Jump to content

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 6.7k
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Top Posters In This Topic

Posted Images

Posted

last night an unexpected and poorly advertised treat.

I saw the ICP orchestra in all its glory, at Edinburgh's Queen's Hall, apparent anarchy and immense beauty in the same bar, Tristan Honsinger was stunning as he veered from total freedom to the purest classical sound and back - , Han Bennink wild as ever, Mary Oliver- not a name I knew was highly expressive on violin/viola, amazing group interplay, highly enjoyable.

Ain't they great!? Honsinger was terrific when I saw them (must have been around 2002/2003)!

I also found Michael Moore to be outstanding (both on alto and clarinet), and Delius was behaving like some kind of weird/nerd/madman, but playing great, too!

As for Mary Oliver, she's been with the ICP gang for a while... when I heard them, she, Honsinger and Glerum did a lengthy string trio improv that was among the highlights!

And I'm a sucker for ICP's Ellingtonia!

Posted

I went to see the CSO last night. If I had known how it would turn out, I would have been better off staying at home. I've known for a long time that the seats get more uncomfortable the higher you go, but now the ones in the upper balcony are sheer agony for me to sit in (something about a slightly unusual angle and being a bit too low to the ground and being too narrow). So I will definitely keep this in mind before buying tickets in the future. If I recall, there are several levels above this (the super gallery?), and those are even more narrow and the stairs have a terrible pitch, but the seats might be higher off the ground.

The conductor was Bernard Haitink. He is looking frail now. He was walking with a cane and sat in a chair to conduct (he did not do this last year, so if you are hoping to hear him conduct you might want to move that up on the agenda). The first piece was a short piece by Purcell, which was ok. The next was Britten's Illuminations sung by Ian Bostrich. I'm not a huge fan of this piece. I generally dislike classical song cycles or lieder or opera (or most jazz vocals for that matter). I suppose it comes down to disliking pieces where meaning is impinged upon by treating the voice as an instrument. Anyway, the problem this time was really with Ian Bostrich. He's got quite a career going on across the Atlantic. He certainly has the look of the Romantic poet, but then he spent half his time singing down at his feet (I guess because he looked cooler that way)! Sorry, we can barely hear you in the cheap seats. I was thoroughly disenchanted.

Anyway, I had primarily gone for Shostakovich's Symphony 15. I was hoping that this would save the night. I've really enjoyed hearing some of his symphonies, but this wasn't one of them. Haitink took the middle movements at a truly glacial pace, and the symphony didn't benefit from it. It just seems too slight when really stretched out and you have to pay such close attention to each element. I was exhausted and basically bored when it finally ended. So it was kind of a bust all the way around, sorry to say.

Posted

Mike Watt & the Missingmen. Opening band was Lite. They're an instrumental outfit from Japan heavily influenced by Explosions in the Sky, Mogwai, etc... Good times.

Posted

Yesterday: Circulasione Totale:

Frode Gjerstad, saxophones/clarinet; Sabir Mateen, saxophones/clarinet; Bobby Bradford, cornet; Børre Mølstad, tuba; Kevin Norton, vibraphone; Anders Hana, guitar; Lasse Marhaug, elctronics; Morten J. Olsen, percussion/electronics; Nick Stephens, bass; Per Zanussi, electric bass; Hamid Drake, drums; Louis Moholo, drums

Quite intense, and with many good moments! Bradford has a beautiful and strong sound on trumpet! And the three drummers were quite something... also Lasse Marhaug did some great stuff and it really made sense having him in this band! Kevin Norton was terrific as well!

Just noticed this. Bobby sent a cd by this band called Open Port and it is fine. Check it out.

Guest Bill Barton
Posted

Tonight it's Deep Listening Band at the Chapel Performance Space after a day at Folklife...

Posted

Went to go see Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey's Circus "Zing Zang Zoom" today with my wife & son. Tonight I'm going to see Marshall Allen and the Sun Ra Arkestra in honor of Marshall's 85th Birthday and Ra's 95th arrival on the planet.

Posted

Two really different shows on Thurs and then Sat. Thurs was Chicago Symphony - two pieces that mixed jazz and classical. Mercer Ellington finished his father's Three Black Kings suite (recorded a handful of times most recently by the American Composers Orchestra on Nimbus). Saxophonist Donald Harrison took chief solo duties. The middle section was played at a very fast clip. I still don't think orchestras can swing -- it just isn't what they are trained to do -- but the CSO was pretty game. The last section, dedicated to Rev. King, was really soulful. The second half was Mark-Anthony Turnage's Scorched, which is his reorchestration of John Scofield pieces. The piece has traditionally been played by Scofield himself, bassist John Patitucci, drummer Peter Erskine, and orchestra. I do wonder if it is one of those pieces that just couldn't be played by some other guitarist. Anyway, it is far more involved that one of those typical jazz with strings in the background. The orchestra cuts across the trio's playing. Sometimes only the guitar and orchestra play. Sometimes it is just the orchestra alone (usually then the trio plays the same tune -- considerably better). I probably would have enjoyed the trio just played their music more than Scorched but it was an interesting experiment. As it happened I had second row seats, so I could actually see the jazz trio close up, and could even watch them reading the music, again something that they wouldn't normally need to do. Still I had a good time, and it was so much better than my last trip to CSO!

Sat. I was visiting my dad, and he thought we should go see a bluegrass music show. I wasn't real big on this, but agreed to go. Well, we went to this small concert venue in a former strip mall church in Thomasville, NC and saw the opening act, which was fairly entertaining, esp. the rapport between the fiddler and the guitarist which was very much in the Sonny and Cher mode. Then the main act was Scott Fore and the Hillbilly Hot Club. The lead guitarist comes from the flat picking guitar tradition, but recently has gotten really, really interested in the music of Django Reinhardt. So these guys play gypsy jazz, with just a slight bluegrass inflection on the guitars and the bass is moved up in the mix. It was really great, much more interesting than a was expecting. I told the rhythm guitarist that I hoped they would record soon. They don't have a CD out yet, but they do have a myspace page with some songs. Hillbilly Hotclub I would encourage people to go see them, though they don't seem to be touring much outside of North Carolina and Virginia so far.

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

This last Tuesday I saw Enrico Rava in Foligno Italy.

471340983.jpg

Great show, he played songs off his last three records in Easy Living, Words and the Days and New York Days in a auditorium built in the 14 hundreds, I will never forget it. At the beginning of my trip I met Stefano Bolani at the Florence airport and got to talk to him for a half hour, he gave me his new cd which was very nice of him.

Posted

Abdullah Ibrahim solo at Jazz Standard - a lovely, subtle, 90 minute set with no breaks between tunes - one piece just melted into the next. He didn't see the person giving him the "10 minute warning" after 50 minutes, so he just kept going! Sublime...........

Posted

Abdullah Ibrahim solo at Jazz Standard - a lovely, subtle, 90 minute set with no breaks between tunes - one piece just melted into the next. He didn't see the person giving him the "10 minute warning" after 50 minutes, so he just kept going! Sublime...........

That's sounds awesome. Lucky you.

Today at Noon a free concert by the Meat Puppets. Later tonight - Sunny Murray and Odean Pope duo.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

×
×
  • Create New...