David Adler
October 2002

New York @ Night
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By David R. Adler

On 9/11/02 at 8:46 a.m., I woke to the sound of fire signals commemorating the exact moment of the first plane's impact. I turned on the TV and listened as the names of the dead were read aloud, and left for work when they were starting the C's. By the time I arrived downtown and tuned in again, they were starting the M's. The list, in its sheer length and brute factuality, made one contemplate anew just how many people were lost.

Several days later, full service was restored on the 1-2-3 subway line for the first time since the disaster. This was perhaps America's greatest, most unambiguous victory so far, though the news coverage it received was modest. It felt like an earthquake in reverse, a seemingly mundane but in fact momentous return to the status quo antebellum.

On a purely selfish level, my travel time to and from jazz central has been substantially shortened. What I have endeavored to do in this space for the last year — subjectively chronicle a highly selective and incomplete list of the live music happenings in this city — I will now do with hopefully a bit more peace of mind and a growing sense that we are truly on the road to recovery.

Unfortunately, September was also notable for what I missed: the week of solo piano concerts at the Jazz Standard, held under the auspices of the Verizon Festival; Ben Allison's weekend with Peace Pipe at the same club; and Ted Nash's run at the Village Vanguard with the remarkable band Odeon. My apologies.

The Trumpet Shall Sound

Roy Hargrove stirred up a good deal of excitement during the Jazz Gallery's four-night series, "The Trumpet Shall Sound." Each night found Hargrove in a mentoring role, sitting in with a different up-and-coming trumpeter. His presence made for amazing music and also consistently packed houses. The first two to step into the spotlight were Yasek Manzano from Cuba and Ambrose Akinmusire from California.

Friday's show featured LeRon Thomas from Houston, who dwarfed his instrument with his large frame and played beautifully, with a lighthearted, dancing disposition. Tenor saxophonist Marcus Strickland, pianist Robert Glasper, bassist Brandon Owens, and drummer Kendrick Scott completed the lineup. This clique has become loosely known as "the class of 2001"; they're a powerful, rambunctious lot, playing with remarkable advancement for their age. As Thomas and Hargrove went toe to toe, with yet another trumpeter, Keyon Harold, sitting in on a fast "Straight, No Chaser," the combative but good-natured ethos of the cutting session filled the air. And by no means was Hargrove pulling any punches. The strong players to his left and right were raising the stakes and pushing him to the limit. "Play your horn!" implored someone in the audience, and Hargrove responded with biting phrases, deep in the pocket and drenched in soul.

The following night featured Baltimore's Dontae Winslow. Hargrove swapped his red sleeveless tee for an impeccable jet-black suit, and the sartorial shift said a lot: this evening would prove to be more restrained. That's not to say that the charming Winslow didn't have surprises up his sleeve. He sang a Lou Rawlsian vocal on Gary Bartz's "Sun Song," unleashed an outrageous scat solo on the slow blues "My Baby Mama," and dropped admirably authentic rap verses on the finale, written as a pep-talk to his inner-city music students. And let's not omit the fact that Winslow is a stellar post-bop trumpeter, again pushing Hargrove beyond the safety zone on a number of spirited exchanges. Also lending their talents were Stephen Scott (one of the deepest, brightest pianists on the scene), bassist Dwayne Burno and drummer Eric McPherson. The gifted alto saxophonists Justin Robinson and Tim Green sat in as well.

Last month I asserted that few trumpeters can touch Wynton Marsalis. Well, we can certainly count Roy Hargrove among those few. This Gallery series revealed that others are poised to join the ranks as well.

Kenny Wheeler Goes Clubbing, Part II

Following up on a successful big-band run at Birdland last month, saxophonist Andrew Rathbun and trumpet great Kenny Wheeler pulled into Cornelia Street for two nights, joined by Frank Carlberg on piano, bassist John Hebert, and drummer Jeff Hirshfield. This show didn't have quite the emotional sweep of the large ensemble, but it was cooking nonetheless. Rathbun has gotten deep inside Wheeler's harmonic language; the trumpeter's influence is all over Rathbun's spellbinding new CD, Sculptures. There's nothing quite like the lithe poetics of Wheeler's horn, which sounded marvelous in this intimate setting. In addition to several pieces from the CD, the quintet offered a plangent reading of "Kind Folk," from 1997's Angel Song (ECM).

The AACM Plows Ahead

Muhal Richard Abrams opened the AACM's season at the New York Society for Ethical Culture with an extended piece called "The Path." The individual movements were titled "Sightway" one through five, and the first three featured a quartet with Aaron Stewart on saxes, Brad Jones on bass, and Reggie Nicholson on drums. Stewart began the show with piercing, mysterious cries on soprano, an instrument he doesn't often play; as the suite progressed the instruments paired off in various combinations, with the full quartet active only for short spells. Abrams's piano playing was incredibly vigorous and evocative. After intermission, trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith and trombonist Alfred Patterson joined the leader for "Sightway" four and five. Patterson played a behemoth creation — a bass trombone with a second, smaller bell just above the main one. This mutation of a horn complemented and to some extent softened Smith's knife-like long tones and urgent shouts.

For the finale, both groups joined Muhal for a rhythmically driving homage to the late Lionel Hampton. The relatively brief tune reminded one that the AACM never really saw itself as rejecting jazz tradition. There is one way in which the New York chapter radically departs from traditional jazz practice, however, and that is by starting its programs fastidiously on time. Braxton's May concert began a couple of minutes early, in fact. Muhal's suffered an insignificant delay, but it bothered him enough that he felt the need to apologize. (Look out for upcoming concerts by John Stubblefield, Reggie Nicholson, Kalaprusha and the Light, and Myra Melford's Be Bread.)

Electric Avenue

Raising its New York profile as it does every so often, Andy Milne's Dapp Theory enjoyed a dual residency in September, playing two Tuesdays at Bar 13 and three Thursdays at the Jazz Gallery. The first Gallery show involved a slight personnel shuffle, as two of the band's earlier members, drummer Gene Lake and vocalist Maritri Garrett, came back on board. (Sean Rickman and Gregoire Maret returned on the remaining nights.) Playing two electric keyboards and fistfuls of brilliant acoustic piano, Milne laid out his complex, funk-based vision, girded by Rich Brown, one of the finest electric bassists you'll hear anywhere. As they were dealing with some older material, Milne and Brown would exchange glances from time to time, smiling broadly when they made it through a difficult, seldom-visited passage. Garrett's singing was radiant, particularly on the new "Everywhere Dance," which on Milne's forthcoming CD is sung by co-author and fellow Canadian Bruce Cockburn.

Guitarist Wayne Krantz isn't hurting for an audience over at the 55 Bar, where he continues his regular Thursday night throw-downs with bassist Tim Lefebvre (or Paul Socolow) and drummer Keith Carlock. Slinging his beat-to-hell Stratocaster, Krantz continues to grow grittier, toying with thick octave and whammy effects that give him an evil kind of P-Funk-synth-bass sound. When combined with ripping single-note lines, this sound can cause quite a rumble in one's gut. But there's also a sparkling clarity to Krantz's unique harmonic concepts. And the band is relentlessly searching and flexible, even on material as old as "Dream Called Love" from 1995's 2-Drink Minimum, which sounds quite different today.

A New Collective Season

The 11th annual Jazz Composers Collective concert series began with a double-bill of trios. First, tenor saxophonist Michael Blake and MB3, with Ben Allison on bass and Daniel Freedman on drums, took the stage for a raw but fairly short set. The swinging "Stupid Happy" led it off, followed by "Dougie's Rum Punch," which benefited enormously from Freedman's emphatic dub and dancehall borrowings. Allison played beautifully on a captivating ballad — sounding like Wilbur Ware to Blake's Sonny Rollins, belting out bluesy phrases shaped by a masterful use of space. Blake, irreverent but humble, has brought his simultaneous tenor-soprano playing to a high level of harmonic development, and he relied on it heavily during the set.

The irreverence factor shot through the roof when drummer Matt Wilson took the stage with Field Trip, featuring Matt Shulman on trumpet and Luis Perdomo on piano. As a performer, Wilson falls somewhere between Elvin Jones and Victor Borge, drumming marvelously even as he cracks jokes and employs sight-gags; the best was when he toyed with a dinosaur drum machine and then yanked a tiny splash cymbal out of his bag to mock the flying saucer sounds he was getting. "Hacksaw," an insane rock tune, immediately followed. The more serious pieces were drawn from a suite-in-progress inspired by the poetry of Carl Sandburg (from Illinois, like Wilson himself) and commissioned by Chamber Music America. "Disturbing the Peace," in contrast, involved Shulman stating a plaintive melody and then Wilson and Perdomo playing a tightly executed series of jackhammer hits to destroy the mood, or disturb the peace as it were. Perdomo surrendered to the informal vibe of the show by exclaiming, "This is a bad tune, man!" when they finished.

Shulman's signal processing apparatus, known as the Shulman System, gives his tone an enormous amount of warmth and timbral variation. And Wilson's chosen instrumentation — horn-piano-drums — brings to mind the similarly named Fieldwork, a project of Vijay Iyer's, although the music itself is totally different. Iyer, incidentally, will play the next Collective concert in December, in a double-bill with Ted Nash.

Snapshots

Absolute Ensemble, a new music group conducted by the energetic Kristjan JÀrvi, did its part to revitalize lower Manhattan with a free concert in Battery Park (part of the River to River Festival). Stravinsky, Dukas, Buena Vista Social Club, Fiddler on the Roof, intricately composed new works peppered with imaginative sampling — it's all fair game for this polished and extroverted group. JÀrvi is determined to make Absolute's show as entertaining as it is demanding, often turning to face the crowd and whip up audience participation. The resonant and fairly acrobatic playing of bassoonist Martin Kuuskman is a centerpiece of Absolute's sound, as is the muscular rhythmic support of bassist Mat Fieldes and drummer Greg Landes. Lew Soloff walked on for a couple of savory solos (including the Sabbath Prayer from Fiddler). Look out for Absolute's new Enja release, Fix.

For tenor saxophonist Walt Weiskopf to get Brad Mehldau to play on his new record, Man of Many Colors (Criss Cross), was fortunate enough. Snagging the star pianist for three out of four nights at Birdland was luckier still. Playing a number of originals as well as challenging arrangements of "Haunted Heart" and Jule Styne's "People," Weiskopf and Mehldau brought beauty into the room, backed by bassist Doug Weiss and drummer Tony Reedus. Weiskopf has a soft-edged but forceful tone and a kind of Trane-meets-Dexter outlook; Mehldau brings his distinctive touch to everything he plays, but it's on the ballads that he really startles the soul.

Pianist Mika Pohjola and Mikasonik played Cornelia Street Cafe as a quartet, with Ben Monder on guitar, Fernando Huergo on electric bass, and Mark Ferber on drums. (Alto player Miguel Zenon sat this one out.) The band played music from Pohjola's Landmark and Announcement discs, as well as some highly promising new work. Pohjola's concept is not at all straightahead, but it is highly accessible despite its complexity. He writes brisk and busy melodic lines and his solos rely on clustery, intersecting chords more than strings of single notes. Monder's unique blend of ghostly atmospherics and snarling distortion suits this music perfectly.

The Bad Plus continues to add more disco classics to its repertoire. This time, during the trio's three-night run in the Knitting Factory Old Office, it was "I Will Survive." That this unit takes seriously the music of Gloria Gaynor, ABBA, Blondie, and Kurt Cobain is noteworthy enough. But even more remarkable is the band's ability to tell sweeping, dynamically varied stories with this unlikely source material. Put another way, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and "Knowing Me, Knowing You" sound no less rigorous and dramatic than Ethan Iverson's "Guilty," or David King's "1972 Bronze Medalist," or Reid Anderson's masterful and haunting pair of compositions, "Silence Is the Question" and "Love Is the Answer." Seems there's a substantial buzz developing around this band; you don't see a standing-room crowd in the Old Office every night. Nor do you ever see a grand piano in there (the band paid to have it moved).

Trumpeter Jeremy Pelt's new band premiered at Kavehaz, and with its vibes/guitar harmonic core it struck quite a contrast with the piano-based sextet that Pelt led at the Jazz Standard a couple months back. The remarkable altoist Myron Walden was the only member common to both groups; his bass clarinet, heard against Warren Wolf's vibes, brought the Hutcherson-Dolphy precedent strongly to mind. Bassist Derek Nievergelt, of Blanchard band fame, had a superior hookup with the amazingly burning drummer Tommy Crane, a recent New York arrival from St. Louis whose nerdy look has earned him the nickname Harry Potter. Guitarist Mike Moreno, who appears on the opening track of Pelt's debut album Profile (Fresh Sound/New Talent), is a member in full standing of this group, and his Rosenwinkel-like fluidity is certainly an asset. Pelt was on fire this particular evening; Crane's drumming propelled him toward the outer reaches. Having worked extensively with Ralph Peterson, Jr., Pelt is no stranger to powerful, highly interactive drumming, and he takes to it like a fish to water.

Recommended Discs:

• Jeff "Tain" Watts, Bar Talk (Sony)
• Andy McKee, One World (CAP)
• Ralph Alessi, This Against That (RKM)
• Curtis Lundy, Purpose (Justin Time)
• Steven Bernstein, Diaspora Blues (Tzadik)
• Matana Roberts/Josh Abrams/Chad Taylor, Sticks and Stones (482 Music)
• John Stetch, Ukrainianism (Justin Time)
• Alex Riel, Celebration (Stunt)
• Jason Moran, Modernistic (Blue Note)
• John Ellis, Roots, Branches & Leaves (Fresh Sound/New Talent)