Easy Street Swingtet

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Spoken like a true New Yorker. Also, true. The Easy Street Swingtet sets no sartorial standards. The band dresses in black pants and red shirts, but some of the shirts are long sleeved, others short, and the shades of red don't match. The drummer wears a green jacket over a white shirt, and the bass player appears in jeans and a red T-shirt.

If you're here to see sequins and tuxes, you'll be disappointed; but if you're here to hear Dixieland and swing standards played the way they ought to be, you surely won't. The music and the spirit of the band's playing are both top drawer. The dress is not New York formal, but this is no casual outfit.

Paul Klinger has been a mainstay of the local jazz scene for more than four decades. He and his cornet and sax cases have also toured nationally with the Chicago Jazz Band, and internationally with the New Reformation Jazz Band. Along the way, he's sat in with such jazz greats as Benny Carter and Doc Cheatham.