Winter Jazz Fest: Snowblind

When: 3/2/08
Where: MacPhail Center for Music
Who: Shilad Sen (tenor saxophone), Adam Rossmiller (trumpet), Scott Agster (trombone), Graydon Peterson (bass), Reid Kennedy (drums)

I previewed the Winter Jazz Fest for MinnPost but didn't see much of it. I spent most of the day at table for the Dakota Foundation for Jazz Education, conveniently located next to a table for Jazz is NOW! (Hi Jason, hi Meg!) I sneaked away long enough to hear a tune and snap a few pictures of Snowblind, a group I've heard a lot about but hadn't yet seen live. Except for bass and drums, it's all horns. Visit their Web site and hear "Dark Mambo" from their second and latest CD, Taking Shape. Very nice.

Snowblind's set was in a room on the sixth floor of Macphail that holds about 60 people. A great space with clean, clear sound and beautiful light during the day.

Top to bottom: Peterson and Sen; Agster; Rossmiller.

Ellen Lease/Pat Moriarty Jazz Quintet

When: 3/1/08
Where: Studio Z, home of the Zeitgeist new music ensemble
Who: Ellen Lease (piano), Pat Moriarty (alto saxophone), Kelly Rossum (trumpet), Chris Bates (bass), Dave Stanoch (drums)

We snag the last three seats in a row in a small room that fills to standing room capacity. (The young man in the orange polyester zigzag trousers just outside the door keeps selling tickets.) I’m not familiar with Lease, Moriarty, or Stanoch but knowing that Bates and Rossum will play has brought me here tonight.

It’s the first CD release for the avant-garde quintet; Chance, Love, Logic is just out on Innova Recordings, the label of the American Composers Forum and home to George Cartwright, Carei Thomas, Steve Reich, and other interesting modern musicians and composers. All of the compositions on Chance, Love, Logic are originals by Lease and Moriarty.

Lease introduces “Phoebe” as “the oldest tune in our book.” It’s melodic and tuneful. “Phrenology,” named for the practice of determining one’s mental faculties and character by the shape of the skull, is next. Stanoch blows a toy trumpet and the band quotes from “Spinning Wheel,” the song by Blood, Sweat & Tears that in turn quotes “The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round.” It’s a tricky tune with a carny feel.

I think the next song is “Italy” but I can’t be sure. The two horns dance. I’m wishing Lease’s piano was miked, or her playing was a bit more muscular; I’m missing parts of her performance, especially the more lyrical passages.

Lease tells us that the title track was inspired by something she read by Robert Motherwell, who was a philosophy major before he was an artist. He called chance, love, and logic the “eternal values.” As I listen, I wonder if I’m hearing a love song, a melody of chance and improvisation, a logical work, or all three.

“Orange” is an homage to Matisse. The next tune has no title; Lease suggests a contest where we all submit suggestions to win a six-pack of a fancy microbrew. She lays down a thick carpet of arpeggios repeated over and over. Bates bows his bass; Moriarty and Rossum come in together, bending and sliding. I think the word "undertow." A potential name for the tune?

“Liner” leaves room for everyone to solo. “A Round with Sphere” is a bow to Thelonious S. (for Sphere) Monk. “Cloisters,” the final song of the evening, is thoughtful and spiritual; Stanoch plays sleigh bells.

Lease is an artist of subtlety and grace. Since this is the first time I have heard her, I hesitate to speculate on her style, but she doesn’t seem like someone who plays strident runs or splashy chords. I would like to hear her again. Until then, I’ll enjoy the CD by the quintet formerly known as “the best unrecorded band out there.”

Photo of the quintet by John Whiting.

Velvet Bebop Kente Cloth: A Musical Reading

When: 2/29/08
Where: Center for Independent Artists
Who: Douglas R. Ewart, Carei Thomas, Kevin Washington, Aimee Bryant, Isis, e.g. bailey, Tish Jones, Mire Regulus, Khary Jackson, J. Otis Powell!, Ibe Kaba, Laurie Carlos, Bill Cottman, Mankwe Ndosi

I learned about this event while searching the CIA’s Web site for information about Jim Ryan’s Forward Energy Band. I read the brief description —“A staged musical reading of Illinois Poet Sterling Plumpp’s ode to Charlie Parker, Fred Anderson, The Velvet Lounge (Chicago, IL) and Be-Bop!”—and thought, “That sounds intriguing.” Then I clicked on the link, read the cast list, and reserved tickets.

Wherever Douglas Ewart goes is worth checking out—ditto Carei Thomas, Kevin Washington, Bill Cottman, and Mankwe Ndosi. Plus I’ve been to the Velvet Lounge. (As Sean Parnell writes in his Chicago Bar Project, “It’s a pain in the ass to get to the Velvet Lounge but it’s worth the trip.”) The last time I was there, I saw Ewart play with a big band of AACM musicians. There may have been more people on the stage than in the audience, and the stage was about half the size of the club. The music was awesome.

Mankwe Ndosi is a Minneapolis-based performer who works in theater, dance, music, spoken word, and improvisation. I’ve seen her perform before and I like her a lot. She arranged this evening’s performance, and I’ll quote from her notes:

There are forty-seven poems in Velvet BeBop. I asked the word workers to select poems that connected to them—that held heat. We chose sixteen to work. We work the words to worry and shake, sing and riff out meaning. To squeeze and jostle out fragments of our histories—propelling us toward re-memory and metamorphosis…. This reading is a first exploration in putting these poems up on their feet live; with how we transform the conversation between poetry and music, each time is different.

The stage is a swirl of color and energy, language and music, singing and speaking. Bill Cottman sits at the edge of the stage with a laptop; I don’t realize until days later that he’s responsible for the powerful visuals on the screen at the back of the stage. Ewart, wearing a coat of many colorful buttons, has come with an arsenal of instruments and plays them all, including his slide didgeridoo. People dance and twirl and whisper and shout. I see artists who are new to me, including the singer Aimee Bryant, who opens her mouth and knocks me backward in my seat. At the end of her piece, a man sitting in front of me says, “Sheeeeeee*t. That was some stuff.”

The parking lot was full when we arrived; the small hall is packed and the audience is enthusiastic. For this eye-opening, ear-opening, mind-opening event with its large and multitalented cast, we each paid six dollars.

When your/Heart Ache/And troubles sting. Be-Bop/Sing. Be-Bop/Sing.
—Sterling Plumpp

Note: Artists' names listed above are from the program.

Photos, top to bottom: Mankwe Ndosi. Douglas Ewart (center) in his fabulous coat. The joyous end to the evening.

Terell Stafford Quintet

When: 2/27/08 and 2/28/08
Where: Dakota
Who: Terell Stafford (trumpet, flugelhorn), Tim Warfield (tenor and soprano saxophones), Bruce Barth (piano), Phil Palombi (bass), Dana Hall (drums)

Stafford and his quintet are here for two nights and we go for both. It’s the long-delayed CD release for Taking Chances: Live at the Dakota, recorded here in June 2005. The only change in personnel from the CD is the bass player, Phil Palombi, replacing Derrick Hodge.

I learn later that Palombi has just joined Stafford’s quartet; after five years backing singer Curtis Stigers, he has made a big change. This is a terrific quintet. Not only can they play, but they may be the best-dressed group in jazz.

They’re here for the CD but don’t limit themselves to those songs. Wednesday’s set starts with a Bruce Barth tune “Let Me Go,” then a fierce version of “September in the Rain,” a ballad arranged by Bobby Watson’s wife Pamela (quoting “Amazing Grace” near the end), and “Everything Happens to Me,” which resolves into a sweet swinging series of solos; Barth is especially delicious.

Another Pamela Watson arrangement, this time the spiritual “He Knows How Much You Can Bear.” Stafford tells us that he often stayed at the Watsons’ home. (Tomorrow afternoon, when I interview Jaleel Shaw for MinnPost, he, too, will tell me how important Bobby Watson has been to him.)

The set ends with Warfield’s “Shake It for Me,” which is on the CD. Hall takes his big solo of the evening. Someone please tell me why the drum solo always comes at the end.

We arrive late on Thursday and this time hear more from the new CD: “Paper Trail,” written by Hall; the jazz standard “Old Folks” (which I most recently heard Irv Williams play, and it’s also on his latest CD, Finality). For “Old Folks,” Warfield steps back and Stafford mutes his trumpet; it’s sweet and wistful. Stafford’s solo at the end is so beautiful the crowd goes totally silent to hear every note. Once more, Warfield’s “Shake It For Me” ends the set.

In two nights of stellar music, the most pleasant surprise is Palombi. I have always enjoyed hearing him play as part of Stigers’ trio (which, in fact, is the way I prefer to hear Stigers—with a trio, not with accordion and celeste and B3), but I’m seeing a whole new Palombi as part of this quartet. He has a lot more to do, he’s stretching out big-time, and he can’t stop smiling. When you back a singer, the singer is almost always the one in the spotlight. I think this new gig will give Palombi the specific and concentrated attention he has probably deserved for a long time. I'm going to make him a hat.

Stafford on the flugelhorn; the quintet. Photos by John Whiting.

Connie Evingson

When: 2/25/08
Where: Dakota
Who: Connie Evingson (vocals), Phil Aaron (piano), Dave Karr (tenor saxophone, flute), Gordy Johnson (bass), Phil Hey (drums)

It’s the CD release party for Connie Evingson’s eighth recording and maybe her strongest, Little Did I Dream. (The “maybe” is because I’m not familiar with her 2000 release, Some Cats Know, which a lot of singers love.) All 14 tracks are by St. Paul native, jazz legend, and wiseacre Dave Frishberg, who plays piano on the CD and is in the house tonight. It’s an open curtain show and looks sold out. Minneapolis and St. Paul love Connie.

The band warms up with an old song (1938) by Rudolf Friml called “Only a Rose.” Then Connie comes on stage looking fabulous in a sparkly, lacy cocktail dress and shrug. This is her night and she’s ready. She opens with the title track from the CD, “Little Did I Dream,” a swinging, sophisticated tune. Next up is the saucy “Peel Me a Grape,” a song I first heard sung by Diana Krall; it has also been recorded by Blossom Dearie, Shirley Horn, and Anita O’Day, among many others. This is a new arrangement Frishberg created for Connie, speedier than the languid, late-night Krall version.

She follows with the ballad “Our Love Rolls On,” then “Can’t Take You Nowhere,” more smart-aleck Frishberg. She tells us that Frishberg wrote the next tune, “Listen Here,” for Mary Tyler Moore in the 1980s. Before beginning “My Attorney Bernie” (as on the CD, she’s alternating more straight-ahead numbers with the witty lyrics Frishberg is famous for), she tells us that Bernie is in the room tonight as well.

After “Bernie,” Frishberg is persuaded to take the stage. He and the quartet play a song they recorded earlier that day, Fats Waller’s “Sweet and Slow.” Then Frishberg introduces “Quality Time,” a tongue-in-cheek tune about a couple too upwardly mobile for romance (“Come fly with me/Unwind, kick back, relax/I’ll bring my laptop fax/You’ll bring your new screenplay….”). He thanks Connie for making the record and all of us for coming: “This is probably the biggest audience I’ve ever had.” It’s a warm and affectionate segue to “Snowbound,” the song they sing together on the CD.

The first set ends with “Zoot Walks In,” with a spoken lead, Beat Poet style, by Karr (“Jazz is a saxophone sound...”). The second set continues to take us through the CD: a sweet and lovely “Eastwood Lane,” “In the Evening” (just Phil Aaron and Connie on this one), “Zanzibar,” “I Want to Be a Sideman,” “Heart’s Desire.” Connie is relaxed and easy with this music, and she nails every tune.

Frishberg’s Web site is full of fun stuff.

Gordy and Connie. Photo by John Whiting.

Jim Ryan's Forward Energy Band

When: 2/24/08
Where: Center for Independent Artists
Who: Jim Ryan (alto and tenor saxophone, flute, spoken word), Dan Godston (trumpet and percussion), Alicia Mangan (tenor saxophone), Joel Wanek (double bass), Steve Hirsh (drums)

My first time at this venue, a nonprofit membership organization for artists from diverse physical, cultural, and aesthetic perspectives. A small audience, but it is free jazz, which doesn't draw crowds. Some people don’t like it and some won’t even try it. I like it a lot if I experience it live, less so on recordings, because part of the art (and part of the fun) is observing the interaction between the artists.

Behind a curtain before the show, Mangan does t’ai chi. She doesn’t like the spotlight and avoids it for most of the evening. J. Otis Powell! is in the house, one of the few, one of the proud; he sits right in front of me with his head full of dreads. That’s all right; if I want to take pictures, I can move.

Ryan titled this show “Sounds U Have Not Yet Heard,” and quite a few come out of his saxophones. The music ebbs and flows, stops and starts; sometimes they all stop, stand motionless, and you’re not sure if they’re done or not until someone plays a note or a series of notes and they’re off again. Then, like a school of fish or a flock of birds, they turn and head in a new direction. I find the whole thing fascinating.

They’re all fun to watch—Ryan in his red socks, Mangan forgetting the spotlight when she plays, Wanek serious on his bass (which, unfortunately, is undermiked for most of the evening), Hirsh rhythmic on his drums—but my favorite is Godston, who’s everywhere playing everything. His trumpet grunts and mumbles and blows hot air. He sits cross-legged on the ground and plays a Dave King array of what look like toy instruments. He disappears behind a curtain and plunks on an out-of-tune piano. He plays harmonica and mbira (African thumb piano). He whistles. Later, I learn he’s also a poet. A well-rounded, highly creative guy.

Every so often, Ryan lays down his horn or flute and approaches the mike to say a poem—about dying elves and enchanted boys, or a bad wizard (“The wizard rides on yellow wheels/The wizard lies, the wizard steals!”). Again, they pause. They’re perfectly still. We hold our collective breath. We wait.

Photos, top to bottom: Ryan. The whole group. Godston, up to no good.

View a video. Click it. I dare you. (Thanks to Andrea Canter for finding this.)

Kelly's Mutes

The stage at the AQ before the show on 2/23.

Kelly Rossum Quartet

When: 2/23/08
Where: Artists' Quarter
Who: Kelly Rossum (trumpet), Bryan Nichols (piano), Chris Bates (bass), J.T. Bates (drums)

In late February through mid-March, if you don't want to see Kelly Rossum, stay home. Starting with his quartet's two-day stay at the AQ, he's everywhere: performing with the MacPhail Jazz Faculty, with Ellen Lease and Pat Moriarty, running around (but not, I think, performing at) the Winter Jazz Festival, with Woody Witt at the Dakota, with the Jazz is NOW! NOWnet.

This is a great night at the AQ. Davis is at the door, the crowd is mostly attentive, and the music is as good as you'll hear anywhere and better than you'll hear in most places. See for yourself in this video taken by Don Berryman, newly rendered in high definition by YouTube. We were sitting with Don and Beverly so this is pretty much the same thing we saw and heard.



Also on the program: "Fly Away," "Seduction," a funky "Lead Soldiers," "La Vita a Roma," Nichols' "A Word from Our Sponsors" (with a big, bad solo by Chris Bates), "Majestic, Mighty Monarch of the Air," and two tunes from the not-yet-released Family, recorded by this quartet: "After the Snow" and the title track. Much of it was mellow and all of it was good.

Rossum is one of the few artists who regularly updates the performance schedule on his Web site.

Top to bottom: Kelly Rossum, Bryan Nichols. Photos by John Whiting.