February 2001

Seatle Sound
Archive

CONCERTS Steve Lacy Trio '00 Earshot Jazz Fest Ernestine Anderson DJ Spooky Clark Terry Tula's Jazz Club INTERVIEWS Chuck Bergeron Wayne Horvitz Jeff Johnson Don Lanphere Marius Nordal Dave Peck Jay Thomas Pax Wallace PROFILES Origin Records Jazz Club Guide CD REVIEWS Pride and Joy Live! Ways of the Hand

By Jason West

For February’s column I’ve included reviews of new releases from three Seattle artists: Steve Korn, Steve Griggs and Marius Nordal. Korn and Nordal’s recordings are available at the web site for Origin Records, an independent jazz label based in Seattle. Steve Griggs’ HipCity label can be found at www.hipcitymusic.com.

Pride and Joy
Steve Korn

Pride and Joy (Origin, 2000) is the second release in as many years by Seattle drummer Steve Korn. His quintet on this session features a handful of the Northwest’s finest young jazz musicians, including Mark Taylor on alto and Rob Davis on tenor saxophones, Dan Heck on guitar and Joe Doria manning the Hammond B3 organ. Continuing to develop their musical voices, these late-twenty-early-thirty-somethings are well on their way up the musical ladder, climbing the tenuous slope from respectability to distinction.

Recording with his peers is a departure from Korn’s initial release, Here & Now (Origin, 1999), which captured the mature voices of his Seattle jazz mentors Jim Knapp (trumpet), Marc Seales (piano), Jeff Johnson (bass) and Dave Peterson (guitar). The change in personnel produces its own rewards on Pride and Joy, for, although not spectacular, this recording is perhaps most notable for the complementary nature of its musicians. No one dominates the stage; no single player outshines another. Conversely, there is no audible weak link. Rather, Korn and Co. perform well together as a band, creating an ideal mix of individuality and balance lead by the dual sax combination of Davis and Taylor.

For his part, Korn is a drummer whose playing is memorable for its rhythmic subtleties and percussive finesse. More often then not he plays the right note at the right time, offering well placed accents and keeping solid time. Without relying on excessive volume, the drummer creates lyric solos within the context of a given melody. I found myself tuning in instead of out during solo passages.

Korn’s choice of compositions reflects his musical influences. Tunes by top-notch composers Joe Lovano (“Birds of Springtime Gone By”), Ornette Coleman (“Kathelin Gray”) and Pat Metheny (“Change of Heart”) appear alongside two Korn-arranged standards and three original compositions. This brief look at Korn the composer again shows that, like his choice of personnel, the drummer knows that works. His pieces are simply constructed blowing tunes that offer each musician improvisational room to stretch. Not surprisingly, the quintet sounds most comfortable on these cuts, including the up-tempo title track penned for the composer’s newborn son.

Cleverly conceived arrangements of jazz standards “Dear Old Stockholm” and “In Your Own Sweet Way” highlight this recording. Korn refits the latter tune in 5/4 tempo and adds 8 measures of chromatic vamping – a rhythmic approach that would likely receive Mr. Brubeck’s approval.

Live!
Steve Griggs Quintet

Live! (HipCity, 2000) is the third successive release in as many years from local saxophonist, composer and producer Steve Griggs. It follows on the heels of the well-received Jones For Elvin Vol. I and II, featuring the propulsive rhythmic flame of that venerable timekeeper.

Recorded at Seattle’s Jazz Alley on April 17, 2000, this recording documents Griggs’ accomplishment as a first-rate composer, in addition to his considerable talents as a saxophonist and bandleader. All 10 of the tunes on are originals and their composition reveal Griggs’ greatest gift. Like Wayne Shorter, who Griggs cites as an influence, his writing is profoundly honest and built upon a desire to communicate via the most sublime of art forms.

As a saxophonist, Griggs produces a lush, fat tone on tenor. He utilizes the entire range of his horn, varying the volume and dynamics to suit a wellspring of musical ideas. No matter how well he plays, however, the saxophonist is just one color in the composer’s palette, for undoubtedly, Steve Griggs’ “voice” is his composing. In this way, the composer can be found in Jay Thomas’ trumpet, Milo Peterson’s guitar, Phil Sparks’ bass and Jeff Stitely’s drums.

A key to his talent: Griggs makes difficult music – complex forms and constantly changing harmonic progressions – sound simple. His ballads “To Walk in Beauty” and “Yes” are thoughtful, intimate moments of inquiry offered in repose. Up-tempo tunes such as “Jones for Elvin” and “Benny Bop” exude confidence without hesitation. They are the agreements of composer and Muse, both of whom love to swing.

Happily, Live! has been aggressively marketed by Griggs and his independent label HipCity Music. As a result, it has come to the attention of jazz radio DJs throughout the country who have propelled the recording up the Gavin Jazz charts. This is a good thing since live music by Steve Griggs is a terrible thing to waste.

Ways of the Hand
Marius Nordal

From the first notes of his introduction to “All the Things You Are,” Seattle pianist and composer Marius Nordal offers listeners a tantalizing taste of his touch, sound and feel – extra sensory perception that dominates his latest release, Ways of the Hand (Origin, 2000). An early 1970s composition graduate from North Texas State, Nordal established his reputation as a big band composer early on, yet only recently has he begun to play and record his piano pieces. The results are startling, as he reveals on Notoriety (Origin, 1999).

On that recording as on this one, Nordal’s playing is orchestral in nature; he utilizes the entire piano. His touch is both percussive and precise. His time is almost too perfect (He admits to using a metronome on some tracks.), and his musical ideas as a player and composer are sophisticated and earthy, intelligent and swinging.

Ways of the Hand is sure to catch the attention of those jazz listeners fortunate enough to hear Nordal’s tribute to seven of his favorite piano men. In these pieces one discovers the easy swing of Nat Cole (“Love”), the abstruse beauty of Art Tatum (“Willow Weep for Me”) and the technical mastery of Oscar Peterson (“I Remember You”). Offerings for Bill Evens (“Emily”) and Keith Jarrett (“First Light”) are perhaps the best gifts of all, delivered in the spirit of these great pianists with a mix of improvisation and composition, joining mind and soul. For those who know little of the previously mentioned giants, not to mention jazz’s unsung heroes Fats Waller and Henry Butler, Nordal’s tribute pieces encourage a deeper study of their respective lives, times and recordings.

Longtime Seattle vocalist and instrumentalist Floyd Standifer sings on two of the 12 cuts included here, lending his rich baritone vocal. “I Concentrate on You” and “Long Ago and Far Away” are pleasant songs, showcasing Standifer’s full-bodied tone and comfortable delivery on top of Nordal’s contrapuntal comping. However, these tunes are scribbles in the margin compared to the pianist’s musical landscapes that qualify this session as spectacular.

Credible in their sidemen roles are bassists Bob Bowman and Doug Miller, joining drummer John Bishop as Nordal’s rhythm accompaniment. However, they are hardly noticed: Ways of the Hand is a one-man piano tour-de-force.