My friend, jazz reviewer Troy Collins (All About Jazz, et al), got me a comp pass to see the John Abercrombie Quartet at the Hilton tonight.

This was his self-inflicted penance for telling me about Pere Ubu being in town a few weeks earlier. I went and the show was horrible. Being the nice guy he is, to square things he brought me along on his assignment to review Abercrombie.

The show opened with an hour set from the 5th grade jazz band of the Milton Hershey School. These nine- and ten-year-olds rocked the house with swinging renditions of the Beatles -- that classic British band who first came to our shores in 1967 (as their teacher and conductor would have us believe). They also lit up the night with "Proud Mary," by both Creedence and Clearwater.

Either that chunk of musical history has become irrelevant or that piece of human history is fading into the good-night. I don't know which is scarier.

I suspect at least one of those little munchkins will actually become a professional musician someday, with many jingles to their credit; perhaps even a space in the house band of American Idol.

John Abercrombie's quartet was fine. Joey Baron, the drummer, is a scene-stealer with his inventiveness. Mark Johnson is a solid bassist, Mark Feldman is reminiscent of Grappelli, and Abercrombie has chops but is too mellow for my taste. As I am ignorant about most jazz after 1965 (be honest, you don't even know that much) that's all I'm able to say. I enjoyed it a lot.

DL