By John Eyles
Louis Moholo: The Sound of Freedom.
March 10th 2002 saw a moving and memorable event at The Vortex jazz club, when a gathering of friends and associates came together to celebrate the 62nd birthday of Louis Moholo, one of London's most distinguished and best-loved adopted sons. In a night of fine music and celebration, Moholo played drums with two groups, a quartet with Evan Parker, Steve Beresford and John Edwards, and a larger group with Edwards, Parker, Beresford, Jason Yarde, Mark Sanders and Francine Luce on vocals.
Moholo is an important part of one of the greatest - but lesser known - jazz stories. He was the drummer in The Blue Notes, and it is no exaggeration to say that their story is as extraordinary as any in jazz. The group came together in 1963, and consisted of Moholo, Johnny Dyani, Chris McGregor, Dudu Pukwana, Mongezi Feza and Nick Moyake. McGregor was white, the others black. In the wake of the Sharpeville massacre and the State of Emergency, South Africa was not a hospitable place for any multi-racial group. In 1964, they left for France, never to return to South Africa. Eventually they settled in London, where they formed a powerful alliance with the blossoming free improvisation scene, including such players as John Stevens, Evan Parker and Mike Osborne. In 1969, this alliance lead to the formation of the big-band Brotherhood of Breath, whose music was a potent amalgam of free blowing and township jazz. Moholo took to free improvisation like a duck to water, becoming one of the most distinctive and influential drummers of his generation.
Sadly, for over a decade Moholo has been the only surviving member of the original Blue Notes. Nick Moyake died in 1969, Mongezi Feza in 1975, Johnny Dyani in 1986, Chris McGregor and Dudu Pukwana in 1990. However, their collective recorded legacy is nearly a hundred albums and, individually and collectively, they changed jazz immeasurably for the better. Moholo himself has played on countless great recordings. Apart from those by The Blue Notes and Brotherhood of Breath (which no household should be without), he can be best appreciated with his groups Spirits Rejoice and Viva La Black, on Outback by Mike Osborne, In the Townships by Dudu Pukwana, Remembrance with Cecil Taylor, among many others.
I spoke to Moholo at his North London home on March 20th 2002.
AAJ: Can we go way back? You started in the 50s with The Chordettes.
LM: When I was about seven years of age, there was a cat called Molelekoa who had a youth band, and I was the drummer in that. Somehow I didn't behave like a seven-year old in the band; my music was too advanced. First of all I was a cub, then I graduated to boy scouts, where I was near to the kettledrum and I was fired from there because I overplayed; I could hear some other things that other drummers couldn't hear and the whole orchestra couldn't hear. I didn't realise it then, but I was a rebel in the making, even then. Little did I know that at 62 years of age, I would still be that rebel. I thank god for that. I broke a lot of barriers that were restricted, in my musical youth, and that is what brings me to be what I am today - breaking those boundaries.
Somebody else heard me and requested of my father that I join a small band. But the guy got greedy and thought he should keep the money for himself, so the band broke away. When I was seventeen, I revisited the music.
AAJ: What form did that revisiting take?
LM: I felt like the music came back to me and I took the opportunity. I followed the urge. I had an ear for music because I was listening to guys like Charlie Parker, Mingus and Big Sid Catlett - who was the best drummer in the world ever. There was an opportunity to join this band called The Chordettes, and from there on, I became what I am today.
AAJ: Were you only listening to American jazz like Parker, Mingus?
LM: Yes. There was a British contingent in Simonstown that supplied the forces with the music of the west. I heard all this on the radio; my father had a radio. In those days, we were under heavy manners. The Boers who were our oppressors were hopeless musically.
AAJ: Was there also any South African jazz?
LM: It was there, but the SA whites owned everything, including the radio. (They still do actually. Although we are "liberated" they are still in key positions. They are still in power so to speak.) They did not appreciate SA jazz, so it was hardly on the radio. It was only in the townships that this music was surviving. When the whites wanted it, they wanted it on their own terms. For instance, at Gallo studio, they had their own man who played drums - like Motown used to do. This guy, I don't know if he could play the bass drum or not, but you don't hear any bass drum in the music of that era, just snare drum, cymbals and high hat. This is why when I played bass drum in our music, it wasn't heard of, and they found it very strange to hear the bass drum happening. It is a shame, but it is a legacy of apartheid. The SA whites have fucked us up a lot, more than we think. We continue to discover how much damage there is.
The bass drum is the key. That influenced me in picking up the instrument, because when I was a young boy, scout bands would pass by and that guy playing the bass drum - boom, boom, boom - used to excite me.
AAJ: When did you first record?
LM: We recorded with The Chordettes in '58 but were never paid. As usual, tapes are missing, musicians unknown, that kind of thing, when it comes out. Some German guy disappeared with the money, never heard of again. It was an LP that is long deleted now. That record was a hit, though. The band itself was a hit band. But no money.
Several times in the interview, Moholo is keen to counter the view that Chris McGregor formed and lead The Blue Notes. Currently, the only book about the band is by Maxine McGregor, Chris McGregor's widow, and unsurprisingly it puts him at the centre of the story. Moholo is writing a book that will give his version of The Blue Notes story, the black version.
AAJ: After that, it seems that the next significant development was meeting Chris McGregor..
LM: Chris seems to be playing a very important part in our music. But we did meet some other people before we met Chris McGregor. When we met Chris McGregor, he met us as well. I always find it so difficult that [view that] King Chris McGregor came along and rescued us like Captain Marvel. He did not really. We did him a favour. There were no white musicians that could do it like we did. I am not the only drummer that played with him. Some other black drummers played with him. But those black drummers were better than the white drummers, I'm sorry to say. So we did him a favour. We joined forces together, rather than him coming and looking for a drummer. I demonstrated my drums to him. I was on the case. When we met up - me, Dudu, Mongezi, Johnny Dyani, Nick Moyake, Chris - we were on the case already. And we were kind of like rebels in a way as well. So like birds of a feather flock together. We were rebels and we were trying to run away from this apartheid thing. We rebelled against the apartheid regime that whites and blacks couldn't play together. We stood up. There is a lot involved in what we did, how we met Chris and for what reason. And I will put them in my book.
There was a festival that was happening in Cape Town and Chris McGregor came to look for me, he had heard of me. I went to the festival, playing with Ronnie Beer and some other cats, Tete Mbambisa, Danayi Dlova, Sammy Maritz, Bob Tizzard on trombone. And he heard me from then. There was a competition and I won the prize then, in conjunction with another cat called Early Mabuza who was a great SA drummer, and we shared first prize. From there The Blue Notes happened. It was like all-stars in the beginning.
And because Chris was white, things would go smoothly for him. He could talk the language of the white guys, he could enter into offices that I wouldn't be allowed in. We used to play concerts in places where my mother wouldn't be allowed in.
I wonder if the band would have lasted if it had remained in SA. The chances are that it wouldn't have survived because of apartheid and the state of emergency whereby any black people more than three would be arrested straight away. A lot of trios, quartets and quintets disbanded because of this. And I was a bit political. It was a macho thing to do to join the movement, to be a man if you did and a sissy if you didn't. The mood of the country was like this, and so I was in the task force. So I had a bad reputation with the Boers. At some point I was raising funds for the ANC and the Boers came to stop the show. Automatically they would have arrested us. So if we had stayed in SA, I think we would have been fucked up. The Boers would have succeeded in breaking us up. Fortunately, we had an appointment at the Juan-Les-Pins jazz festival that saved our beef. We never went back. For a good ten years we didn't go back. First, Dudu and Chris went for a short spell. I followed. Mongezi never did and poor Johnny never did as well. I wonder if we would have lasted because the Boers would have caught up with us. Lucky that we split when we did.
AAJ: Quite a lot of people who stayed in SA gave up music.
LM: Yes. Your wife would tell you to go and work nine-to-five because it was difficult - no gigs, unable to work, state of emergency, no clubs.
Throughout this interview, and in his speech in general, Moholo uses the word "freedom" to refer to musical freedom and to personal freedom. For him, the two seem inextricably linked. He first encountered free playing shortly after experiencing freedom from oppression, on leaving South Africa.
AAJ: From Juan-Les-Pins you went to Switzerland.
LM: Yes, we had a gig at the Africana club. We met great musicians like Irene Schweizer and John Tchicai. Dollar Brand was also there, working with Makaya Ntoshko and Johnny Gertze. The musical development started. That brought home the fact that I am a rebel. I met some other rebels, musical rebels like Irene Schweizer, Pierre Favre. It made sense to me. Freedom made sense to me. I was looking for it all the time anyway.
AAJ: As soon as you discovered it?
LM: Straight away, yes. I thought why was I chained until then. It was in me before then but I didn't recognise it until I came overseas. I could feel the freedom straight away.
AAJ: Was that what you'd been hearing ever since the scout band? Had it been there all the time?
LM: Yes.
AAJ: You've worked with those people subsequently.
LM: From time to time, yes. I worked a lot with Irene Schweizer. We made a hit record, a duo, which we developed into many other things. That opened up doors for me that I could work with Keith Tippett as a duo and with Cecil Taylor as a duo.
AAJ: From there, you came on to London.
LM: Yes, London then was cream cheese musically. Thank God that we came to London at that time because London was the place, Mecca for music in the '60s. To meet people like Joe Harriott, Tubby Hayes.
There was a development happening here with people like Evan Parker, Derek Bailey, John Stevens, Trevor Watts. We gigged together, so there were people to play with, people to make sense with. And it was allowed for us to do thatÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ
AAJ: ...in contrast to what you had experienced in SA.
LM: It was fantastic, exciting to break away from the chains. Like the old conventional way of playing the drum. All of a sudden it was taken into consideration because before that the drum was the last instrument in the totem pole, the drummer just kept the rhythm. When I started to play this free music, it was allowed for the drummer to be in front. And so we also got a lot of encouragement from people like Max Roach and Art Blakey who were leaders of their own bands. Not to say that they influenced me to do that - I wanted to do it anyway. But then I was playing conventional drums as well.
Then I met Steve Lacy and broke away from The Blue Notes. We went to Argentina [on a tour with Johnny Dyani and Enrico Rava]. In Argentina, some freak jumped on the bandstand and smashed my drums with a hammer, so everything was smashed. So all of a sudden I didn't have any drums. So I kept on collecting this, that and the other. I didn't have any money. I was in Argentina. I collected things like pots and pans - make do with this, make do with that. This became a fashion; little did I know but I'd started something. To me, it wasn't from choice that I played these things, unlike some other cats who played these things. Milford Graves chose to do that; I did not, it just happened to be like that through poverty, through frustration. Through a love of music, I had to hit something. Round about then, I heard that some cat in the States was doing the same thing - that was Milford Graves. It made sense as well, because it got away from the snare drum that was conventional, away from the cymbals; instead of the cymbals there was a pot that had a sound.
Then I came with this instrument from Argentina when I finished with Steve Lacy. The first gig I did was to play at Ronnie Scott's old club with this drum. And who comes to this gig we were doing with Chris McGregor, but Dave Holland. He was playing with Tony Oxley at Ronnie's new place. By then, I'd had two years playing this kit and I was mastering it; I was flying on it. So Dave got so knocked out that he went and told Tony that he should listen to me. Tony came and all of a sudden decided to copy that. And then I heard that John Stevens was doing the same thing. John was maybe experimenting but also doing the other stuff. In most clubs, they were not kind to this type of playing with pots and pans. For instance, I played in a club in Zurich where the guy had a Slingerland drum kit and he refused to remove it for the pots and pans. It was a nice club, suave. It was the era of people looking nice and wearing ties, the whole Miles Davis look. So here I come with pots and pans, and they said "Oh no". So I suffered a bit. But it was not from choice. Lots of drummers I know had another kit; if they were playing with Sonny Rollins at Ronnie Scott's, then out would come the other kit. Me, John Stevens, Sunny Murray and all those cats would not have a chance. We would not even be fired by the bandleader; we would be fired by the owner of the club. After Tony heard what I was playing, then he got his pots and pans as well. Although he was still working at Ronnie Scott's, when he would have his Slingerland out. At other Bohemian gigs and underground music he would use his other kit. I'm not saying he is a copycat; he is a good drummer. I must explain this. I love him too, man. But the truth is the truth.
AAJ: Around that time Brotherhood of Breath began.
LM:When Johnny Dyani and I went to Argentina with Steve Lacy, Chris made do with the cats that were around, and at the back of his mind he wanted to make a superband but the penny hadn't dropped. It dropped when we came back. So what happened is that we were also involved in the building of this big band. I don't say it was our band. It was Chris's band, but we jogged his mind. We helped in building this thing. If we weren't geared up for it, maybe it would never have happened. We did a lot to support it. We lived together, we ate together, we discussed things together, and if I heard of an alto player that was good, I would tell him, and then that person would be in. We helped each other in that kind of way. If the rhythm of a tune was not fitting, if I heard another rhythm, it would be OK.
We worked together. He would just say "Free, man" or "Six-eight, man". But there are so many flavours of six-eight that he would leave it up to me. I would hear the pulse - as Dudu would too - and just do my thing in the context of the music. The Blue Note guys who were in the band did this kind of thing, which influenced everybody that it was OK. But we didn't say anything; Chris took all the credit and all that. It's like Thabo Mbeki saying about the Mandela magic; people do forget that there was a committee where these things had been discussed and then the buck stops with Mandela. So it became "Mandela this, Mandela that" but it came from a meeting where those things were discussed. That is the best kind of explanation I can give of this area.
AAJ: It sounds as if the credit that Chris McGregor got is a sore point with you. I had always thought of Brotherhood of Breath as a collective band, even though it was under his name.
LM: No, it was his band. As for gigs, if I went to the continent to work, sometimes a promoter would ask how he could get the band, and I'd tell Chris to phone the cat. That kind of thing. I'm just trying to say that we worked together.
When we left SA, it was under heavy manners. We went to Zurich and some white cats would come up to us and tell us that they liked us. And then we'd find out that they were from Special Branch. They would befriend us because we didn't have much money. If someone gave us something we'd appreciate it. And because we are nice people anyway, that was maybe how we first of all lost our country, being nice, allowing these people to come to our country. So the same thing happened; some cat would be nice to us and the next thing he'd be saying "Fuck SA" and we'd join in because of how he'd been talking. And then the next thing you would hear was that your mother had been visited in SA. So we shied away. But it was not particularly hurting Chris so much because he was white. It did hurt us because we had news that our families were being visited. So we didn't trust anybody. We didn't say anything. These people would talk to Chris, and because they were the same nation, or whatever. Chris was a nice cat anyway, but we were under heavy manners; something was happening to us that wasn't happening to him. Even in SA we were fed up of it. If you see a white, you see an enemy. This is how they showed themselves to us. As people who hurt other people. Chris would talk to these people and they would automatically have a rapport with him. I would run away from them; I did not want to see them. Chris would be entertaining them, verbally.
Oh, he was the leader, automatically. If there are four black guys and a white cat, it is assumed he is the boss. Under apartheid, black and white were not to be seen together, but it was OK if a white was driving a car and in the back there were some black guys. It would say that the white was hiring these people, that they were his boys, that he was taking them to his farm. This is the game that used to be played. It is like when Charlie Parker had Red Rodney play with him and in hotels, where no blacks could be, he would carry Red Rodney's trumpet as if he was the boy although he was actually the boss. It was that kind of situation. But maybe I'll put it nicer in my book!
AAJ: When did you first go back to SA?
LM: In 1972. Not to play. For a holiday. My mother was freaking out. She wanted to see me badly; my father had died. There were things that I'd left because we had semi run away. We left in a hurry, so things were not finished. So there were custom things - my people's things -that I had to do.
I was in touch with SA, having been here in England. I grew up with Thabo Mbeki, Essop Pahad, Pallo Jordan. We are a little SA here too. It is just that geographically it was different. Otherwise, they talk the same language in SA, if not better! Because I grew up in SA that was westernised, the eastern bloc seemed different. It was a shock coming here, rather than a shock going back there. I knew that it was dire straits back there. I knew it because I grew up in it. It just came back to me, the same old shit was happening. It made me stronger actually to say "Yes. That's why I left SA. I left for these reasons." I couldn't play music there. I could get away with it now. Just about, actually. I want to go back to SA, not to retire, but I'd be lying if I think I am going to get gigs there.
Somebody told me that jazz is dead in SA, a musician. I won't mention his name because he's not as revolutionary as I am. (I don't give a damn. That is why I left SA. ) That is why I am playing this music. I know I would have made a lot of money playing pop music. A lot of pop bands wanted me to join them; John Lennon and Frank Zappa had an interest; I turned them down. I just wanted to play with Dudu and Mongs and Johnny Dyani. I thank God that I turned them down. I would have been a millionaire, though. But maybe dead.
AAJ: It wasn't until 1993 that you eventually played music back in SA.
LM: With my band Viva La Black. The political situation was in upheaval, so I went back into the lion's den and stood up there, like I used to do when I was canvassing for the ANC. I went there knowing that if I said anything about anything that they would fuck me up. I did go there and I did name my band Viva La Black. That was challenge enough. They didn't do anything to me because the music was tough. The music was saying more things than that were saying. This music saw to it that the Berlin Wall fell. We liberated our country partly through this music. Everybody gave a hand - Coltrane, Cecil Taylor, Keith Tippett, Elton Dean, John Stevens, Johnny Dyani, Mongs. We broke the barriers; down fell the Berlin Wall.
AAJ: You see the two as very interlinked, political freedom and musical freedom.
LM: Music is the healing force of the universe. The political disease that was there needed music to heal it up. I'm speaking from a musical point of view, and for my brothers.
AAJ: How was Viva La Black received when you toured?
LM: I asked the main guys in SA what they were playing, who they were playing with, and they'd say they were playing rock. What? They'd say jazz is not happening there. You'd play it, but you wouldn't survive. So forget about it, you wouldn't survive.
AAJ: You go back to SA a couple of months each year.
LM: For my holidays. I just want to feel that I belong, that I'm not a minority. Here, I am a minority, although I am in the majority music-wise. Over there, I'm not well known, but I am comfortable, much more than I am here. Comfortable in other ways, not musically. I'm comfortable here musically. I have a lot of fans here. In SA, they don't really understand my music, because of the legacy [of the Boers]. It was taken away from them.
AAJ: Musically, you need to be here, but you feel comfortable there. A difficult position.
LM: Yes. It is like this. I would not have many gigs in SA. I just want to be there, get a piece of the action. But I would never retire. I would never divorce Europe or the west. I have an English passport; I will never give it away. I will always be in Europe.
I don't want to be so hard. I don't hate SA. I love it. I have big hopes for SA. We didn't leave SA for gangsters to be running around killing us. We fought the war with the Boers. Now it seems we have to fight a war with the gangsters. Gangsters of all kinds - people who take other people's land - that is why I say we have to fight in SA.
In SA some people are allowed to play gigs while others are not allowed to play. There are a lot of festivals in SA but the Americans are taking over everywhere. The fight is not over in SA. We have to fight to be recognised as maybe sometimes better than the Americans. I fancy myself actually as a drummer. No American can tell me anything. (laughs) It is disappointing to hear that the South Africans do not accept it. In England and Europe they accept that I am one of the best drummers, but not in SA, no.
I love SA; I've got my people there but I'm telling the truth; they are not equipped for my music. It's the legacy. [The Boers] stopped the music when it was in flight. They could see all this liberation, like Max Roach fighting with his music. Like his record "We Insist" was banned. Books, paintings, artists are banned. So there is this legacy. The white people of SA, they have the money, they are the promoters. They don't want to be disturbed. They don't give a damn about the music. If I am in SA and I arrange to play with someone, all his agent will be worried about is money, money, money. And he will say "Who's Louis? Why didn't he come to me? How dare he come to you. I don't want you to do this gig." He doesn't give a shit about the music. Even if a deal was done, he wouldn't even go to the gig. Just interested in the money.
So we have to fight. Not physically. I'm not a soldier, but I fight with my music.
AAJ: Is there any grass roots jazz movement in SA now? Weren't you going to use the money from The Dedication Orchestra to set up a scholarship?
LM: No. It didn't take off because we would have needed support from the government. Now that apartheid is finished, some people say there is no need, although I know that they need the money there. There is no genuine school or genuine project that we could give the money to, not at the moment. If there is, we would like to know because we have got the money here. We really would like to know. The government give hand-outs for everything - football, cricket, rugby - but not for music.
I don't know if they are jealous because they are not gifted musically. But they have the influence. They can determine that they don't want this music in a university or in a radio or TV programme. They don't really believe that we can play it as well. They'd rather have Chick Corea. Americans laugh all the way to the bank with the money they get from SA. Ever since Percy Sledge came to SA in the 60s, and played three segregated concerts a day. But then they banned him. He didn't know who he was dealing with. The SA government was very determined; you didn't cross them. They would hang you for nothing; they were shooting kids for just lifting up their hand.
AAJ: There is a lot of your music that we have not covered. You have been involved in many great sessions and albums. Looking back, what are particular landmarks?
LM: The Blue Notes were the thing for me. That was the band for me, the fountain. It all comes up from The Blue Notes. It made it easier for me to deal with the other cats. To be born in that beautiful country, the rhythm of that country is fantastic. I'm so lucky to have been born there with all that rhythm. So when I played with all those other guys although we're not playing rhythm, the pulse of the heart beats a certain rhythm so you cannot say we're just playing free music not rhythm. It made it easy for me to deal with situations in music. Also, apartheid did that too, made me that much angrier that much more awake to the vibes of the universe. The world is like this, you will come across things like this. You will meet people like Cecil Taylor and the way to deal with them is to open up this bag full of experience, and it brings the right frame of mind. SA was a school for me.
The Blue Notes were the thing for me. I'm still suffering from not being able to play with those guys. Even if I was not playing with them, just because they were around I would hear their music on the radio. If I heard Johnny Dyani, that was going to be my food that would make me survive musically for the next three months. It was spiritual rejuvenation. I didn't have to go to SA to get spiritual rejuvenation. Just by looking at Dudu, just seeing his eyes would knock me out. And now those eyes are no more, they're gone. It is not finished, but the inner driving force is handicapped. Sometimes it seems unfair that people like that have to die - Charlie Parker, Coltrane, Bud Powell.
I don't want to believe this, but I have experienced it myself too, that drummers always suffer from heart attacks. I know a lot of my friends have died from heart attacks, and I had one myself too, when I was 49. I didn't die, thank God, but lots of my friends did, a lot of drummers - Early Mbuza, Phaks Joya, Steve McCall who played with Air, Dewey Redman's drummer died of a heart attack on the bandstand, Stu Martin, John Stevens.
AAJ: Who are you particularly enjoying playing with at the moment?
LM: I've got this band with Jason Yarde, Francine, John Edwards (who knocks me out, man). I love playing with Evan Parker. I'd love to play with Keith Tippett all the time. Irene Schweizer. I've grown up, I'm this age; gone are the days when I'd make a fuss about not playing with someone. If someone is not hooked up to what I'm doing, it is a challenge now. You have to know what this guy is doing. He is genuine but he works another way.
I know I've got the right stuff. I don't have any difficulties with the people, but I do have difficulties with the promoters. They want everything. It happens here too, when there is a festival they do the matchmaking - "We'll pair Louis with Evan, no, no, with Trevor Watts" - but sometimes that makes you play with people you would never play with. Like I would never have had the chance to play with Cecil Taylor.
Louis Moholo's group plays the Freedom of the City festival, in London, in May (see below).
Moholo will also play at a concert/symposium in memory of Johnny Dyani, to be held in Frankfurt, from 25th to 28th April.
Freedom of the City festival
The line-up for next month's second Freedom of the City festival has been announced. Fittingly, the Louis Moholo Group (with Jason Yarde, Francine Luce, John Edwards & Veryan Weston), described above, is one of the star attractions.
The line-up is as follows:
Friday May 3rd, 7pm:
Procession 1
Matt Davis & Mark Wastell
Maggie Nichols 'Nuts in May'
Saturday May 4th, 3pm:
Chris Burn & Matthew Hutchinson
Roger Smith
Birdyak
Louis Moholo Group
Saturday May 4th, 7-30pm:
Phil Minton & Roger Turner
Trevor Watts & Veryan Weston
Sylvia Hallett
Evan Parker & John Russell
Sunday May 5th, 3pm:
Responge
Charlotte Hug & Pat Thomas
PIM
Lol Coxhill, Paul Rutherford & Ian Smith
Sunday May 5th, 7-30pm:
London Improvisers' Orchestra
Monday May 6th, 3pm:
Anton Lukoszevieze & Eddie Prevost
Procession 2
Furt
Monday May 6th, 7-30pm:
John Tilbury
Marianthi Papalexandri Project
Nathaniel Catchpole, Jamie Coleman, John Edwards & Eddie Prevost
Highlights of last year's Freedom of the City can still be viewed at the BBC Radio 3 website.
Concert Review
John Zorn's The Gift
Barbican. 25/03/02
John Zorn is a regular visitor to the Barbican, and usually causes the odd raised eyebrow. He is never short of surprises, and the more knowing punters would now only be surprised if Zorn weren't unpredictable.
This world premiere of his composition The Gift was just such an occasion. Zorn didn't touch his saxophone until after the premiere was over, only getting it out for the rousing encore. During The Gift, he confined himself to conducting and playing occasional keyboards. This composition was about as straight ahead as anyone could wish for; you could have taken your maiden aunt along and she'd have happily tapped her foot and smiled. The music was melodic and tinged with Latin rhythms, provided by the A-team of drummer Joey Baron and percussionists Roberto Rodriguez and the mighty Cyro Baptista. Even occasional hints at more typical Zorn territory - such as a cacophonous opening barrage to one piece (no titles were given, other than the overarching one) - soon subsided again into the overwhelming pleasantness of the composition.
Anyone drawn to this concert by the promise of Dave Douglas would have been sorely disappointed - at least until the encore; Douglas only appeared briefly to solo on one of piece. Instead, the lion's share of solo duties fell to guitarist Marc Ribot, whose trademark full-bodied 50s-tinged guitar sound was the perfect vehicle for much of the music. Nonetheless, over the course of an hour, the overall effect was rather underwhelming, particularly for anyone expecting Zorn the swashbuckling iconoclast of yore. He himself went some way to acknowledging this, when he said that he is not very keen on playing this type of music live. However, the audience left happy, as Zorn and Douglas launched into a hell-for-leather blowing session for the encore. Now, we would have liked more of that!
