JUNE 2018—ISSUE 194 YOUR FREE GUIDE TO THE NYC JAZZ SCENE NYCJAZZRECORD.COM CHARLES TOLLIVER IN MEMORIAM CECIL LAST MAN TAYLOR STANDING DAVID PAAL PETER JOHANNES FIUCZYNSKI NILSSEN-LOVE KUHN BAUER Managing Editor: Laurence Donohue-Greene Editorial Director & Production Manager: Andrey Henkin To Contact: The New York City Jazz Record 66 Mt. Airy Road East JUNE 2018—ISSUE 194 Croton-on-Hudson, NY 10520 United States Phone/Fax: 212-568-9628 N Ew YORK@Night 4 Laurence Donohue-Greene: I nterview : DAVID FIUCZYNSKI 6 by george grella [email protected] Andrey Henkin: [email protected] A RTIST Feature : PAAL NILSSEN-LOVE 7 by john sharpe General Inquiries: [email protected] OE N TH COVER : charles tolliver 8 by thomas conrad Advertising: [email protected] E NCORE : PETER KUHN by robert bush Calendar: 10 [email protected] VOXNews: L EST We Forget : JOHANNES BAUER 10 by mark keresman [email protected] LA BEL SPOTLIGHT : double moon by marilyn lester US Subscription rates: 12 issues, $40 11 Canada Subscription rates: 12 issues, $45 International Subscription rates: 12 issues, $50 For subscription assistance, send check, cash or VOXNEwS 11 by suzanne lorge money order to the address above or email [email protected] obituaries by andrey henkin Staff Writers 12 David R. Adler, Clifford Allen, Duck Baker, Stuart Broomer, FESTIVAL REPORT Robert Bush, Thomas Conrad, 13 Ken Dryden, Donald Elfman, Phil Freeman, Kurt Gottschalk, Tom Greenland, Anders Griffen, IN memoriam : cecil taylor 14 Tyran Grillo, Alex Henderson, Robert Iannapollo, Matthew Kassel, Mark Keresman, Marilyn Lester, CD ReviewS 16 Suzanne Lorge, Marc Medwin, Russ Musto, John Pietaro, Joel Roberts, John Sharpe, Elliott Simon, M ISCELLANY 42 Andrew Vélez, Scott Yanow Contributing Writers E CVENT ALENDAR Marco Cangiano, Brian Charette, 44 George Grella, Jim Motavalli, Anna Steegmann, Eric Wendell Contributing Photographers Scott Friedlander, Peter Gannushkin, It’s easy, from the outside, to think of the musician’s life as one of glamour. But spend five Jimmy Katz, Radosław Kaźmierczak minutes talking to one and you’ll learn why playing jazz is as real a job as you can have. Our Robert I. Sutherland-Cohen, Big Three features this month all demonstrate the effort involved in this career choice. Adrien H. Tillmann, Trumpeter Charles Tolliver (On The Cover) is a legend to those in the know but still not a Jack Vartoogian, Simon Wu household name despite decades of performing and recording; he is among those musicians who spearheaded the artist-owned record label model so common today. Tolliver is at Smoke Fact-checker for a weekend engagement. Guitarist David Fiuczynski (Interview) probably made more work Nate Dorward for himself by devoting his time as a performer and educator at Berklee College of Music to exploring micro-tonality. You can see the results when he performs this month as part of the Alternative Guitar Summit. And Norwegian drummer Paal Nilssen-Love (Artist Feature), who relentlessly tours and records all over the world, takes on the musical and logistical challenge of leading a big band, appearing in a rare stateside visit at Pioneer Works. We also take the time to celebrate the life’s work of the recently departed piano master Cecil nycjazzrecord.com Taylor with a two-page In Memoriam spread full of remembrances from his colleagues. On The Cover: Charles Tolliver (photo by Jimmy Katz) Corrections: In last month’s CD Reviews, Brandon Seabrook is of the same generation as Daniel Levin; in the Brad Mehldau, the correct name of the commissioned piece was “Three Pieces After Bach”; in the Jim McNeely, the album was recorded with the Frankfurt Radio Big Band; and in the Marc Ribot, Briggan Krauss played alto saxophone. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission strictly prohibited. All material copyrights property of the authors. 2 JUNE 2018 | THE NEW YORK CITY JAZZ RECORD JAZZ FESTIVAL JAZZ FESTIVALPRESENTED BY JUNE 2018PRESENTED BY WWW.BLUENOTEJAZZFEST.COM KEYON HARROLD PAQUITO D’RIVERA THE BAD PLUS & FRIENDS ENSEMBLE MAY 29 - JUNE 1 JUNE 5 - 10 JUNE 12 - 17 VICTOR WOOTEN TRIO FT DENNIS CHAMBERS MONTY ALEXANDER - & BOB FRANCESCHINI LOVE NOTES: JAMAICA TO JAZZ LETTUCE JUNE 19 - 23 JUNE 24 - 26 JUNE 27 - JULY 1 SOUTHSIDE JOHNY PERFORMING THE MUSIC OF BILLIE HOLIDAY JUNE 4 MCCOY TYNER WITH SPECIAL GUESTS JUNE 11 • AN EVENING WITH SARAH MCKENZIE JUNE 18 SPECIAL SUNDAY JAZZ BRUNCH $39.50 INCLUDES BRUNCH, MUSIC & COCKTAIL LATE NIGHTS MICHAEL MWENSO & THE SHAKES RESIDENCY JUNE 1 & 8 • DUDLEY MUSIC JUNE 9 JASON STEIN & FRIENDS - BLUE NOTE JAZZ CLUB DEBUT! JUNE 16 • LETTUCE JUNE 29 & 30 l3l WEST 3RD STREET NEW YORK CITY • 2l2.475.8592 • WWW.BLUENOTEJAZZ.COM @bluenotenyc TWO SHOWS NIGHTLY 8PM & l0:30PM • FRIDAY & SATURDAY LATE NIGHTS: l2:30AM TELECHARGE.COM TERMS, CONDITIONS AND RESTRICTIONS APPLY NEw YORK @ NIGHT Curated by trombonist Chris McIntyre, the Syncretics It felt a bit like ‘30s Paris, the brief respite between Open at Series at Issue Project Room aims to present parallel or wars when jazz manouche flowered in the capable complementary universes in music and sound, the hands of Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli. connections between not always obvious. For the third “Forever Django: Passing the Family Torch”, held at 7pm! installation (May 5th), improvising percussionist Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium (May 1st), starred Pheeroan akLaff and new music pianist Isabelle guitarist/violinist Dorado Schmitt, his guitarist sons O’Connell were presented opposite each other, the Samson and Amati, accordionist Ludovic Beier, latter on a program of four post-millennial works for violinist Pierre Blanchard and guitarist/vocalist piano. AkLaff, since the ‘70s a frequent collaborator of Doudou Cuillerier, plus guest spots by clarinetist Ken trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith and reedplayers Oliver Peplowski and vocalists Melody Gardot and Veronica Lake and Anthony Braxton, was featured in a Swift. Too often, stagings of the Reinhardt/Grappelli kaleidoscopic solo recital spanning African and Asian repertoire degenerate into note-fests of flashy runs and percussion traditions rooted in spirituality and fast strum patterns and certainly these were present, This Month! corporeal movement. His drums, tom-heavy and with but what separated this event was a sense of romance, Live! an array of cymbals, gongs, cowbell and a balafon, an emotional awareness that bordered but never FRI KEN FOWSER QUINTET 7:30PM took up the center of the room as he entered and did a crossed over into sentimentality. Each of the principal 6/1 TONY HEWITT & slow, deliberate dance around the instruments, tapping soloists, especially Beier and the three Schmitts, were THE JOHN COLIANNI GROUP 10:30PM gongs and delicately eking out dry melodies on the firebrands, capable of dazzling feats of finger-play, yet balafon. Moving to the kit, he built snapping, sinewy each embraced an ethos of tasteful restraint, most SAT RAY GALLON TRIO 7:30PM 6/2 EYAL VILNER BIG BAND 10:30PM rock rhythms in a ceremony of economical integration notable in the patriarch’s subtle touches behind the towards a ritual of body, instrument and tradition. singing of Gardot and Swift and in Samson’s jazz- TUE DOM SALVADOR 7:30PM Occasionally doling out missives, including on his tinged playing over his well-wrought originals. The 6 /5 studies with Fela Kuti, akLaff stitched together second half featured the patriarch playing his own Ghanian highlife, nods to Max Roach and Art Blakey, a tunes, first on guitar, then violin; two trio numbers WED PASQUALE GRASSO SOLO GUITAR 7:30PM resonant exploration of cymbal tunings and bright displaying Amati’s impeccable fretwork; “Hymne à 6/6 DJANGO JAM 10:00PM processionals translating hand drumming into fancy l’Amour” sung by teenaged Stefi Schmitt, her stadium- THR STAFFORD HUNTER & CONTINUUM 7:30PM kit-work. This exploration filled the Beaux-Arts stone sized tone belying her awkward shyness; two covers 6/7 “RITA” FT. BRENDAN SKIDMORE theater and turned it into, as the title of aklaff’s debut by sultry chanteuse Swift; then a brisk finale with 13 & BRUCE HARRIS 10:00PM LP reads, a House of Spirit and Mirth.—Clifford Allen pairs of hands onstage, all swinging. —Tom Greenland FRI KEN FOWSER QUINTET 7:30PM 6/8 LEZLIE HARRISON 10:30PM G R O . S TUE JAINARDO Y SU KUMBATRIO 7:30PM S O N 6/12 LOS HACHEROS 10:00PM T O O I S H S P WED E PASQUALE GRASSO SOLO GUITAR 7:30PM W R P 6/13 O DJANGO JAM X 10:00PM R E T Z N Z THR O FREDDY DEBOE BAND 7:30PM A R J F 6/14 / IAN HENDRICKSON-SMITH 10:00PM / N N E A I FRI H KEN FOWSER QUINTET 7:30PM G O O 6/15 DANNY JONOKUCHI & THE C - O T REVISONISTS FT. ALEXA BARCHINI 10:30PM D R N A A V L R SAT DONALD VEGA 7:30PM K E C H 6/16 MIKE SAILORS BIG BAND 10:30PM A J T 8 U 1 S 0 . 2 WED I PASQUALE GRASSO SOLO GUITAR 7:30PM . 6/20 STEVEN FEIFKE BIG BAND 10:00PM R © Pheeroan akLaff @ Issue Project Room Melody Gardot & Dorado Schmitt @ Stern Auditorium THR BRANDON BAIN 7:30PM 6/21 MARK WHITFIELD 10:00PM Trumpeter Ahmed Abdullah has been Musical Although most rivers are unidirectional, the idea Director of Bedford-Stuyvesant community center behind Zakir Hussain and Dave Holland’s FRI KEN FOWSER QUINTET 7:30PM 6/22 HUDSON HORNS 10:30PM Sistas’ Place since 1998, so it’s fitting that the storefront Crosscurrents is that musical cultures, whether borne jazz room on Nostrand Avenue would fête him for his along the Ganges or the Hudson, can flow both ways. SAT DWAYNE CLEMONS QUINTET 7:30PM 71st birthday (May 12th), where his group Diaspora More specifically, as Hussain explained before the 6/23 PROFESSOR CUNNINGHAM & (Dispersions of the Spirit of Ra) performed two sets concert at Rose Theater (May 5th), he wanted to show HIS OLD SCHOOL 10:30PM separated by a rousing champagne toast and delicious what Indian music might offer jazz.