Tenor saxophonist and clarinetist Anat Cohen is coming to San Diego on July 1, at the Athenaeum Music and Arts Library, 1008 Wall St. La Jolla. Unless you've already got your tickets, be advised that the performance is sold out.

Since arriving in NYC in 1999 from the Berklee College of Music in Boston, by way of her native Israel, Cohen's international profile has been steadily rising. On tenor, she favors an early Coltrane / Dexter Gordon aesthetic, and on clarinet, which has become more of a focus, she's got a rich, chocolaty tone and an intensely intricate rhythmic drive.

Cohen has mastered several forms of Brazilian music, as well as being conversant in most styles of modern jazz. After her debut CD, "Place and Time", scored high in 2005 Critic's Polls, Cohen followed up with "Noir" and " Poetica."

In the midst of a long tour that found her in LA last week for the Playboy Jazz Festival, and on her way to gigs in Montreal and NYC (at Birdland, no less), Cohen's San Diego show with her working band of Robert Rodriguez on piano, Joe Martin and Daniel Freedman on bass and drums, figures to be a summer concert highlight.

photo courtesy of Anat Cohen