FRIDAY, JUNE 19

4:30 p.m.: Rochester Area High School Jazz Bands Jazz Street Stage

5:15 p.m.: Rochester Area High School Jazz Bands Jazz Street Stage

6 p.m.: Half Ton Horns Jazz Street Stage

Specializing in true-to-the-original arrangements of r&b classics like "I Want You Back," "Rock Steady," and "Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours," the Half Ton Horns has the power to deliver them with a punch. When it comes to 1970's soul, the band can channel the Average White Band, Earth, Wind & Fire, and Stevie Wonder with a combination of fine vocals, a funky rhythm section, and tight reeds and brass. (RN)

6 p.m.: John Boutte Montage Music Hall

New Orleans singer John Boutte cooks (you could say Sam Cookes) up Louisiana boogie. There's some city, there's some swamp, and all kinds of soul. Think Lee Dorsey, but just a shade sweeter. Boutte has racked up plenty of awards for his golden voice, including Best Male Vocalist and Best Traditional Jazz Album at the 2008 OffBeat Music Awards. (FD)  

6 p.m.: Pat Martino Kilbourn Hall

Few musicians have had as riveting a journey as Pat Martino. After establishing himself as one of the premier guitarists in jazz in the 1960's in bands with greats like Jimmy Smith and on his own albums, Martino suffered a brain aneurysm in the late 1970's. An operation in 1980 caused him to lose both his memory and his ability to play. Over the next decade he studied his past albums and re-taught himself guitar. In the late 1980's Martino re-emerged on the jazz scene and has been at the top of his form since then. (RN)

6:15 p.m.: Lori Andrews JazHarp Max of Eastman Place

Just wait until you see Lori Andrews rock out on the electric harp. Andrews and her group order off the whole menu, from floating atmospheric jazz, funky stratospheric jazz, to Sunday brunch smooth fusion. Andrews' harp is full-on electric, allowing it to rise above the sultry ripples you're used to hearing. Her unique style has booked her gigs at all sorts of jazz festivals, including Playboy, Newport, Sacramento, and even Oprah's 50th birthday. Oprah, dude. (FD)

6:30 p.m.: RIJF Salutes Joe Romano Xerox Auditorium

From his early days, playing with Chuck and Gap Mangione, to his packed-house performances at the RIJF in recent years, the late saxophonist Joe Romano was a favorite on the Rochester jazz scene for half a century. Even when he lived on the West Coast, playing in the bands of Lionel Hampton and Woody Herman and subbing in the Tonight Show Band, Romano returned home to play gigs in the city where his musical imagination first took flight. A beloved mentor, he will be honored by the musicians whose lives he enhanced. (RN)

6:45 p.m.: Norma Winstone Christ Church

Whether gently breathing out a lyric or word-less sighs, Londoner Norma Winstone always maintains a beautiful tone. She has been exploring language and sound becoming apart of the avant-garde movement in the early 1970's. More recently she has concentrated on putting lyrics to existing works by composers like Steve Swallow. (FD)

7 p.m.: Campbell Brothers East Ave/Alexander St Stage

On stage or in the sanctuary, there's a whole lotta push and pull in the Campbell Brothers' sacred steel sound. Not just for Sundays anymore, the band is bringing its music to the world, playing numerous jazz festivals, Bonnaroo, Carnegie Hall, and the Hollywood Bowl. The brothers have shared the stage with artists like The Allman Brothers, North Mississippi All-Stars, Gov't Mule, Medeski Martin and Wood (John Medeski produced the band's 2005 "Can You Feel It"), and have helped spawn the next generation of sacred steel acolytes like Robert Randolph. (FD)

7 p.m.: Ryan Shaw East Ave/Chestnut St Stage

Ryan Shaw takes a break from touring with Brit-soul babe Joss Stone to rock with us for just one evening. But that may be all it takes to rejuvenate and resuscitate your faith in r&b. Hailing and wailing out of Decatur, Georgia, Shaw digs deep from the genre's classic era, when r&b actually meant rhythm and blues and had plenty of both. Shaw sings creamy smooth, with lofty forays into the clouds that will make you tingle. Wilson Pickett and Jackie Wilson may be gone, but it's comforting to know someone's still doing their work down here. (FD)

7:15 p.m.: Po Boys Brass Band Jazz Street Stage

Now based in Rochester, The Po' Boys Brass Band got its start in New Orelans, where one of its members caught a concert by trombone group Bonerama. The Po' Boys play with an element of electric wrong, with the lead trombone getting run through stomp boxes that bend and twist and distort the sound into a creamy stratospheric tapestry. It's like Dumbo on an acid trip. The band bust up joints nightly with stuff off its debut, "Bonebreak," as well as unlikely trombone tributes to tunes like "Thriller" and "Frankenstein." (FD)

7:30 p.m.: Arve Henriksen Lutheran Church of the Reformation

Arve Henriksen is another trumpeting Norwegian who has worked in free jazz influenced by Japanese koto, biwa, shakuhachi music, and rock with bands like Motorpsycho. Henriksen recently said, "In my opinion, the trumpet has vast potential for tone and sound variations that we still have not heard." Perhaps he'll stumble upon some of those variations here. (FD)

8 p.m.: Susan Tedeschi Band/Taj Mahal Eastman Theatre

Susan Tedeschi's "Back To The River" may be the artist's attempt to grow and explore, but this leopard's spots are still pretty blue, jack. The colors that aren't blue are due in large part to the collaborations on the album. Swampster Tony Joe White, The Jayhawks' Gary Louris, songwriter on the rise Sonya Kitchell, Texas wildman Doyle Bramhall II, and hubby Derek Trucks all sat down with Tedeschi with pen, paper, and guitar. So the record leans a little rootsier than previous platters, yet when she opens her mouth and hits the strings, there's no doubt about who's at the mic. (FD)

Taj Mahal dumps the whole spice rack into the soup and makes it work. Afro-Caribbean blues, folk-blues, world-blues, jazz-blues -- when you describe Mahal's music, you've got to hyphenate. However, despite the diversity, the blues remains the meat, as Mahal deconstructs the sounds to their roots. Born Henry St. Claire Fredericks in Harlem in 1942 to a jazz pianist father and gospel-singing mother, young Henry was surrounded by music. It was in college that he transformed himself into Taj Mahal after the idea hit him in a dream. He cut his teeth in the L.A. club scene in the early 60's, where he got to share the stage with influential blues greats like Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Junior Wells, Buddy Guy, Sleepy John Estes, and Lightin' Hopkins. Mahal has earned two Grammys, and plays more than 20 instruments. But it all comes down to the man and his guitar, the history they explore, and the history they are now apart of. (FD)

8:30 p.m.: Dwayne Dopsie & The Zydeco Hellraisers Big Tent

Dwayne "Dopsie" Rubin's old man is considered the king of Zydeco. So here comes the prince. The 29-year-old Dopsie grew up in Lafayette, Louisiana, surrounded by Zydeco music's spicy rattle and cry. The young man first got involved by strapping into a washboard before moving on to the accordion, where he really shines. People in the know know; Dopsie was voted "Hottest Accordion In America" in 1999 by the American Accordionists Association. (FD)

8:45 p.m.: Norma Winstone Christ Church

See bio above.

9 p.m.: Tower of Power East Ave/Chestnut St Stage

In the 1970s there were funky, horn-based bands on stages everywhere. But there were none funkier and none hornier than Tower of Power. Every brass and reed riff was perfectly punctuated, and the section was stop-on-a-dime tight. The band is still going strong with vocals that are pure soul and arrangements as sophisticated as a Gil Evans chart. Tower of Power is capable of beautiful ballads like "You're Still A Young Man" or mid-tempo masterpieces like "So Very Hard To Go." And the band can make it hard to sit still with tunes like "What Is Hip?" The passing years have shown that the answer to that question is Tower of Power. (RN)

9 p.m.: Robert Randolph & the Family Band East Ave/Alexander St Stage

Parked unassumingly behind his pedal steel, Robert Randolph will knock you over, out, and off your feet. With a frenetic attack, Randolph blends blues, rock, funk, and gospel, taking each genre to its absolute limit. Like The Campbell Brothers, Randolph got his start in The House of God Church, a Pentecostal denomination known for its use of steel guitar in its liturgy. Randolph has taken this church base and revved it up with equally powerful secular grooves. The man hasn't even reached 30 yet and has already been named "one of the greatest guitar players of all time" by Rolling Stone. (FD)

9 p.m.: RIJF Salutes Joe Romano Xerox Auditorium

See bio above.

9:15 p.m.: Po Boys Brass Band Jazz Street Stage

See bio above.

9:30 p.m.: Arve Henriksen Lutheran Church of the Reformation

See bio above.

10 p.m.: John Boutte Montage Music Hall

See bio above.

10 p.m.: Dwayne Dopsie & the Zydeco Hellraisers Big Tent

See bio above.

10 p.m.: Lori Andrews JazHarp Max of Eastman Place

See bio above.

10 p.m.: Pat Martino Kilbourn Hall

See bio above.

10:30 p.m.: Bob Sneider Trio State Street Bar & Grille

The RIJF line-up may change from year to year, but one thing remains constant. Every night, after the last notes are sounded at venues around the city, the Bob Sneider Trio hosts the jam session at the Rochester Plaza Hotel's State Street Bar and Grill. Starting at around 10:30 p.m. and heating up as the night progresses, the session has attracted some of the festival's finest musicians - Wynton Marsalis, George Benson, Jake Shimabukuro, to name a few - for after-hours jams. (RN)