Gent Jazz 2023

Gent Jazz Festival
Gent, Belgium
July 9-15, 2023

It looked dire in 2022. The Gent Jazz festival, a two-decade integral element in the cultural life of this wondrous Belgian city, was declared bankrupt, along with Jazz Middelheim in Antwerp, which had an even more august history. Amazingly, it's still here in 2023, just as strong artistically, and looking like it just pulled in larger crowds than usual. The Flemish booking agency Greenhouse Talent stepped in to rescue Gent Jazz, themselves well experienced in programming starry-level acts throughout the territory. To an outsider, it appeared to be a success, subject to the balancing of the books. Most of the atmosphere and structure was retained, with the obvious improvement being the enlargement of the secondary Garden Stage, no longer in a smallish tent, or perched on a makeshift wooden platform, but now rising high in an obelisk-type structure, multiplying the lines-of-sight. The Garden zone still provided a more laid-back respite from the full rows (or crammed standers) of the Main Stage, with the DJs of the long-running Music Mania record store providing a curated choice of vinyl sounds, in between the performances.

As ever, the programme included acts that dwell outside of the mainline jazz category, such as Mulatu Astatke, Joe Bonamassa, Mavis Staples and Arooj Aftab, but these all performed prior to your scribe's arrival, this being an extended 10-dayer festival. Amongst the jazzed big names were alto saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin, guitarist Julian Lage, singer/percussionist Kahil El'Zabar and, within Belgium, the Brussels Jazz Orchestra, collaborating with the three-decades-old Aka Moon trio. The most towering headliners were Herbie Hancock and The Branford Marsalis Quartet.

Marsalis never lets his superior performance slip, operating on the highest possible levels of intensity, virtuosity, entertainment, ruggedness and brutal stamina overload. The saxophonist ranged from convoluted original material right through to liberating versions of some of the oldest jazz songs. The initial salvo of near-unbelievable driving energy turned out to take up almost an hour of the set, before anything approaching a ballad unwound. This foursome also feeds off a long relationship that's produced a visibly tight rapport, with pianist Joey Calderazzo and bassist Eric Revis around since the late 1990s, and even drummer Justin Faulkner now being onboard for nearly 15 years. It seemed like an unusual move to open on soprano saxophone, but in Branford's hands this is an ice-pick horn, throwing a challenge to Calderazzo for a follow-up solo, as Marsalis perched on his stool, slightly to the rear, biding his time for the next unleashing. Here we witnessed how Stateside jazz is often cookin' on the highest flame, compared to most practitioners from around the globe. We're talking the mainline stoker rather than the risk-taking flash-fire. The funk emerged via a switch to tenor, the leader in shirt and tie, Calderazzo sporting a t-shirt, sweating and expending enormous energy, as the combo turned into a temporary piano trio, of the slamming variety. Marsalis makes it all soft and bright, back on soprano. The set was climaxed by the surprise appearance of trumpeter Terence Blanchard, to deal with, of all tunes, "My Bucket's Got A Hole In It," delivering a somewhat coolster reading.

Herbie Hancock provided the climax of the festival's final night, opening his set with a 'sophisticated medley' of multiple hit tunes, avoiding obvious structures by sometimes slipping in a brief snatch, at other times elaborating fully, or segue-ing subtly. He terms this his 'overture,' including "Rockit" and "Footprints." Herbie enjoys a loading of vigour beyond his years, brightly switching from Fazioli acoustic piano and electronic Kronos Workstation keyboards, often within the same composition, or even playing both simultaneously. Drummer Jaylen Petinaud is by far the youngest band member, impressively funky, but tending to overuse one of those small triple-layer cymbals that click and snick like a 1980s drum machine. Hancock isn't always as tasteful, sonically, as we might suppose, often opting for keyboard sounds that are across the wrong side of the retro-cool tracks. Likewise, it was deeply puzzling that Lionel Loueke spent most of his time trying to impersonate yet another keyboard, his guitar rarely sounding like an actual guitar. Then, Herbie recreated his old vocoder tones, at great length. Thankfully, Terence Blanchard provided some bite, but also some ethereal washes. The Headhunters-era number "Actual Proof" proved to be an unpredictable highlight.

When the going gets mighty on the Main Stage, respite can be sought out in the Garden zone, at the other end of the Bijlokesite. However, when alto-man Immanuel Wilkins played a pair of sets, preceding Hancock's set, matters could never become too relaxing. Though Wilkins did deliver a less manic run than is usually the case, only having two 45-minute sections during which to ascend, interrupted midway. His complex phrases and accents made a dense progress, leaving little space. The piano dropped out, leaving the sound even more hardass in nature, and then the leader rested, during a totally solo drum passage. There was a surprising swap to a lounge sway, and the first tune-pause landed 30 minutes into the set. The second Wilkins burst was placed immediately before Herbie's performance, so suffered from an audience migration towards its close. Wilkins was more relaxed and reflective, finally opening up some space, gliding with a faintly Latinised feel, then twisting to an emphatically slower tune, loaded with soulfulness, repetitive piano figure locked in, as the leader made crying alto phrases.

A prime example of this festival's continuing support for the slightly strange was the showing by Salami Rose Joe Louis, originally from California, and signed to the Brainfeeder label. Maybe she was presenting her special jazz-orientated set, but the lasting impression was of vocals that sounded like a sweeter, good-fortuned Billie Holiday, honeying beside an electronic palette descended from the Autechre duo. SRJL is extremely talented in the one-woman band realm, singing, playing multiple keyboards and manually governing a bank of electronic beat-maker boxes. Her sonics continually shifted, offering surprises, and her songs were well-lit but still slightly sinister. Down into the grassy earhole of David Lynch, we hope. A perfect midnight chanteuse, she was, with creeping basslines, a synth impersonating a theremin. "My name is Salami," she announces cheerfully. SRJL's songs made softly circular gyrations, with purring, playful vocals and meaow-ing synths. She sounded like a heavily altered cabaret singer, appearing in an interstellar arcade game. The bewitched audience perhaps had thoughts of Sun Ra or Moondog. At one strategic point, she absolutely shocked by suddenly producing a harmonica for a perfectly poised solo. The only sorrowful part was the sudden curfew-ending of SRJL's set, to make way for a Main Stage appearance by the rock-techno truckers Stavros.

Let us all hope that there is hope for the return of Jazz Middelheim in 2024, perhaps even run by Greenhouse, presuming that this Gent Jazz edition is considered a financial success...

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