Festival International de Jazz de Montreal 2016

Perhaps most impressive, if only for its rare use during the show, Miller shone on bass clarinet during "Gorée," a lovely ballad from Renaissance (Concord, 2012) with a darker genesis that Miller introduced as initially being about the anger, tension and pain of Africans captured and put through "the door of no return," which led to a boat that would take them (hopefully alive) across the Atlantic and into slavery, but ultimately became "about the ability to endure inhumanity and come out the other side with dignity. We have to hold on to our hope."

"Tutu," written for Miles Davis' well-received 1986 Warner Bros. debut of the same name, was another set highlight, though it would be great to see Miller step away from his tendency to play it at a faster tempo than the greasier, down 'n' dirty feel of the original, as he closed the set on a high note—and the bassist's third standing ovation of the night. Miller and his group returned for a raucous version of the '70s Edgar Winter Group hit "Frankenstein" and, while it was fun, it was a little over the top with the exception of Bailey's impressive drum solo, combining frightening virtuosity with a compositional sense of construction.

It was, however, Miller's way of ending the night on an even greater high. As soon as the group was off the stage the house lights came up and it was clear that, unlike some of the other performers at the 2016 FIJM, one encore was all there was to be had...though after 100 minutes of testosterone-infused playing by one of Miller's best live bands in years, it was plenty good enough.

Nir Felder
L'Astral
July 7, 2016

For the final show of the 2016 FIJM, there was only choice to make: Nir Felder. A guitarist who has been slowly moving on an upward trajectory—except that his debut album, Golden Age, was released in 2014 on the prestigious Okeh imprint, the same label handling artists ranging from Bill Frisell, Branford Marsalis and Kurt Elling to Dave Holland, Stacey Kent and Nils Petter Molvær, suggesting that his profile may be higher than it might seem—Felder has already made some formidable appearances on albums by trumpeter David Weiss, Terri Lyne Carrington and Rudy Royston. He's also gaining a reputation as an educator, recruited by organizations like the Fondazione Siena Jazz Summer in 2013, to conduct workshops and combo classes, as well as participate in live performances; he'll be returning to the renowned Italian institution again later this summer.

For his packed show at L'Astral, Felder came with a completely different group than the quartet on Golden Age; instead of pianist Aaron Parks, bassist Matt Penman and drummer Nate Smith, the 33 year-old Felder brought another New York City veteran, bassist Orlando le Fleming, and Jimmy Macbride, a very young (24 years old) but stellar drummer who managed to navigate his way through Felder's oftentimes cerebral, knotty compositions with the same effortless confidence as his more experienced trio mates.

Breaking the evening into two sets, Felder announced, early in the first, that the majority of the music being played was brand new...much of it still untitled. And if Felder's blend of sophisticated jazz harmonics, rock music sensibilities and staggering virtuosity, as he moved across and up and down the neck of his Fender Stratocaster—creating rapidly cascading lines, executing broad intervallic leaps and seeming to, at times, quite simply do the impossible with just six strings and two hands—were plenty unique, it was also refreshing to hear a young guitarist informed by bigger names like Kurt Rosenwinkel, Pat Metheny and label mate Bill Frisell, but whose approach to both writing and performing has already evolved into something instantly recognizable and utterly distinctive. Tasteful use of effects including some gritty overdrive, plenty of reverb, delay and more, only helped to shape a dense near-"wall of sound" tone that rendered his trio surprisingly full, even when the guitarist was delivering linear phrases that might, under other circumstances benefit from some chordal support.

But the truth was that Fleming was all Felder needed when it came to both a muscular groove-driver and engaging melodic foil; and while MacBride may be nearly a decade younger than the still-youthful Felder, his remarkable dexterity and huge ears made him not just a notable asset in Felder's trio, but a young drummer well worth watching.

While largely focused on new material, Felder by no means avoided Golden Age entirely...though a couple in the front row, celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary and clearly avid Felder fans, were a touch disappointed when he had to decline their request for a particular tune from the album because, as Felder explained, apologetically, "we haven't played that one for at least two, maybe three years." Still, an energetic version of "Sketch 2" that built even more gradually, more inevitably, to its peak was trumped by an even more potent version of Golden Age's rock- inflected, drum-driven opener, "Lights," which closed the second set...with, despite a crowd clearly looking for one, no encore.

Still, there's no doubt that Felder's FIJM audience was afforded the opportunity to hear one of the most promising relatively new guitarists on the jazz scene...and, like the Punkt Presents just two nights prior, a show that will definitely go down in FIJM as one that many more people should have seen, were it not for the limited size of the venue. With a style informed as much by the rock bands he played with in his younger days, some Midwestern elements that were, perhaps, surprising for a guitarist who grew up in the New York suburbs, and a very specific approach to blending melodic phrasing with rapid-fire virtuosity and sophisticated voicings, there's little doubt that his still-to-be-recorded followup to Golden Age may be a ways away but, if it's loaded with the new material Felder, Fleming and MacBride worked through at L'Astral, it promises to be a step up for the already ascendant guitarist.

And so, after five nights spent in Montréal it was time to return home, closing a roughly three-week run covering both FIJM and 2016 TD Ottawa Jazz Festival: two very different festivals.

That people can attend FIJM for its entire ten-day run, not pay a penny and still get the chance to hear an impressive array of world-class acts starting late afternoon and running until close to midnight also means that, as big as the festival is, it has never lost sight of the fact that not everyone can afford the indoor ticketed events. Still, to be fair, for the acts it programs, and compared to many other festivals with ticket-rather than pass-driven events (Examples: $45- $52 for Tord Gustavsen; $75-$85 for Joe Jackson; an incredible $38-$42 for the Punkt Presents show; $60-$69 for Marcus Miller; and $32-$37 for Nir Felder), Montréal's prices are far from unreasonable. The result of combining superb free outdoor programming with equally outstanding ticketed shows is a ten-day party that literally anyone can attend and enjoy.

Attending FIJM is very much like living in a "jazz bubble," because once entering the six square blocks of Montréal's downtown core closed for the festival, there's simply no need to leave as everything you need is there, from hotels for every budget and restaurants of all persuasions to enough shopping to keep American's happy spending their more valuable bucks. It's truly a great opportunity to forget about the world—skip those newspapers, television and radio and, for just a short while, enjoy being immersed in nothing but music, music and more music—at a festival that does "big" like no other, accommodating sometimes massive numbers in a friendly, joyous environment where there's never any visible trouble- -just hundreds of thousands of people on the street eating, drinking and enjoying some of the best music you'll find in such a concentrated timeframe in one of Canada's most welcoming cities.

Photo Credit: John Kelman

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