Thanks to the new Steven Spielberg production, West Side Story is back in the popular discourse.
They were kids when they saw it in the early 1970s, Nash on TV with his family in Los Angeles and, 3,000 miles east, Sanabria on the big screen at his hometown cineplex in the Bronx.
Around 2015, Ted Nash — along with bassist Ben Allison and guitarist Steve Cardenas — formed a drummer-less trio rooted in the sparse but rich sound akin to groups like the Jimmy Giuffre / Jim Hall Trio.
The group packs a punch on the Latin sections of the music, of course, while the drummer and bandleader also puts his stamp on the jazz portions, giving pieces like “Jet Song” a bit of rock-and-roll flare.
And more than 70 years since the musical debuted on Broadway, jazz musicians like Nash and Sanabria remain fascinated with West Side Story.