Two musicians, members of one of the longest-running jazz groups in the world, unleashed their smooth tunes during a performance Tuesday night in one of the world's oldest jazz clubs. What do these historic record-holders have in common? Kansas City.

U.S. Congressman Emanuel Cleaver, a former Kansas City mayor, is proud of Kansas City's firsts, and wants to make sure the city maintains its status. So proud is the congressman that he recently sponsored a $143,000 earmark, or Congressionally-directed spending measure, as part of a hefty spending package for the Department of Health and Human Services. The federal grant will help pay for past-due repairs and upkeep to the Mutual Musicians Foundation, Inc., at 1823 Highland, said Danny Rotert, communications director for Cleaver. Rotert said the money will mainly be used to update still and video photography housed at the club, which is appropriately located in the heart of Kansas City's 18th and Vine Jazz District.

One room serves as a photo gallery/museum of famous jazz musicians, while other portraits are scattered throughout the club.

Such earmarked funds go to non-profits which, "without them would have a hard time making it," Rotert explained. Battered women's shelters and the YMCA are examples of other local non-profits that have received earmarked funds. Competition for the funds is stiff, Rotert said, with Congress reviewing hundreds of requests each year.

The foundation initially served as the headquarters for the segregated black musicians' union, Local 627, affiliated with the American Federation of Musicians. The local union moved into the building in 1930. Today, the brick building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the Kansas City Landmarks Commission Register.

Jazz musicians have played at the club continuously. In fact, the club years ago became a hang-out for musicians who had finished their late-night gigs and wanted to jam for their own enjoyment.

So-called Territorial bands that lit up the Midwestern jazz scene in the '20s and '30s and made their headquarters at 1823 Highland were the subject of a 1969 documentary entitled, "The Last of the Blue Devils." These legendary bands had their heyday in Kansas City during the reign of political boss Tom Pendergast.

Local 627 merged with its white counterpart, Local 627, in 1970. The dimly-lit upstairs piano bar has all the required equipment, including a state-of-the-art sound system, a grand piano and free-standing microphones, all posed on a small stage. Rows of padded chairs seat most visitors, while a small couch and love seat along the room's perimeter accommodate the rest.

A sign that reads "Kansas City Jazz--The Tradition Jams On" beckons visitors from the ground-floor entry up the narrow, steep staircase to the club's bar and main attraction, its small stage. Photos of two of the many jazz greats who've played the tiny club stare out from the back of the stage--great such as Charlie Parker and Jay McShann.

Red marquis lights flash around a nearly life-size image of jazz legend Big Joe Turner. The black-painted walls and dark curtains mix with the cool tunes resonating from the bass, vocals and piano on the stage. Luqman Hamza, a member of the world-renowned '30s and '40s group the Ink Spots, played piano and sang at the Foundation recently, while Lucky Wesley, of the renowned local group the Scamps, added his bass and vocals to the mix.

Hamza crooned, "I'll be around no matter how you treat me now...I"ll be around when he's gone..." while his fingers flit on the keyboard. Wesley strums his bass, his head and one foot tapping to the tune.

The two grew up in a neighborhood near the club, almost as if they were destined to follow the lead of some of the jazz greats who have graced the unpretentious stage. After all, jazz greats Count Basie, Mary Lou Williams and Lester Young once played the club and these two men, now in their golden years, feel lucky to have sat at the elbows of these jazz greats.

The two grew up idolizing the Ink Spots, then known as "the world's greatest quartet."

Hamza still remembers watching Charlie Parker play the Foundation. Although 'Bird Parker was one of the greatest of jazz greats, Parker gave the young Hamza advice that would later help propel the teen's jazz career.

He said jazz evokes a lot of feelings.

"Jazz takes in so many different sounds," Hamza said. "The lyrics are very powerful. The harmony, the lines, they do somethin' to you."

Wesley also remembers the greats.

"I've met so many people who were just so inspirational," he said, adding, with a chuckle, that he had a regular gig playing at Hugh Hefner's mansion, rubbing elbows with the Playboy bunnies.

These two elder statesmen of Kansas City jazz were playing for about 30 members of a traveling Elderhostel Tuesday night. The retired people who made up the group were from throughout the country, and meeting in Kansas City to take in its sights and sounds as part of a non-credit university course designed to mix education with fun.

Betty Goen of Albuquerque, New Mexico, said the performance lived up to Kansas City's unequalled jazz reputation.

"This is one of the best jazz performances I've ever seen," she said. "They played the kind of music I remember. They don't write songs like that anymore."

Nancy Stone, of Minnesota, said hearing the old tunes brought a renewed appreciation of the music.

"I remember listening to this as a kid and I didn't know what I was listening to," she said.

Eloise Carter, 80, and Dorothy Diehl, 94, both live in Kansas City and heard these two were playing at the Fooundation. "We're regular jazz fans," Carter explained. "We don't like the modern stuff."

Carter said she remembers dancing to Big Band era music and she continued to dance until about ten years ago when her body would no longer tolerate the exertion. Diehl explained that she came to love jazz later in life, after her husband's death, when she visited clubs with a date.

She explained, "I met the cutest fella and he used to take me to all these places."

At all-night Friday and Saturday jam sessions at the Foundation, however, both musicians and fans are considerably younger and a little hipper than these visitors who lived during the Jazz Age. The Missouri Legislature passed special legislation a couple of years ago allowing all night bar service at the Foundation, and the place swings on weekends until dawn