Friday, October 9, 2026

FRIDAY ARTNIGHT: Vagabond Muse to Play Four Improvised Sets at Pasadena Museum of History for ArtNight

By THERESE EDU

Vagabond Muse, an improvising quartet from Los Angeles, will play four sets at the Pasadena Museum of History from 6 to 10 p.m. Friday, Oct. 9, during ArtNight Pasadena.

The performance is paid for by a city-funded MiniGrant, one of the $500 grants the city offers smaller organizations, ensembles and individual artists who live, work or lease property in Pasadena to perform at larger ArtNight venues. It is the band’s first ArtNight.

The city lists the set as improvisational jazz. Trumpeter Sarah Kramer said the band sees it differently. “I call it instrumental improvisation. I don’t call it jazz,” Kramer said. She said she also thinks of it as “collective composing,” with the four players creating pieces in the moment.

Kramer, who also plays flugelhorn and percussion, is joined by Chuck Manning on saxophone, Jorge Calderón on electric bass and John Ferraro on drums. According to the band’s biography, its members have worked with musicians including Leonard Cohen, Warren Zevon, Ry Cooder, Jackson Browne and Burt Bacharach.

The quartet will play in a room off the museum’s garden, Kramer said, doing “four sets, so four hours with short breaks in between.” The museum’s two exhibitions, “Where History Meets the Road: Celebrating Route 66 & Colorado Boulevard” and “Pasadena Palette: Selections from the Museum’s Collection,” are open during the evening. “There’s no art in the room with us, but we will be influenced by being there and anything that’s going on there,” Kramer said.

Kramer has played ArtNight before, with her own ensemble perhaps 15 or more years ago and with Royal Flux, her trio with Calderón, which was listed as a city MiniGrant recipient for fall 2023.

Musicians apply for the grants, and the host venue writes a letter confirming it wants the artist, Kramer said. “But rather than the venue paying us, the grant is paying us,” she said.

Kramer said listeners who want to follow the players’ other projects can ask them in person: “anybody who’s there can certainly come up and talk to us.”

Need to know: ArtNight Pasadena at the Pasadena Museum of History, Friday, Oct. 9, 6 to 10 p.m. Free. 470 W. Walnut St., Pasadena. Complimentary parking in the museum lot off Walnut Street near Orange Grove Boulevard. The museum is on the North and Central free shuttle routes, and accessible buses are available. The Salt N Pepper food truck will be on site. Information: ArtNight hotline, (626) 744-7887, or cityofpasadena.net/artnight.