The spring rains and cool weather yielded the most abundant flowers I’ve ever seen in Edgewood Park, near Redwood City. I hiked the Serpentine Loop. Serpentine is a California rock formation that has the beneficial property of killing non-native grasses, and thereby allowing the local wildflowers to thrive. It’s a greenish rock. In my first photo, of the poppies on the rock, note the lizard. Redwood City was so-named because it was a port from which redwoods were shipped....

Ethan Iverson, formerly of the Bad Plus, played a great set in the intimate Joe Henderson room at SF Jazz. The trio with Reuben Rogers and Gerald Cleaver had excellent chemistry and impeccable swing. Rogers was particularly impressive on bass with expressive, dynamic solos. I enjoyed learning from his perfect walking bass, especially as we were in the 3rd row. They played a mix of standards and compositions by Iverson, closing with a cover of Roberta Flack’s Killing Me Softly....

Ravi Coltrane played two long sets at the opening of his residency at SF Jazz, each filled with extended, soaring solos. The first set featured the “electric band” which was electric by virtue of using a synthesizer to enable the keyboard player to cover the bass line. The second set involved his long-standing Coltraxx quartet, with piano, drums, and bass. The two drummers were the highlight of the date; both were very intense....

We went out looking for life in Death Valley. We found long vistas of wide valleys and dry mountains;lakebeds that haven’t seen water in ages; and, ghost towns with tales to tell. We crossed the Tehachapi Pass and found some Golden State dreamscapes. Here’s our trip: Mojave Desert We first struck gold in the Mojave Desert, when we came across huge superblooms of “Desert Gold” flowers covering the sandy basin. The air was clear and the views were vast....

Marcus Miller played a haunting version of Gorée on bass clarinet, after introducing this composition as inspired by his visit to the island in Africa that was a slave trading center. His tune for his mother-in-law, Bunny’s Dream, was also especially beautiful. His tribute to Jaco Pastorius, “Mr Pastorius,” was another highlight, featuring Russell Gunn on trumpet who played with a Miles Davis-inspired muted tone. The show had no shortage of jaw-dropping bass solos, but especially featured Marcus’s talents as a composer....