leavers, produced by Joe Henry. Curtis McMurtry (son of James) opens. Tuesday at World Cafe Live.
Alison Krauss. The country-bluegrass singer and fiddler who has won more Grammys that any other woman in history — 27, five more than Beyoncé — released Windy City, her first solo album in 18 years, earlier this year. It's an all-covers exercise in classic country pop, produced by Buddy Cannon. She's on a double bill with British songwriter David Gray. Wednesday at Mann Center.