That headline is intentionally misleading.
Yet not as misleading as this one, from New York’s Daily News: “Jazz saxophonist Robert Vineberg, arrested for heroin dealing in Philip Seymour Hoffman net, has A-list recording credits”
And neither is as clever or cynical as this one, from trumpeter Nicholas Payton‘s website: “Another Shot in the Arm for Jazz,” which ran atop Payton’s riff in response to the Daily News piece.
Through his music, Payton has attracted a wide range of listeners and consistent acclaim: His most recent CD, “Sketches of Spain” (BMF Records), revisits the classic Miles Davis-Gil Evans collaboration of the same name, expanding his working group into a 19-piece ensemble conducted by Dennis Russell Davies.
Though his website, Payton has angered a great number of people during the last few years, mostly through a series of blog posts beginning with one on November 27, 2011 titled, “On Why Jazz Isn’t Cool Anymore.” His prose style can veer toward anger, his posts sometimes sounding like rants. Yet he nearly always has good and necessary points to make, not least that to talk about the word “jazz” and about whatever music you associate with that word is also, at some point (if you’re honest and well-educated) to consider the issue of race. Payton’s 2011 post, which was structured almost like a poem, contained these lines: Continue reading “When Nicholas (Payton) Met Philip (Seymour Hoffman)”
What The Songwriting World Needs Now
Burt Bacharach‘s music has resonated through every generation and genre since he first started composing hit songs more than a half-century ago. His memorable and distinctive music, along with the words of his longtime collaborator, lyricist Hal David, gets a focused celebration six nights each week at the New York Theater Workshop, through “What’s It All About?—Bacharach Reimagined” (which has been extended through Feb. 15th.)
I’ve not yet seen the show, but Charles Isherwood, writing in The New York Times, assures that it isn’t “another jukebox musical manufactured to supply baby boomers with a sweet rush of synthetic nostalgia.” Instead, Isherwood writes, “the musical reinvigorates the staged-songbook genre by stripping familiar pop songs of their shiny veneer, and by digging into the melancholy and yearning that suffuses so many of the hits Mr. Bacharach wrote.”
Aside from his compositions and David’s lyrics, Bacharach’s own words commanded attention recently, lending a different sort of context to his catalog of hits on the Opinion page of The Wall Street Journal. In an essay titled “What The Songwriting World Needs Now,” he implored the U.S. Justice Department to revise the consent decrees that govern licenses (and therefore, pay, for composers, lyricists and musicians) in order to align with a digital world that, under the current scheme, amounts to a badly rigged game (with artists coming out the losers). Bacharach began by describing his humble beginnings: Continue reading “What The Songwriting World Needs Now”
Now Playing (New & Forthcoming CDs)…
So many things—the holidays, deadlines, a nasty flu that I beat back—have led to a terrifingly tall stack of music to catch up with, yet also alluring once I see what it contains. I’ve begun to dig in; more soon…
Rufus Reid Quiet Pride: The Elizabeth Catlett Project (Motema Music, Feb. 11): Now 70, bassist Reid has a half-century of important music-making to his credit, alongside the likes of saxophonists Stan Getz and Dexter Gordon, trombonist J.J. Johnson, drummer Jack DeJohnette and singer Nancy Wilson. For a quarter-century, he mentored countless musicians as director of the jazz studies and performance program at New Jersey’s William Patterson University. He’s spent the past decade or so developing as a composer, and creating music that’s mostly intended for large ensembles and orchestras. For this ambitious new work, Reid was inspired by the sculpture of Elizabeth Catlett, who died in 2012 at 96. Her iconic works, which often carry powerful African American themes, include the statue of Louis Armstrong near Congo Square in New Orleans and can also be found in collections at the White House and the Museum of Modern Art. Here, Reid’s music is realized by 20 musicians, most of them, such as drummer Herlin Riley, standard-bearing players. Yet it’s his own voice and composer—as distinctive as the one he projected as a bassist—that makes grand statements out of mostly subtle gestures. Continue reading “Now Playing (New & Forthcoming CDs)…”
Relaxin' With Karen Oberlin
Too many singers try too hard these days. At least, that’s how it seems.
Some labor to appear as though not trying or caring at all, approximating the ubiquitous small-voiced detachment of indie pop. Others make their grandiose efforts abundantly clear in case there is a celebrity panel nearby to judge them into stardom (as, often, there is).
All of which makes it that much more relaxing and rewarding to spend time with a singer who is fine with just being natural, who needs nothing more. If she’s working hard, well, that’s between her and, say, her guitarist.
Such was the case during Karen Oberlin’s late set on Saturday at Manhattan’s Jazz at the Kitano club, within the Kitano Hotel, where Oberlin and guitarist Sean Harkness celebrated the release of a duo CD, “A Wish” (Miranda Music). Continue reading “Relaxin' With Karen Oberlin”
Amid Winter Jazzfest's Glorious Sprawl, Threadgill Salutes Morris
The Winter Jazzfest, now in its tenth year, has grown into a signature event of New York’s jazz scene. Like the environment it reflects, relationships hold its keys to discovery and understanding. Saturday night at Judson Church in Greenwich Village, within a sprawling nine-venue marathon featuring scores of bands, composer Henry Threadgill had assembled a seven-piece group, Ensemble Double-Up, to premiere a piece, “Old Locks and Irregular Verbs,” in remembrance of his friend, composer and conductor Butch Morris, who died in January 2013. My account is here. Continue reading “Amid Winter Jazzfest's Glorious Sprawl, Threadgill Salutes Morris”
On the Resonant Voices of Roy Campbell and Amiri Baraka
Yesterday I was shaken by the deaths of two men: Roy Campbell, 61, a musician who expressed himself best on trumpet, flugelhorn and pocket trumpet but also played flute, was an insightful writer, and acted in independent films and plays; and Amiri Baraka, 79, who is best known as an influential poet, playwright and critic but whose use of words as rhythm and color and whose many performances with jazz ensembles counts him as a musician of high order in my book.
That they passed on the same day merely highlights many points of connection—cultural, spiritual and intellectual—regarding their respective arcs of art and life, not to mention one regular spot of physical convergence, Manhattan’s annual Vision Festival. That’s where I saw and heard Baraka, wearing reading glasses and a cardigan sweater, holding a book of his own prose onstage, making the phrase “We were slaves” sound alternately tender and fierce, sad and angry, as set against the thrum of William Parker’s bass. And it’s where I began a friendship I’ll always treasure with Campbell, who played in multiple Vision Fest set most years, sometimes alongside Parker, his dear friend and longtime associate, and often leading his own powerful bands.
It will take me a while to process these passings, and I’m sure to write about each of these men separately to celebrate their distinctive achievements and spirits: They were towering artists and very different men whose warmth, wit and wisdom took often contrasting forms. I suspect I’ll be attending gatherings in each of their honors.
But just now, I want to mark the moment and acknowledge how much both of them taught me about what black music sounds like, why it sounds that way, and what that might mean. I want to share these black-and-white photos by Peter Gannushkin. I want to relay what musicians have told me about Campbell and what Baraka and Campbell have said to me. Continue reading “On the Resonant Voices of Roy Campbell and Amiri Baraka”
Celebrating (and Protecting) Brass & Heritage
The first annual New York Brass and Heritage Festival kicked up last night, with New Orleans-based Rebirth Brass Band taking the stage of Manhattan’s Blue Note jazz club for a four-night residency. That gig culminates in a midnight after-party (with, I presume, special guests) on Jan. 10. The Rebirth band earned a Grammy Award in 2012. But they’ve long been heroes in the clubs and streets of their hometown.
If Rebirth revolutionized New Orleans brass-band tradition, incorporating funk and pop elements and attitude, they were turning the next page, following the innovations of their fellow New Orleans trailblazers Dirty Dozen Brass Band, who are also featured in the Brass and Heritage Festival (at the Highline Ballroom, Jan. 10, with Red Baraat, a Brooklyn-based group who blend second-line beats and sounds with North Indian bhangra rhythms, go-go music, hip-hop and beyond).
This five-night affair is subtitled “New Orleans in New York.” It extends, stylistically, well beyond brass-band music and, geographically, outside New Orleans borders. Continue reading “Celebrating (and Protecting) Brass & Heritage”
Rumba with Román Díaz
If it’s midnight on a Thursday in Manhattan, Román Díaz is holding court at the Zinc Bar in Greenwich Village. He’s playing bata and conga drums, chanting and singing, sometimes rising to dance. He’s making music and enacting rituals with old friends and new partners, inviting in ancient spirits as he lends new edge to New York’s scene.
The rumba is on.
Read my full piece about the wide-ranging influence of Díaz and his upcoming gigs here. Continue reading “Rumba with Román Díaz”
Now Playing (forthcoming CDs)….
The streak continues. I’m not talking about the losing ways of the New York Knicks, but rather the influx of new CDs suggesting that 2014 will match or surpass this year’s excellent output. Here are a few more reasons to be cheerful: Continue reading “Now Playing (forthcoming CDs)….”
Yusef Lateef, Multi-Instrumentalist with a Borderless Aesthetic, Dies at 93
At the celebratory concert for the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters in 2010, when multi-instrumentalist Yusef Lateef was inducted into this exclusive fraternity, one had to wonder what he thought of the title. Throughout his life, Lateef, who referred to his music as “autophysiopsychic music,” a term he devised to mean “from one’s physical, mental and spiritual self, and also from the heart.” He rejected the term “jazz” for its pejorative associations and limiting implications.
Indeed, after Lateef’s death on Tuesday, at 93, the brief obituary posted on his website acknowledged his 2010 honor as “the National Endowment for the Arts Award.” Continue reading “Yusef Lateef, Multi-Instrumentalist with a Borderless Aesthetic, Dies at 93”