A Jazz Singer Saunters Through Old and New
Giacomo Gates approaches jazz singing with a showmans poise and an aficionados zeal. Holding court on Wednesday night in the mezzanine lounge of the Kitano New York Hotel, he was solicitous but cool. He wanted to let his listeners in on a secret, bring them into his confidence. With his deep, cognac baritone and his vintage-hipster lexicon, he seemed an appreciative throwback, eager to share credit with his precursors while mindful of keeping a little for himself.
Opening with Melodious Funk, a medium-bright swinger from his most recent album, Luminosity (G88), Mr. Gates laid out his core principles from the start: sporty syncopations, nimble turns of phrase, sure-footed scat choruses. His stage manner conveyed a muted but stout physicality, perhaps as a byproduct of his experience. (Before turning full time to jazz in 1990, he spent more than a dozen years in heavy construction, working on the Trans-Alaska pipeline, among other things.) In his phrasing and his bearing, he upheld a distinctly masculine ideal of deceptive nonchalance.
Opening with Melodious Funk, a medium-bright swinger from his most recent album, Luminosity (G88), Mr. Gates laid out his core principles from the start: sporty syncopations, nimble turns of phrase, sure-footed scat choruses. His stage manner conveyed a muted but stout physicality, perhaps as a byproduct of his experience. (Before turning full time to jazz in 1990, he spent more than a dozen years in heavy construction, working on the Trans-Alaska pipeline, among other things.) In his phrasing and his bearing, he upheld a distinctly masculine ideal of deceptive nonchalance.
