He's Already Played The Gem: Erik's Kansas City Senior Session at Sister Anne's Records and 18th & Vine: written by Kansas City senior photographer
If you're a kid in KC you probably learned about 18th & Vine on a field trip, clipboard in hand, trying to remember whether Charlie Parker played sax or trumpet. (Sax. Alto. There will be a test.)
Erik met it from the stage.
He's a senior at Oak Grove High School, Class of 2027. He plays trombone, he collects records, and before he's even finished high school he has already played gigs in Kansas City's historic Jazz District, The Gem Theater included. A kid from Oak Grove has stood on the same few blocks where Parker came up, horn in hand, in front of a paying audience.
At his age I was mostly proud of a decent parallel park.
When we planned his session he asked for two things. He wanted to feel "really cool," and he wanted what's going on inside to show up on the outside. That's the best senior photo brief anyone has ever handed me. Kendal and I took it and ran: a record shop, a 1912 theater front, the jazz club across the street, and a kid in a pinstripe suit and maroon Chucks with a very strong David Tennant streak running through him.
Sister Anne's Records & Coffee. Buy the coffee.
Sister Anne's sits at 901 E. 31st Street, two blocks west of Troost, far enough from the Crossroads and Westport that you have to mean it to end up there. Frank Alvarez and Jim Oshel opened it in 2018 and named it for Anne Winter, who ran Recycled Sounds at Westport Road and Main from 1988 to 2006 and hosted the Orphan Annie show on KKFI. Anne passed away in 2009 but the shop carries her name and the spirit she brought to this city's music scene.
It's incomparable, and I'm not taking questions on that. (Okay, one question: yes, the coffee is good. Get the iced brew.)
A working shop is somebody else's business, so here's how we do it. We buy a coffee. We stay out of the way of paying customers. We ask for permission before hand, not beg for forgiveness later. Erik brought his own records from home, which is the correct move and also an excellent excuse to show off a collection.... and then his dad bought a few items to add to the crates... plural. There was some shopping done for sure.
Look one was the Erik who hangs out in a record shop on a Monday: an Iron Maiden tee with Eddie on the front, a black striped camp shirt thrown open over it, jeans, a Casio on the wrist. We sat him at a table under a shelf of records with his Union Jack record case cracked open and MF DOOM's MM..FOOD propped up next to an iced coffee. He leaned over the bins with one finger on the C divider, right above Cosmo's Factory, grinning like he'd just found something good. He stood by the Gimme Shelter poster on that peeling plaster wall looking like a guy waiting on a band that's running late.
Outside, under the gold Sister Anne's logo on the front window, he sat back in a patio chair with the trombone propped beside him and laughed at something Kendal said. Then we went to black and white: the bell of the horn pointed straight down the lens in front of the COFFEE sign, and Erik against a tagged wall while traffic blurred past behind him. Same tee, very different kid.
The Gem Theater. He's played it. We just showed up with cameras.
The Gem opened in 1912 as the Star Theater, a silent movie house for Kansas City's Black community, and took the Gem name in 1913. It showed movies until 1960 and had fallen apart by the 1980s, when the city's push to bring 18th & Vine back made its restoration a centerpiece. Today, behind the original 1912 facade, it's a 500-seat performing arts center for live music and community events. The whole district is on the National Register of Historic Places, and it's where Charlie Parker and a long list of players lived, worked and got their start in the 1930s and '40s.
For look two, the suit came out. Black pinstripes, a red paisley tie, a white collar he kept tugging at, and maroon Converse, because the Tenth Doctor ran around in Chucks and so does Erik.
He sat on an amp under the marquee with a milk crate of vinyl at his feet: Earth, Wind & Fire, Humble Pie, the Mills Brothers leaning up front. He slid down onto the sidewalk against the glass block ticket booth, one hand in his hair, giving the camera a look that says he has heard your opinion and filed it. He leaned on a light pole and stared up at that big red GEM sign like it owed him a callback.
He earned one, afterall.
The Blue Room, and one block's worth of running
Across the street is the American Jazz Museum and its working jazz club, the Blue Room, named for the famous 1930s Blue Room at the Street Hotel over at 18th and The Paseo. The museum treats it as an exhibit that happens to have a band in it, which is exactly right.
Young players, pay attention: the museum lists a Monday night jam session at 7 PM, $10 at the door and free for students, musicians and members, with a featured set to kick it off. The schedule shifts month to month, so check before you go. Then go.
We caught Erik under the Blue Room sign as the sun dropped between the buildings, fixing his tie with the light flaring off the glass behind him. We parked him dead center on the block for the hero frame, trombone at his side, the sky handing us its best stuff. Then we let him run. The saxophone mural on the brick off 18th Street turned into a backdrop for motion blur, Erik striding past it like something urgent was happening two streets over. That line came straight out of his session brief, and he delivered.
The last frame of the night was a pair of red and blue 3D glasses under a stamped tin ceiling. If you know your Doctor Who, you know. If you don't, ask the nearest nerd.
Senior photos for musicians: bring the horn
A few things we'd tell any senior who plays something:
Bring the instrument even if you don't plan to play it. Holding it changes how you stand.
If it comes apart, put it together once when you get to the location and keep it out. Packing and unpacking a trombone between every spot eats twenty minutes you'll want back at golden hour.
Pick places you have a real story with. Erik has played The Gem.
Bring your own props. Your records, your sticks, your beat-up case covered in stickers. A working shop's stock stays on its shelves.
Two looks is plenty. One for how you live, one for how you show up to a gig.
Late afternoon on 18th Street gives you long light between the buildings. We started at Sister Anne's around 3:45 and were on the block by 5:00. In October, that was perfect.
Senior photos that REALLY RESEMBLE the kid
Two stops, two looks, one kid who knew exactly who he was before we ever lifted a camera. That's the job. Your senior photos should look like the version of you the people who love you would recognize from across a room, whether that's a horn player in pinstripes, a derby kid on skates, or someone with forty records in a crate and strong opinions about every one of them.
Senior sessions for the Class of 2027 are booking now across Kansas City, Lee's Summit, Leawood, Gladstone, Belton, Harrisonville, Prairie Village and beyond.
Kansas City Senior Photos: FAQ
Where is Sister Anne's Records & Coffee? At 901 E. 31st Street in Kansas City, Missouri, about two blocks west of Troost. It's a record shop and coffee bar named for Anne Winter of the old Recycled Sounds.
Can you take senior photos at 18th & Vine? Yes. The sidewalks and storefronts of the 18th & Vine Jazz District are public, and they're some of the best backdrops in the city. The Gem, the American Jazz Museum and the Blue Room are working venues, so we shoot from the sidewalk and ask before we go inside or block a door.
What is The Gem Theater in Kansas City? A 1912 theater at 1615 E. 18th Street, first called the Star, renamed the Gem in 1913, and restored in the 1980s as a 500-seat performing arts center behind its original facade.
Is there a jazz jam session for students in Kansas City? The American Jazz Museum lists a Monday night jam session in the Blue Room at 7 PM, free for students and musicians. Check the museum's calendar first, since the schedule changes month to month.
Can I bring my instrument to my senior session? Please do. Trombones, guitars, drumsticks, skates, the dog. We plan the locations around the things you love.
Do you photograph seniors from Oak Grove? Yes. Stag & Bird is a Kansas City photography collective based in the West Bottoms and we photograph seniors from all over the metro, Oak Grove included.
How much do senior photos cost at Stag & Bird? Cap and gown micro minis start under $300. Most families choose the full digital gallery, around $1,100. Our flagship Curated Senior Portrait Experience runs around $3,000.
We are the Weirdos, Mister.
-Court
Thank you Court. We loved all the pictures and the experience. A+. You'll hear from us again, guaranteed.
If you've ever wondered if the children of musicians who played death metal for years can grow up normal, these pictures prove that 100%. And proof he's way cooler than I ever was.
And yes, I went back and bought even more records a few weeks later.
Pete, Erik's Dad