New Zealand Jazz Gigs

The sublime odyssey of Hank Jones

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I have never met a Jazz aficionado who did not like the pianist Hank Jones.  Because he was still recording so frequently at age ninety one it was tempting to think that he would live for ever.   To see footage of Hank playing was to love him because he radiated a rare warmth and a humanity.  His early influences in Jazz piano were Fats Waller and Art Tatum.  He was also there from the inception of Bebop but somehow he seemed to span the whole history of Jazz in his chordal voicing; which stretched from stride to post bop .   Joyous music ran out of his fingers like water from a faucet and we loved him because he was a Jazz god living among us. He believed that good Jazz should be infused with the blues and he practiced what he preached.  As he got older you could hear him happily sigh and chuckle as he played.  His deep throated vocalisations though quiet, somehow gave additional joy to his already joyous swinging music.

Hank was born in 1918 into a musical Mississippi family and his younger brothers Thad and Elvin became Jazz greats in their own right.  In his later years wide-spread recognition came his way but his innate modesty meant that the praise washed over him.  Hank was a great teacher and he never failed to support up-and-coming musicians.  A number of careers benefited from his support and this was a gift that he bestowed right up until his passing.   Hank left us in 2010 and the loss is still keenly felt.  A visit to the official Hank Jones web site will lessen the blow, because as you hear him welcome you, the realisation comes that his legacy and above all his music will remain with us always.

Groove Jazz

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El Hombre Pat Martino

'El Hombre' Pat Martino, Birdland NYC

I was eagerly looking through the information about the up and coming visit from Sonny Rollins when I saw in the fine-print a list of the musicians who would be touring with him.    The inclusion of groove guitarist Peter Bernstein pleased me greatly    I am a fan of Peter Bernstein with his rapid fire, deep groove, Grant Green style.    He plays a lot in New York clubs and  when I was there recently I had hoped to see him.     As it turned out I missed him by a week but my desire to hear a Chicago – Philly style guitar, drums and organ trio was certainly fulfilled.   I turned up at ‘Birdland’ on a hot Autumn evening to find Pat Martino was playing and I thought that I had won the lottery.     My wife was a little horrified when she saw the ‘B3’ on the stage and I am the first to admit that it is an acquired taste.  Pat ‘El Hombre’ Martino played deep in the pocket and with an intensity that I have seldom witnessed.    His ‘Blue on Green’ was pure bliss and I still get a lump in my throat when I think of it.   Pat is a guitar hero on many levels and he didn’t disappoint that night.    He played his bop infused groove lines as if he were flying free of the world,with his trio in lock step.

Organ-Guitar Jazz is full throated, raunchy and intensely bluesy.   This style is redolent of an era when Jazz was losing part of its black audience to R & B and starting to fight back.   This funky backstreets music reclaimed some of that turf and found a home on what was termed the ‘Chitlins Circuit’.     Richard Groove Homes, Grant Green, Wes Montgomery, Pat Martino, Jimmy Smith, Brother Jack McDuff, Jimmy McGriff, Big John Patton. Shirley Scott and many others were associated with this style.     One of my favourites in this style was Gene Ammons (tenor sax) who liked to play the Chicago clubs when ever he could.    This was not often sadly because he was frequently in jail for narcotics violations.    His label Prestige indulged him and recored him frequently; knowing that he would be behind bars again before too long.     He is always associated with his ballad albums such as Gentle Jug (which his manager had insisted upon as a good career move), but I still like the badly recorded club dates such as the one where he is accompanied by Eddie Buster (B3) and Gerald Donavan (drums).  Those two are now long forgotten but didn’t they groove with ‘Jug’.    This is a happy music that sets the body swaying and I will often return to it after a period of listening to more cerebral offerings.   This is the intersection in my adolescent life where I discovered jazz and I have joyful memories of bunking off school and wearing out copies of an album called ‘The Chicago Sound’.

For this style of music look on You Tube for Pat Martino’s rendition of ‘Sunny’ with Joey DeFrancesco and prepare to be seriously ‘grooved’.

Concerts in the wind.

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Quick Concert update:

This Saturday we get to hear the amazing Jack deJohnette – colourist and straight ahead master of the ‘traps’- probably the greatest drummer alive.     Jack’s band is performing an update on the ‘Miles Davis‘ fusion classic ‘Jack Johnson‘.     Next month Herbie Hancock is returning to Auckland (Tuesday 26th March) and his new ‘Imagine Project’ band will include talented Benin Guitarist Lionel Loueke.   I was in touch with old friend Larry Koonse last week (gifted West Coast Jazz guitarist) and he told me that he will likely be here again in a few months with the Roger Fox Big Band.     He may even return with Joe La Barbera like last time.

Lastly saxophone colossus Sonny Rollins is going to be playing in Wellington this winter (July).    As grumpy as I am with Wellington for canceling the International Jazz Festival because of the World Cup I will attend.     Swapping Jazz for rugby is a cardinal sin (or it bloody well should be).

Night in Tunisia

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Youssef Dhafer at Moers Festival, June 2006, G...

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In the mid nineties I was lucky enough to visit Switzerland for two weeks. Walking happily and aimlessly around the beautiful shores of Lac Lemon, Geneva, one summer evening, I came across five North African musicians playing entrancing modal melodies on the traditional instruments of their region. As I recall there was an Oud, hand drums, a reed instrument and several other stringed instruments.  I stopped to listen and during a break in the music asked them the obligatory, “what country are you from?”  “Tunisia” they called out with huge grins indicating their traditional costumes.  “Dizzy Gillespie”,  I said turning to my friend Michael as I threw a few Swiss francs into the cap that lay in front of them. We had hardly walked on a dozen steps when a cheerful cry of  “hey English” accosted us.  As we turned round the musicians began channeling Dizzy and to my ears that version of ‘Night in Tunisia” sounded just wonderful. I marvelled that they should know that 1940’s American Be-Bop warhorse because they were barely more than teens.  Jazz can truly be a world-music.

Some years ago I listened to a not-so-successful attempt to use an Oud in Jazz. The band was about in the late 1950’s and the ‘fusion’ was far from convincing; a novelty at best.  As the ECM label broadened the scope of its Jazz offerings I began to hear marvelous improvised music on the Oud. In the late 90’s I purchased several CD’s by Tunisian Oud player Anouar Brahem (a Keith Jarrett influenced musician). The Oud creates a wonderful soundscape and the deep improvisations the instrument is capable of adds much to the musical lexicon.

In 2009 at the Wellington Jazz festival I decided on a whim to go to an additional concert. The group was lead by Sufi Tunisian Oud player Dhafer Youssef.  This concert was up-there  as an experience and I enjoyed every note. His band consisted of Marcin Wasilewski (piano), Michal Miskiewiscz (drums) and a great Canadian arco-stick-bass player whose name now eludes me. Dhafer sung his other worldly songs and played the Oud and the crowd was entranced.  Having the heart of the utterly brilliant Tomasz Stanko band as his rhythm section did not hurt either.

The Oud is just fine by me.