Summer is almost officially here, and the Ottawa International Jazz Festival is less than two weeks away (June 25 - July 5). There aren't many better ways to spend a warm summer evening than sitting outside and listening to some live jazz.

This week's Youtube picks feature a couple of the greats: Miles Davis's soundtrack to the 1958 Louis Malle film "Ascenseur pour l'echaffaud" (Elevator to the Gallows); and the legendary drummer Art Blakey and his group, The Jazz Messengers, featuring Lee Morgan on trumpet, Wayne Shorter on tenor sax, Bobby Timmons on piano, and Jymie Merritt on bass, playing Timmons's "Dat Dere".

Shorter will be performing at the Ottawa Festival on Thursday, July 2nd; and Jimmy Cobb -- Davis's drummer from the Kind of Blue album, made a year after Ascenseur -- is celebrating the 50th anniversary of the album's release by touring with his So What Band, in town on June 26th.