What live music are you going to see tonight?

[HolyStitt]

Friday it was Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings at First Avenue. Tonight it is Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys at The Cedar.

[Van Basten II]

Friday it was Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings at First Avenue. Tonight it is Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys at The Cedar.

So, how was Sharon ?

[Van Basten II]

If time permits i should see those fellows monday night.

ACHIM KAUFMANN • FRANK GRATKOWSKI • WILBERT DE JOODE

[HolyStitt]

Friday it was Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings at First Avenue. Tonight it is Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys at The Cedar.

So, how was Sharon ?

She was wonderful. No Budos Band but the Dap Kings and her (at least the Dap Kings) were on stage for a solid two hours. The place was very packed. She said that it was the first show she had ever sold out.

When you saw her did she do James Brown songs for the encore?

BTW: Dr. Stanley was a treat tonight. He doesn't play banjo much (only one song) but the band and him were great. The highlights were Angel Band, Pretty Polly (my request), and Oh, Death

[Kalo]

I attended the Maria Schneider Orchestra's Boston debut last night.

Underwhelming, to say the least.

I think I'd dig a live gig from Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings a whole lot more.

[sidewinder]

Charles Tolliver Big Band in London tonight - and Tolliver 'in conversation' before that. Part of London Jazz Festival week.

Edited November 19, 2007 by sidewinder

[Van Basten II]

Friday it was Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings at First Avenue. Tonight it is Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys at The Cedar.

So, how was Sharon ?

She was wonderful. No Budos Band but the Dap Kings and her (at least the Dap Kings) were on stage for a solid two hours. The place was very packed. She said that it was the first show she had ever sold out.

When you saw her did she do James Brown songs for the encore?

BTW: Dr. Stanley was a treat tonight. He doesn't play banjo much (only one song) but the band and him were great. The highlights were Angel Band, Pretty Polly (my request), and Oh, Death

As i mentionned in the previous post, she did It's a man man man's world, in Montreal the show turned out to be a sold out, the last tickets were probably sold while the first set was going on.

Did she pace herself because with the level of energy she exhudes, i hardly can beleive that she was able to last two hours on stage.

Edited November 19, 2007 by Van Basten II

[Van Basten II]

I attended the Maria Schneider Orchestra's Boston debut last night.

At least you had the chance of seeing her

[king ubu]

Tonight: Trio 3 here in Zurich (Oliver Lake-sax; Reggie Workman-bass; Andrew Cyrille-drums).

Same venue where the Swell/Ullmann Quartet played ten days ago with 13 people in the audience... I certainly hope the names of Lake, Workman and Cyrille will draw some more attention!

Excellent group to see live!

Sorry to say I didn't find them convincing... mainly Lake, pretty uninteresting player, falling back on cliches too often, doing the overpowering high energy stuff, not building many coherent solos. Cyrille seemed tired but had a few good spots and generally played quite good. Workman was great, good sound (although pick-up > amp) and his solo spot (they did three solos towards the end) was beautiful. Also, contrary to Cyrille (disinterested) and Lake (arrogant, at least that's what he seemed to be, not only to me but also to a few friends who where there), Workman was projecting warmth and joy while on stage.

Will see Trio 3 again on Saturday... haven't given up hope quite yet even more so after getting some flak over in another thread. This time they'll play at the Unerhört festival and Irene Schweizer will play with them!

PROGRAMM AM SAMSTAG, 20 UHR, Clubraum – Rote Fabrik

Yves Reichmuth FRACTAL

Yves Reichmuth guitar, composition | Lucien Dubuis bassclarinet, contrabassclarinet | Jonas Tauber bass | Lionel Friedli drums

Lucas Niggli ZOOM

Lucas Niggli drums | Nils Wogram trombone | Philipp Schaufelberger guitar

Oliver Lake – Reggie Workman – Andrew Cyrille feat. Irène Schweizer

Oliver Lake alto & sopranino saxophones | Irène Schweizer piano |

Reggie Workman bass | Andrew Cyrille drums

On sunday then:

PROGRAMM AM SONNTAG, 19 UHR, Jazzclub Moods

Oliver Lake – Christian Weber – Dieter Ulrich

Oliver Lake alto-, sopranino saxophones | Christian Weber bass

Dieter Ulrich drums

Reggie Workman Solo

Reggie Workman bass

Brötzmann – Pliakas – Wertmüller

Peter Brötzmann saxophon, clarinet | Marino Pliakas e-bass

Michael Wertmüller drums

Zoom, Schweizer, Workman and Brötz are the main interest, but I'll gladly let myself surprise by Lake this time! And Lucien Dubuis, who's part of the first band that appears on Saturday, he's great, too!

[HolyStitt]

Did she pace herself because with the level of energy she exhudes, i hardly can beleive that she was able to last two hours on stage.

The only way this was noticeable was that slower songs were in the set between one or two faster tunes that took more work for her.

[Free For All]

I attended the Maria Schneider Orchestra's Boston debut last night.

Underwhelming, to say the least.

Care to elaborate further?

[Kalo]

I attended the Maria Schneider Orchestra's Boston debut last night.

Underwhelming, to say the least.

Care to elaborate further?

I'd only heard one or two things of hers before attending the concert and I was underwhelmed because I guess I expected something more given all of the hype she gets. Impressive musicianship and inventive arranging, but her melodies, if you can call them that, don't stick at all, so it felt like a lot of decoration and little substance. A lot of it sounded like film music to me. And I am not a fan of that pastoral, mid-Western, hymnal, Methenyish vibe that most of her music has. It doesn't swing but more flows and glides. It's very airy and sometimes watery sounding. Any traces of fire or earth came from the soloists. I did like some of the soloists, especially Donny McCaslin, Rich Perry, Steve Wilson, and Ryan Keberle. Drummer Ted Poor was impressive. I've enjoyed Frank Kimbrough a lot more in other settings. I did like the tune "Choro Dancado" quite a bit. The syncopated Cuban rhythm seemed to focus the piece, and it had a darker harmonic palette most of the others. But overall, just not my cup of tea.

[BruceH]

I attended the Maria Schneider Orchestra's Boston debut last night.

Underwhelming, to say the least.

Care to elaborate further?

I'd only heard one or two things of hers before attending the concert and I was underwhelmed because I guess I expected something more given all of the hype she gets. Impressive musicianship and inventive arranging, but her melodies, if you can call them that, don't stick at all, so it felt like a lot of decoration and little substance. A lot of it sounded like film music to me. And I am not a fan of that pastoral, mid-Western, hymnal, Methenyish vibe that most of her music has. It doesn't swing but more flows and glides. It's very airy and sometimes watery sounding. Any traces of fire or earth came from the soloists. I did like some of the soloists, especially Donny McCaslin, Rich Perry, Steve Wilson, and Ryan Keberle. Drummer Ted Poor was impressive. I've enjoyed Frank Kimbrough a lot more in other settings. I did like the tune "Choro Dancado" quite a bit. The syncopated Cuban rhythm seemed to focus the piece, and it had a darker harmonic palette most of the others. But overall, just not my cup of tea.

Methenyish? Sounds positively Eno-ish.

[JohnJ]

No flaming please.

Elton John.

Actually, should be fun.

[Van Basten II]

Going to see tonight these dudes

Just hope that they're only gonna take my money and not rape my wife or touch the children

Seriously it should be a very good night of African music, fans of Ali Farka Touré should enjoy this band

Edited November 23, 2007 by Van Basten II

[Teasing the Korean]

I'm in Branson, MO for the weekend. Gonna check out John Coltrane.

[Van Basten II]

I'm in Branson, MO for the weekend. Gonna check out John Coltrane.

I heard that he played very long solos, tell us more.

[king ubu]

I had typed up a long post about last night's concerts at the Unerhört Festival, it got lost after I hit "add reply", effin' sucks! I don't feel like typing up all the b-s again, it's such a pain to tranlate all of these adjectives and stuff about music into merikan, suffice it to repeat from the lost post that Trio 3 & Irene Schweizer definitely were da shit, as they say!

So I'm reconsidering my opinion on Oliver Lake, even though again he failed to convince me completely... he's certainly serious about what he's doing, that I'd never deny, but still, as an instrumentalist, he fails to really blow me away.

[Elissa]

We caught Dave Brubeck last night at the Bluenote. Really beautiful show, far exceeded my expectations.

[EKE BBB]

On Friday, at the CMU San Juan Evangelista:

-Tri-ez (Agustín Fernández (p); Baldo Martínez (b); Ramón López (d))

On Saturday, double program at the Centro Cultural de la Villa:

-Gilson Peranzetta (p)

-Lee Konitz New Nonet

[ASNL77]

I went to see Sonny Rollins last night at the Barbican Centre in London. I had never had the chance to see Sonny before and it was well worth the money. The man is still on top of things. Superb play. Nice to see him in great form with his sound intact. Bob Cranshaw was on the bass, Jeremy Jennings on drums , Anderson on the trombone. Guitar and percussions to complete the line-up. I can't believe the man is 77.

[sidewinder]

Glad to hear it went well. I'm dead jelous, of course.

[king ubu]

This was what I caught yesterday:

Oliver Lake – Christian Weber – Dieter Ulrich

Oliver Lake alto-, sopranino saxophones | Christian Weber bass

Dieter Ulrich drums

Very good - Lake (sticking to alto btw) was excellent in this setting. Weber is a young(ish) local bass player who's up and coming (disc out on hatOLOGY, for instance, very active here), and Ulrich is an older local guy, also pretty active. It was fun to see the three play sort of old-fashioned 60s-ish free jazz, sometimes with changes, sometimes with some kind of fixed beat, sometimes with none of that... Ulrich was fun, even more so compared to the too restrained/controlled Lucas Niggli from the night before... very lose and pretty light drumming, though in the tradition of Elvin and the other great ones. Weber has a beautiful sound on bass and lots of good ideas. And Lake convinced me even more than last night... I'm not a fan yet but this was a mighty fine gig from him. They started out with a tune that I think was by Steve Lacy, but I'm not quite sure.

Reggie Workman Solo

Reggie Workman bass

Then Workman for a half-hour bass solo, which he announced as "Sketch". Pretty nice, more great double bass sound, and of course it was a joy to watch this master (he was low in the mix during the Trio 3/Schweizer set on Saturday, so it was even better to really hear him this time). He mostly played traditional, jazzy stuff, but in between did some percussive things and some unconventional stuff, also bowing some. Nothing earth-shattering, but it was good.

Brötzmann – Pliakas – Wertmüller

Peter Brötzmann saxophon, clarinet | Marino Pliakas e-bass

Michael Wertmüller drums

Then to top things off, this earth-shaking band... Brötz on tenor (beginning & encore), alto (most of the time in between) and clarinet (for just one "track"), he was in his loudest mode, what with this earth-shattering band (they even managed to kill a beer glass standing next to me and my friend... the vibrations made it fall off a table and break in hundred pieces...). Wertmüller was astonishing... definitely not from any jazz drumming tradition, rather influenced I assume by hard rock or heavy metal. And Pliakas is playing very fast stuff that you can't actually hear, just feel, paired with Wertmüller's speedy bass drum. Pretty extreme! And on top of that add Brötz in his screaming mode... on alto, he really did hurt the ears... I'm not sure what this was, nor if it was anything much... but it was definitely an experience!

Somehow it all felt very static to me, the only big difference being in some rather beautiful alto sax solo passages, or some slow build-ups by Wertmüller with Pliakas laying out. Other than that, nuance and development is not part of this music...

[Clunky]

end of last week, William Parker and Billy Bang ( their onlly UK date) in an exhilarating set , both were magnificent to say the least, free as you like but swung like hell, loved every minute of it. These two of course go back a fair bit.

[EKE BBB]

Brötzmann – Pliakas – Wertmüller

Peter Brötzmann saxophon, clarinet | Marino Pliakas e-bass

Michael Wertmüller drums

Then to top things off, this earth-shaking band... Brötz on tenor (beginning & encore), alto (most of the time in between) and clarinet (for just one "track"), he was in his loudest mode, what with this earth-shattering band (they even managed to kill a beer glass standing next to me and my friend... the vibrations made it fall off a table and break in hundred pieces...). Wertmüller was astonishing... definitely not from any jazz drumming tradition, rather influenced I assume by hard rock or heavy metal. And Pliakas is playing very fast stuff that you can't actually hear, just feel, paired with Wertmüller's speedy bass drum. Pretty extreme! And on top of that add Brötz in his screaming mode... on alto, he really did hurt the ears... I'm not sure what this was, nor if it was anything much... but it was definitely an experience!

Somehow it all felt very static to me, the only big difference being in some rather beautiful alto sax solo passages, or some slow build-ups by Wertmüller with Pliakas laying out. Other than that, nuance and development is not part of this music...

Caught this Full Blast Trio ten days ago, at the CMU San Juan Evangelista.

IMHO it was disgustingly noisy, boring & uncouth, to say the least. Wertmüller sounded like a German metal drummer, absolutely repetitive and without any idea or sublety (maybe this is his role in this trio). As for Brötmann, without being any expert at all, I have heard several other projects and this is the worst I've heard from him ever. He played four tunes here (tarogato, tenor, metal B flat clarinet and alto) and one encore (alto). He sounded like the same noise the whole 75 minutes. I gotta recognize, though, that I have NEVER heard THAT huge stream of sound coming from a tenor saxophone. It was absolutely impressive (I was at the second row and almost could "touch" that sound... and feel the entrails coming out of the horn).

Just my two cents.