The Collective West Jazz Orchestra is a 12-piece big band that plays delightful, high-energy jazz. The repertoire includes a full range of big band styles, from Count Basie classics to straight-ahead ballads and burners, to challenging contemporary numbers. You might walk in on a soulful blues trombone solo that gets the crowd howling on “Lonely Boy,” then bop along to a spirited tenor solo during an intriguing arrangement of Monk's “Think of One.” You might get to hear the band's up-tempo version of “Just Friends” and feel like you're listening to a Las Vegas pit band circa 1964.

The Collective West Jazz Orchestra is led by saxophonist Fil Lorenz, who fell in love with big bands while a member of the prestigious Menlo-Atherton High School Orchestra. The band includes great Bay Area big band talent: hot, professional jazz players who know how to handle a chart and a solo. These musicians have shared the stage with jazz luminaries like Woody Herman, Stan Kenton, Louie Bellson, Rosemary Clooney and others.

Lorenz began trying to put a big band together in 1998, after returning to the Bay Area from a four-year Navy stint. His original inspirations were Count Basie, and Maynard Ferguson's bands of the '50s and '60s. A long tenure on Tuesday nights forged in the atmospheric basement performance space of Johnny Foley's Pub helped forge the Collective West Jazz Orchestra into a rollicking and dynamic ensemble.


PLEASE NOTE: All shows at Pearl's require a two-drink minimum per person.