In what is either an amazing coincidence or some kind of vast right- and/or left-wing conspiracy, yet another one of my favorite places to eat, drink, and/or shop in Chicago has closed its doors — possibly for good... the venerable Jazz Showcase.

[For those of you keeping score at home, the other ones are The Berghoff, Trader Vic's, Carson Pirie Scott, Marshall Field's, and Tower Records...]

Sure, their cover charges were sky-high, the owner/doorman/master of ceremonies, Joe Segal, was usually more cranky than he was charming, the acts booked there tended toward the overly mainstream/Charlie Parker-obsessed (with a strange aversion to vocalists), and you could only really see the stage from about half of the seats in the place (there was also the time we endured the Maggiano's "Dinner Package" fiasco, but let's not go there right now...).

Still, the Jazz Showcase was a true rarity: a smoke-free venue with no minimum drink requirement and the only place in town where you could see some of the really big names — often the "living legends" of jazz — appearing in an intimate club setting. Plus, they usually let you stay for both sets without paying another cover charge if you wanted to, and there were even "save the children" matinees on Sunday afternoons.

Now, after almost 60 years in Chicago, the Jazz Showcase has lost its lease. They may reopen in a new location sometime in the future, but it seems far from certain at this point.

In the meantime, I can at least be thankful for the great shows SSS and I have seen there over the past few years...

A spunky and sassy Ernestine Anderson digging in deep and holding the audience in the palm of her hand...

Pharoah Sanders — twice! He and his quartet mostly played marathon sets of epic Trane tribute jams, including what must have been a nearly hour-long "My Favorite Things." An enigmatic poet/disciple/hanger-on named "G-Mon" or something was along for the ride the second time around, adding a welcome element of Pharoah-ian mystic strangeness. I even amused and alarmed SSS that night by getting so caught up in the second set that I actually joined in the frenzied chants of "Got To Have Freedom!"

Got to have live jazz too, and the Jazz Showcase was — and hopefully will continue to be — the place to see all the "heavies." Come back soon, Joe... Chicago needs you, I need you, the ghost of Charlie Parker needs you, and — whether they realize it or not — "the children" need you too...!