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Greta Matassa Sextet at Jazz Alley

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Courtesy Lisa Hagen Glynn

By Paul Rauch
April 6, 2025
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Greta Matassa is the most important jazz singer to emerge from the city of Seattle since the great Ernestine Anderson rose from the scene on Jackson Street to international stardom.

Greta Matassa Sextet
Jazz Alley
Seattle WA
April 2, 2025

Truth is a constant, something that remains rooted to fact no matter how many times told. That being said, the obvious must be stated here, as it has many times previously—

Greta Matassa

vocals
b.1962

" data-original-title="" title="">Greta Matassa is the most important jazz singer to emerge from the city of Seattle since the great

Ernestine Anderson

vocals
1928 - 2016

" data-original-title="" title="">Ernestine Anderson rose from the scene on Jackson Street to international stardom.

There is documentation to support this, of course. There are six albums as a leader, including the marvelous Portrait (Origin, 2019), a primer of tunes she had performed for over a decade with her working band. There are the plethora of live performances that are in themselves a constant on the Northwest jazz scene. Then there is her indelible ability to employ scat figures to tunes as any horn player would—with or without the lyrics that she pens to instrumental modern jazz classics. Her influence as a mentor to the Seattle vocal jazz community is impressively immense as well.

Matassa has sold out shows at Dizzy's in New York City, toured Russia, Singapore, Hawaii, New Orleans and other destinations abroad. Yet a stage that she has visited as a performer a scant few times beckoned for this evening in her home turf of Seattle, arguably the most important stage for any jazz musician reared in the Emerald City.

Dimitriou's Jazz Alley began as a small bistro on the "Av," a bustling stretch in the city's university district, and in 1985, moved to Belltown into what would evolve into a 400 seat jazz club. In essence, it is a place where Seattle jazz and R&B fans can settle into a fine culinary experience alongside the finest touring acts in the business. Only occasionally does resident talent appear, though that trend appears to be turning. Just a month earlier, Seattle based trumpeter

Thomas Marriott

trumpet
b.1975

" data-original-title="" title="">Thomas Marriott attracted large audiences for his two night stand at the club. It seemed only right that Matassa would return for another one night stand, to tell her truth with her long-tenured talented band.

Bassist

Clipper Anderson

bass

" data-original-title="" title="">Clipper Anderson is Matassa's partner in music and in life, while drummer

Mark Ivester

drums

" data-original-title="" title="">Mark Ivester and saxophonist

Alexey Nikolaev

saxophone, tenor

" data-original-title="" title="">Alexey Nikolaev have performed with Matassa for so long, they may seem like family as well. Both are veteran ensemble players, with the added ability of being outstanding soloists. Pianist

David Lee Joyner

piano

" data-original-title="" title="">David Lee Joyner, and the brilliant guitarist

Brian Monroney

guitar

" data-original-title="" title="">Brian Monroney are more recent additions, giving the band a wide array of musicians who can carry the load while Matassa claims her choruses in the same way her musicians do—as part of a unit that works together. Such longevity and familiarity in modern jazz bands is not all that common, making Matassa's dates with her fans multi-dimensional in a very musical sense.

The band minus its leader began the evening festivities with Matassa hanging out in the bar observing with obvious pleasure. Working their way through Joyner's "The Rock," listeners were reminded of Matassa's methodology as a bandleader, seeing herself as a centerpiece, but in that role still occupying only a sliver of the band's musical identity. In other words, she lets the cats play, which has engendered a deep sense of camaraderie within the collective, and partly explains the band's longevity as a unit.

Matassa shifted gears from the boppish opener by launching into "The Smiling Hour," a Hans Lins composition that served as the title track for her 2007 Origin Records release. Jobim's "Double Rainbow" followed, though a noticeable imbalance existed in the sound. Matassa's voice was buried in the mix, and Nikolaev's tenor lacked any kind of acoustic quality in the low end. By the time the two were trading fours on Matassa's "A Walk With Miss Begonia," the sound was dialed in, and the marvelous trademark luminescence and range of the singer's voice had dramatically appeared. Nikolaev, in a way the second voice of the band, sounded like his usual, soulful self. The remainder of the nearly two-hour set went off unhitched, with Matassa gathering in the audience and creating a welcoming vibe in the room—something she has consistently done throughout her 40 years of performing.

The highlight of the evening may have been Matassa's dive in the tune known in English as "Yellow Days," a bolero written as "La Mentira," by Alvaro Carrillo. Made popular in the jazz world by a rare Duke Ellington / Frank Sinatra collaboration, she tiptoed into the melody with bare-bones accompaniment from Anderson on bass. With a blues-based vibe and an easy sense of swing, Matassa made the tune her own with a melodic scat run that gave one the sense that she was now fully engaged, and that the best was yet to come. It was the peak of the definable arc the performance embraced.

"If I Could" was a nod to Matassa's interest in the music of Pat Metheny, nudging the spacious melody through with lyrics written by another Seattle music treasure—drummer

Michael Shrieve

drums
b.1949

" data-original-title="" title="">Michael Shrieve. Monroney's support on acoustic guitar and Anderson's nimble bass solo brought this gorgeous melody to a melancholic place where Matassa could maneuver with romantic grace. The singer penned lyrics herself to Metheny's "On Her Way," a tune that enabled her to use her complete instrument. In the end, the lyrics allowed her to state the melody and improvise over the changes utilizing both words and scat figures on a tune that for most vocalists would be inaccessible. The tune also allowed guitarist Monroney to shine at last, the veteran working his way through the changes in spontaneous and melodic fashion. His work has certainly added a new dimension to the band, both as a lead and harmony voice.

Matassa referenced Seattle's Jazz and Blues icons Ernestine Anderson and

Ray Charles

piano and vocals
1930 - 2004

" data-original-title="" title="">Ray Charles towards the end of the set, highlighted by a scat technique employing her hands in blues harp position, muting her voice a tad to accent the tune with her deep understanding of the blues form. Along with

Tommy Flanagan

piano
1930 - 2001

" data-original-title="" title="">Tommy Flanagan's swinger, "Cup Bearers," these songs put Matassa smack dab in the middle of her expertise as a jazz singer who deeply understands the music's foundational presence in the blues. "A Fool For You" shook the foundation of the audience, providing some jump and groove.

A large portion of the Jazz Alley crowd consisted of dedicated former and current students who have been mentored by Matassa over the past twenty-five years, something she referenced several times over the course of the evening. While most are not, and likely will never be professional singers, they all share in the joy that learning how to make music with the most personal instrument of all can bring. There was a lovely sense of closeness and community in the room from beginning to end of the performance and beyond.

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