The Out to Lunch Quintet @copy; Andera Canter

Eric Dolphy was a masterful composer, arranger and performer on multiple reeds. A favorite of Mingus and Coltrane, he was perhaps best known as the composer of avant-garde compositions using odd time signatures further pushed outside by his dissonant and unpredictable blowing style. Yet, Dolphy is not a popular icon of modern jazz, perhaps because musicians find his compositions difficult to play and because audiences find the music challenging to hear. But always up for a challenge, vibraphonist and St. Olaf instructor Dave Hagedorn brought a Dolphy chart to a performance at the Artists Quarter in early 2005. In the audience, Berryman was intrigued by sound of “Hat and Beard” (a favorite since his college days) and suggested that the entire Out to Lunch set would make an exciting performance, leading to a concert at St. Olaf (“Still Out to Lunch”) sponsored by the Twin Cities Jazz Society the following winter.