Irene Schweizer

[jazz1]

It was with great anticipation that I waited for this night to arrive

The venue was unusual for a jazz performance, “The City Hall”

which in days past was used by the Cape Town Symphony Orchestra.

A grand old building sitting about 1300.

As you can imagine the stage is huge and on it just a grand piano

and an amazing set of drums, including kettledrums.

Then the musicians,

Irene Schweizer a small lady with short white hair, dressed in a pair of jeans and a red blouse, she could be a house wife in a small Swiss village rather than a jazz musician, very humble, very unassuming.

Then Louis Moholo, a complete contrast, he is quite big in every respect,

badly dressed with hideous camouflage pants and the most horrible see through

black lace shirt I’ve ever seen, walks around the stage randomly it seems before settling down by his kit.

Irene looks at Louis, shakes her head and them Whaaammm she hits the keyboard with a flurry of notes “a la “ Cecil Taylor, Louis assaults his kits and the sounds coming out of it reminded me of a machine gun, it was so fast, just incredible energy.

After the initial burst things starts to settle down.

Looking around me I could see that most people where flabbergasted, in semi- chock

After all we are in Cape Town where the jazz audience it pretty conservative,

Stuck in the sixties..

They played mostly originals, one aspect that struck me where the intense rhythmic personality of her music, maybe it is because Irene is also a drummer.

I just love the ways she changes tempo, most of the music has an European rather than American quality to it, people that heard Martial Solal may understand what I am trying to put across, it must the classical background coming through.

She played one standard, a Monk tune, which the title escapes me just now

During the second set, the music shifted to a more South African sound, (Kwela-jive) Dollar Brand influence could be clearly heard.

One must remember that when Dollar Brand left Cape Town to go in exile he went to Zurich, and obviously his influence is continuing in Schweizer playing.

This was a hit with the crowd, some people started to stand up and dance.

To me this music is great in small dose but it can become repetitive, and obviously Irene and Louis responded to the crowd and gave them more (let them eat cake)

Louis was also acting, I am certain that he was under the influence????

He also walked off the stage a few times disappearing, Irene carry on regardless,

She also started to explore the interior of the piano using different device to extract the most intriguing sounds possible.

The evening ended with a tune similar to the one they opened with.

I just love the way she shift gears, or style within a single phrase, from stride, to swing, to bop via Monk and Taylor, just plain amazing.

This is experience coming through, but then she has been playing for over forty years.

In a way she is capable of putting across the complete history of piano playing.

Her technique is also astounding, she is self-thought.

All in all a great concert, I could have done with a little less of the South African sound.

I bought a few cds at the concert, (Chicago piano solo, and with Pierre Favre)I listened to them briefly, they sound fantastic

I will report back when I had time to absorb all the intricacies.

All in all a great evening, “unforgettable”

Just been listening to "Chicago piano solo" this is a really good example of what happened Saturday evening, (also live) although there is no drummer. I suppose that it is due to the fact that the repertoire of originals is similar.

One has to remember that during the concert Louis Moholo did not play the role of the time keeper at all, the drums where like another instrument, in actual fact the rythm originated from Irene playing.

Sometimes one felt that they where working in opposite directions

but always making beautiful sound.

Moholo is very busy, has a very unusual sound, I cannot think of anybody sounding like him, maybe a little bit of Elvin (Coltrane days) now and then?

The other cd I bought with Swiss drummer Pierre Favre, is very different, on some tracks the 2 nearly become one such is the rapport, this music takes us to a different level of interplay

So Irene Schweizer is really somebody worth investigating, I've already ordered

more of her cds