David Adler
June 2002

New York @ Night
Archive <& /articles/nyan_archive.tmp &>

By David R. Adler

Danilo Perez at Jazz Standard

Calling out to his trio mates (bassist Essiet Essiet, drummer Adam Cruz) like a sports coach, pianist Danilo Perez makes it clear that spontaneity on the bandstand is his highest aesthetic priority. At any moment he might ask Essiet to lay out, or Cruz to start trading, or both to nail unrehearsed hits. The arrangements are in a state of perpetual flux, and the set proceeds along a carefully crafted arc. Essiet and Cruz are always on top of it, pushing the music to volcanic heights or making it glow with restrained melodicism. In particular, it’s Perez’s hookup with Cruz that causes jaws to drop. And Cruz mixes it up sonically, keeping his steel pan off to the side, always ready to color a vamp or bring out a key melody. This is the same killing lineup (sans Donny McCaslin) that played the Vanguard last year, and its rapport has only grown. Highlights included "Panama 2000" and "Panama Libre" (both from Motherland), as well as a slippery reading of "It Could Happen to You" and a couple of very promising new things.

Astilla

One of the things that makes singer-songwriter-bassist Me’Shell Ndegéocello so compelling is her firm connection to the jazz and creative music scene. At a special Sunday night showcase at the Jazz Gallery, she made a rare appearance as a side-person, playing bass behind her monster keyboardist Federico Gonzalez-Pena, with Gregoire Maret on harmonica and Me’Shell regular Gene Lake on drums — a unit known as "Astilla." After sitting out the first tune (an atmospheric keyboard/harmonica duet), Ndegéocello hustled down the aisle (no applause), strapped on the bass, and disappeared behind a music stand. After a subdued and somewhat shaky start, the band began to rev its engines, enticing Roy Hargrove to break out his horn and contribute some devastating stuff on a thumping groove in 4+6 meter. Hargrove stuck around for the next one, a rocking, Batman-like bass line with a B section based on Me’Shell’s "Outside Your Door." Pena wrapped up with a hip, full-on funk version of "Freedom Jazz Dance," playing the first two phrases slow and the third one double-time, with a thunderclap of a hit at the end. By this time Ndegéocello was up and dancing, and Gene Lake was unleashing chops. Pena’s a serious player, full of harmonic savvy and sonic inventiveness; his arsenal includes some frighteningly good sampled percussion.

Sangha I, Sangha II

Drummer Rob Garcia released a strong debut record last year called Place of Resonance (CAP), and he’s been busy with good sideman gigs, like Sam Newsome’s Global Unity. At Cornelia Street Café he premiered a new project called Sangha (as in Buddha, Dharma, Sangha), featuring Newsome, Michel Gentile on flute, Russ Lossing on piano, Kenny Wessel on guitar, Dave Ambrosio on bass, and Yuni Choy on vocals. Tucked within Garcia’s complex line writing and tight ensemble passages is a kind of pop/groove sensibility. Choy, in particular, brought it out, belting the group’s title song and giving a bit of R&B growl on another, untitled one. (I was singing back some of this stuff a week later.) Garcia’s ability to sustain interest over a long form was clear on "Just Do It," even more so on his "Burning Heart Suite"; his melodic powers were at their peak on a beautiful adaptation of a poem by the Sufi poet Hafiz. Lossing and Newsome were the monster soloists of the set, and with this many musicians on stage, Garcia was smart in setting limits — one or two solos per tune. These weren’t simply blowing vehicles, after all.

Pianist Vijay Iyer and altoist Rudresh Mahanthappa, who perform fairly regularly as a duo under the name Raw Materials, received a Rockefeller grant to compose new music specifically for the duo setting. It so happens that they titled the resulting suite "Sangha: Collaborative Fables." (Sanskrit words are public domain, you know.) The Jazz Gallery presented the debut of this ambitious program as part of its new Composers Series. Iyer and Mahanthappa divided the suite, 17 pieces in all, into two sets, and began each set with "The Shape of Things," an ever-changing improvisational "ritual" (a musical analogue to yoga’s sun salutation, if you will). While the new music — seven tunes by Iyer, six by Mahanthappa, one co-written — shared with much of their previous work a brooding dissonance and dizzying polyrhythmic complexity, a number of musical departures were apparent. The methodically leaping cadences of "Five Fingers Can Make a Fist," the rigorously transformed Coltraneisms of "Deep In," the yearning yet opaque quality of "Come Back" — these were new raw materials, broadening an already expansive and highly individual musical language.

From Colorado to BAM

Ron Miles, the Denver-based trumpeter and composer, just released a record called Heaven (Sterling Circle), a spiffy duo session with Bill Frisell. When he swung into town on a mini-tour that included a stop at the cavernous BAMCafé, he tackled some of the duo music in a quartet setting. With Brandon Ross on guitar, Mark Helias on bass, and Olivia Sci on drums, Miles transfixed a big room with a very intimate sound. There’s a kind of pastoral, prairie melodicism to some of his work, like the upbeat "Just Married" or the darker, more spacious "Falsetto." It’s even more pronounced on the record, on old songs like "Your Cheatin’ Heart," where Frisell’s country-Americana orientation comes into sharp focus. At the gig, Brandon Ross channeled Frisell nicely and added a whammy-bar minimalism of his own making. Miles, dressed to the nines, conveyed his freebop commitments on Ornette’s "Congeniality," giving the rhythm section a bit more to chew on. The group’s uptempo reading of Monk’s "We See" wasn’t quite as convincing (on the record it shines). Let’s hope this shy, imaginative fellow makes a return visit soon. Meanwhile, check out the remarkable Heaven.

Jazz Composers Collective: The 10th Season Ends

Seems like yesterday that the Collective’s annual concert series was starting up again, with the smoke of September 11 still in the air. It took a lot of strength and focus for the Collective to launch a successful new season under these circumstances, but they did it. In addition to their regular New School concerts, they reopened the Jazz Standard with a full week of club gigs. We heard new releases by the Herbie Nichols Project and Michael Blake. (Frank Kimbrough’s two forthcoming discs hit a frustrating snag, but they’ll be out soon.) And Ben Allison recorded a new Medicine Wheel CD titled Peace Pipe, slated for release on Palmetto this fall.

Allison’s new music represents the first fruits of his collaboration with Malian kora virtuoso Mamadou Diabate. The band, with Diabate joining on most tunes, was the first to hit on May 16 at the New School. Regulars Frank Kimbrough, Ted Nash, Michael Blake, and Michael Sarin were on hand. (Sometime-member Ron Horton was not, but we’d hear him soon enough during the next set.) Not only has Diabate influenced the way Allison writes, he also influences how each member of the band plays. Part of this is a matter of dynamics — it’s easy to drown out the kora with a set of drums, for instance. So there’s a certain delicacy to the new stuff, requiring sensitive listening among the players. There’s also a turn away from Western harmony in some instances, with sparse rhythmic ideas laying the foundation for a piece, rather than a set of conventional chords. You’d often hear Allison and Sarin playing against each other at polyrythmic angles, giving the music a feeling of non-resolution, of suspension. In a way, this is just a heightening of elements that have always been present in Allison’s music. His penchant for unorthodox bass techniques, Kimbrough’s whimsical prepared piano: These sounds remain in the mix, offsetting but sometimes even mimicking the metallic, percussive voice of the kora. When the band closed with a reworking of "Mantra," one of the most memorable pieces from 1999’s Third Eye, the continuity that Allison was after couldn’t have been clearer.

Collective concerts almost always showcase all-original material, but Ron Horton departed from the script, taking on challenging material by a motley crew of composers. His spirited quartet featured Kimbrough, Allison, and Matt Wilson on drums. He opened with a nod to his colleague Andrew Hill, choosing "Cantarnos," from 1965’s Black Fire, which found Wilson coming on strong (the tune was originally played by Roy Haynes, after all). Two strong originals followed: first "Malaby," a free blowout named for the increasingly influential tenor saxophonist, then "Ruminations," loosely inspired by the 12-tone composer Hanns Eisler. Jimmy Giuffre’s "Gotta Dance" was next on the program, but Horton chucked it in favor of another original, this one untitled. (Wilson’s working title is "Drano.") The most ambitious moment arrived with Steve Coleman’s "Wights Waits for Weights," a deviously funky thing from Dave Holland’s 1987 album The Razor’s Edge (ECM). Horton interpolated this with an adaptation of a Schumann piano piece — a fine idea that would’ve been finer had the Coleman tune found solid ground. The quartet regained its footing to close with Paul Motian’s beautiful rubato meditation "9 x 9," with Horton on fluegelhorn. An eclectic modernist, Horton has a special knack for the music of the overlooked greats, and whether playing in or out, he nails it. Let’s hope for a follow-up to Genius Envy (OmniTone) soon.

Snapshots

Liberty Ellman: New music, new blood. At Cornelia Street, guitarist Liberty Ellman had some different personnel: Mark Shim on tenor, Reid Anderson on bass, J.T. Lewis on drums. The quartet dealt with untitled tunes ("as fresh as a raw oyster"), along with work horses like "Orthodoxy" and even an item from the Blakey book, Wayne Shorter’s "United." Shim and Ellman are remarkably compatible — both have a fondness for the low register and come at chord changes obliquely yet forcefully. Anderson got plenty of solo space; Lewis dove in and took the music apart with relish.

Dave Douglas: Oh yes, the "New Quintet" is still new, and stretching like never before. The band’s Vanguard run was an enormity. The segues, the development, the consistent fire: everyone’s "off the paper" and firmly in the zone. Chris Potter’s solos took on the quality of fervid and persuasive speech. Uri Caine tapped into the Rhodes’s special harmonic electricity. James Genus and Clarence Penn willed rhythmic mountain ranges into being. And Douglas, when not playing the shit out of the trumpet, was smirking in the wings, soaking in the sheer badness of it all.

Anthony Braxton Solo Alto 2002: He’s dismissed angrily by the old guard and idolized like a rock star by ardent fans. But polemics and panegryics aside, Anthony Braxton is simply a brilliant improviser. His solo alto concert at the Ethical Culture auditorium, produced by the AACM, showed that it is coherence and consistency, not undisciplined chaos, that lies at the heart of his project. Look at his bio and the Kandinsky-like pictograms he uses in place of titles and one realizes that his music is in fact the most accessible part of the package. Each piece delineates a very specific sonic world and performance aesthetic. To watch him enter and exit these worlds, one by one, is a moving and unforgettable experience. Along with the unpronounceable titles, Braxton played one-of-a-kind renditions of "Tune Up," "Body and Soul," and Ornette Coleman’s "Peace."

Dafnis Prieto Quintet: Another installment of the Jazz Gallery’s Composers Series, this one featuring Cuban wunderkind drummer Prieto, with Brian Lynch on trumpet/fluegel, Tim Ries on saxes, Luis Perdomo on piano, and Hans Glawischnig, oddly enough, on fretless acoustic bass guitar. Prieto played very aggressively but cued the band with poise through some very difficult rhythmic passages and over-the-top vamps. His music has a romantic side as well, and Lynch, in particular, was just the guy to bring out the contrasts.

Vision Snapshots

Poet Jayne Cortez and her Firespitters (including Bern Nix, Alex Harding, Bobby Bradford, Denardo Coleman, and many more) kicked off the Memorial Day tribute to Don Cherry; Cortez’s presence was commanding, even if she was preaching to the choir for the most part. Dewey Redman and his quartet (Barney McAll, John Menegon, Matt Wilson) zig-zagged from slow, fiery bop to free exploration; their encore, a dirty, bluesy shuffle, instigated a small dance party toward the back of the room. The Don Cherry Memorial Band featured Peter Apfelbaum, Frank Lowe, Graham Haynes, Bob Stewart, Karl Berger, Mark Helias, Hamid Drake, and vocalist Ingrid Sertso; their set was sleepy but Apfelbaum rescued it, ditching tenor for piano and leading the band through an inspired Don Cherry medley. Finally, the Pyramid Trio (Roy Campbell, William Parker, Hamid Drake) took the stage and worked their way gradually toward grand heights, although the big room made their interplay seem less nuanced than it was.

Later in the week, William Parker’s Little Huey Creative Music Orchestra crammed into CB’s Lounge for a special two-set performance. What began with two lonely, intersecting flutes soon grew into a massive tangle of melodic shards and off-kilter rhythms, finally settling into a fractured waltz. Soulful statements from Rob Brown, Roy Campbell, Ori Kaplan, and many more.

Piano Snapshots

Bruce Barth led a quintet date at Smoke, featuring Steve Wilson, Randy Brecker, Ugonna Okegwo, and Adam Cruz. A quintessential Manhattan jazz moment: Randy Brecker, well after midnight, clicking off his music stand light and ending the third and final set with a searing solo on "I Hear a Rhapsody." Barth summoned great things from these players, on originals like "Hope Springs Eternal" and "Back at the Ranch," Dave Stryker’s "Muddy Waters," Steve Wilson’s "Grace," Okegwo’s arrangement of "Let’s Call This." Always solid, always burning.

Fred Hersch, with Drew Gress and Nasheet Waits, brought sublime sounds to the Vanguard: a playful "Bemsha Swing" with fleeting bits of bitonality; a medley of Shorter’s "Miyako" and "Black Nile"; a candlelit ballad reading of "How Deep Is the Ocean"; odes to Kenny Wheeler ("A Lark"), to Nasheet Waits ("The Riddle Song"), to depression ("Black Dog Pays a Visit"). More than most, this trio moves as one, placing every shimmering cadence, every lustrous thought, in its ideal spot. Recording mics were in place, and Hersch made a point of telling us, so look for a Live at the Vanguard disc in the not-too-distant future.

Denny Zeitlin made a rare New York appearance at the Jazz Standard, with Buster Williams on bass and Matt Wilson on drums. Tall and lanky, with big hands, Zeitlin has an exceptional command of the keyboard and a storehouse of harmonic riches. His reading of "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes" has a magical quality and takes a number of funk detours, not unlike what he does with "The Man I Love" from As Long As There’s Music (32 Jazz). On "Mr. P.C." he states the head thunderously and lets a deceptive cadence linger after the 12th bar; "Cousin Mary," another Coltrane blues, gets a similar treatment on the record. Zeitlin plays in big, orchestral strokes rather than single-note fusillades; his dynamic instincts are superb.

Orrin Evans brought a quintet to the Jazz Gallery for two nights, with Ralph Bowen on tenor, Sam Newsome on soprano, Eric Revis on bass, Rodney Green on drums. First night, second set was sparsely attended due to threatening storms, but that didn’t stop Evans from playing the genial MC and having a ball. He began with his modal piece "For Miles," segued into Eric Revis’s blues "J.D.’s Revenge" (which will appear on Evans’s forthcoming Palmetto album in the fall), and then basically called a jam session, inviting up Duane Eubanks and even fellow pianist Jean-Michel Pilc for a long look at "All the Things You Are." And then what? Why, birthday cake for Eric Revis, of course.