Jazz at the Root, at the Meadowlark

Jazz has long been music reserved for the best players and has produced some of popular music’s most memorable eccentrics and rebels. While not a jazz show in the purest sense, Jazz at the Root (taking place this Thursday, April 29, at the Meadowlark with a wealth of talent on the bill) lives up to its title. Former Czars guitar hero Roger Green’s solo material and performance experiments draw clear inspiration from jazz rule-breakers like Ornette Coleman. Lelah Simon, meanwhile, may be better known for her stints in Astrophagus and Ode to the Marionette, but her facility as a jazz bassist informs all of her work. Likewise, Cloud City may have come together originally to do a hip-hop remix of a folk song, but its original material shows how jazz can be purely electronic without being dumbed down, and SuperCollider includes veterans of the local and national jazz and improv scenes.