Newport Jazz Festival

[Guy Berger]

I'm going with some friends on Saturday. Here's the schedule.

Shows I'm probably catching:

Carla Bley

Joe Lovano & Dave Liebman

mark whitfield trio, maybe (or lunch)

McCoy Tyner w/Ravi Coltrane & Terrell Stafford (or perhaps Kurt Rosenwinkel's group)

Brad Mehldau

Wynton Marsalis, maybe (or dinner)

Charles Lloyd

[Hardbopjazz]

I'm going with some friends on Saturday.  Here's the schedule.

Wynton Marsalis, maybe (or dinner)

←

Dinner sounds like the correct choice.

[sal]

[danasgoodstuff]

My wife and I are going, see seperate thread...

[robviti]

i'll be there on sunday. so will steve schwartz and a lot of nice people from the boston area, thanks to wgbh, our local public radio station. they've arranged to take a bus load of jazz fans from boston and rhode island to the festival. heck, they even feed them! as long as the weather holds up, it should be a great time!

[Guy Berger]

Alright folks, it looks like it will be a brutally hot Saturday in Newport tomorrow. If anyone sees a dude in flip-flops, blue shorts, white t-shirt and baseball cap with a "Y" on it that's me.

Guy

[robviti]

i don't know if i'd call a predicted high of 88 "brutally hot," but it could be uncomfortable. fort adams is on the water, so hopefully you'll feel the benefit of an ocean breeze. enjoy the music!

Edited August 13, 2005 by jazzshrink

[Guy Berger]

A brief review of Saturday:

Got there a little late and missed Carla Bley's set, unfortunately.

Caught the tail end of the Saxophone Summit w/Joe Lovano, Dave Liebman, Phil Markowitz, Cecil McBee, and Billy Hart. This show didn't do much for me, despite being a fan of the concept (post-bop saxophonists taking on Trane's '65 & onward music) and several of the musicians. A little too focused on the individuals. My perspective might be skewed by the fact that it was hot and I could barely see the stage.

I saw a bit of the Mark Whitfield trio. Very good -- I might have to pick up one of his albums at some point! The drummer was excellent, though I don't remember his name. Reuben Rogers on bass.

At this point I decided to see McCoy's quintet w/Ravi Coltrane and Terrell Stafford instead of Kurt Rosenwinkel's group, which might have been a mistake. While McCoy with horns is a lot more exciting than McCoy in a trio (which, at least the one time I saw him, was a little dull), something was missing. Ravi was very good. The highlights of the set were a great version of "Mana Layuca" as well as a Trane tune that I didn't recognize (and sounded like it came straight of a mid-60s "progressive" BN session). I didn't like McCoy's bassist. As far as McCoy's health, he looked kind of frail.

The highlight of the day (for me) was Brad Mehldau's solo set. I'm not a big Mehldau fan -- I really liked his work with Charles Lloyd, but am ambivalent about the one trio album I have (vol. 4). Still, he was terrific. He did a Nick Drake tune from Pink Moon whose title I can't remember, "Mother Nature's Son" (I think), "Countdown", "How Long Has This Been Going On" and some other tunes. Really great -- I might have to pick his recent solo album.

Then I decided to skip out on the Ponty/Fleck/Clarke trio and get good seats for the Charles Lloyd group. That meant that I caught most of the Wynton Marsalis quintet performance, which was kind of boring.

The Lloyd group performance was mixed. The rhythm section (Geri Allen, Reuben Rogers & Eric Harland) was great. Charles started out really strong (a great sax-drums) duet but seemed to lose energy and focus near the end of the set. I was a little disappointed given that the set started out so strongly.

Guy

[Jazz Kat]

I've heard so much about that festival. I want to go there one day. Well at least, you can say you went.

[take5]

My girlfriend and I attended. We had fun.

Because we came from far away and I had to drive a lot, we came a bit late both days and left early Sunday. I was actually planning to stay to the end on Sunday because I though Brubeck was playing later but since he went on early we left earlier. I didn't feel like sitting through Chick Corea even though I bet the Roy Haynes thing was fun.

Acts I missed that I would have liked to see; Haynes, Patricia Barber, and especially the Dave Holland Big Band.

This was the third time I've seen McCoy Tyner. I enjoyed him a lot before but not soe much here, though I only caught the last couple of tunes. I agree with Guy about the bass player- too show-offy and mugging for the audience. Ravi Coltrane was fantastic. The trumpet player was too loud and like the bass player. Of course the audience cheered for the two guys I didn't like. Whatever. Tyner was leaning as heavy on the chords as always.

I was not familiar with Brad Meldau but we enjoyed his solo piano performance. My girlfriend likes that sort of thing anyway. I found it pleasant and musically interesting, a nice middle ground. We stayed longer for that than we though we would.

I tried to check out some of the Fleck/Clarke/Ponty trio. Even though I don't like "fusion," I figured these three together should sound interesting. But everytime I approached the stage one of them was playing solo. zzzzzzzzzzz Meanwhile my gf was in the bathroom/gift shop and I got so bored I went to find her and when I did she was like "so how's the ban?" and I blurt out "now the bass player's just jerking off himself" and some woman shoots me a fantastically dirty look.

Wynton was kinda dull.

Charles Lloyd was nice, I just really like his ballad playing.

The second day was a lot better. I got a real kick out of Brubeck. I've never seen him before. He played with energy and invention, delving into free and trad and swing and bop stylings. Very nice quartet music. The topped it off with a rousing rendition of Take the A Train with Wynton. A did an uncharacteristically corny thing for me: went up to the front to snap a pic of Brubeck. My first attempt failed 'cause Wynton stepped in front, but I believe my 2nd attempt was more successful.

We ended the day with Lovano and Hank Jones, reliving our first date over a year ago when we saw the same band (with Paul Motian instead of this drummer) at the Iridium in NYC. Musically, this was the finest performance of the weekend. These guys are just so tight, so sweet, and Jones really is the master of taste and elegance. I realised that nothing Corea or the possibly circus-like nature of the Haynes b-day thing would top it, so we left.

[Guy Berger]

My girlfriend and I attended.  We had fun.

You weren't the dude from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan that I was talking to after the Lloyd set, were you?

Guy