Monterey Jazz Festival On Tour 55th Anniversary January 2012 Dee Dee Bridgewater Over the course of a multifaceted career that has spanned four decades, DEE DEE BRIDGEWATER has risen to the top tier of today’s jazz vocalists, putting her own unique spin on standards as well as taking intrepid leaps of faith in re-envisioning jazz classics. For her latest recording, ELEANORA FAGAN (1915-1959): TO BILLIE WITH LOVE FROM DEE DEE, Bridgewater honors an iconic jazz figure, Billie Holiday, who died tragically at the age of 44 a half-century ago. “This album is my way of paying my respect to a vocalist who made it possible for singers like me to carve out a career for ourselves,” says Bridgewater, who performed the role of Holiday in the triumphant theatrical production, Lady Day—based on the singer’s autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues—staged in Paris and London in 1986 and 1987. “I wanted Eleanora Fagan to be something different: more modern and a celebration, not a [recording] that goes dark and sullen and maudlin. I wanted the album to be joyful.” Bridgewater adds that Eleanora Fagan goes far deeper than being a tribute album of retreaded Holiday tunes. “Billie deserves to have her music heard in another light,” she says, “and I definitely didn’t set out to imitate her.” Key to the fresh approach is pianist Edsel Gomez, Bridgewater’s longtime band mate who wrote new arrangements for the 12 songs on the album, including the African polyrhythmic-charged interpretation of “Lady Sings the Blues, “ a reharmonized version of “All of Me” and the gospel-tinged “God Bless the Child.” Says Bridgewater: “Edsel is an extremely gifted, talented arranger with very modern ideas. Edsel has the ability to be modern and work in a tasteful fashion.” Gomez took on the daunting challenge of bringing new life to the music with enthusiasm. “I listened to everything Billie Holiday ever recorded,” he says. “I let her music speak to me.” He also kept in mind the personalities of the TEDKURLANDASSOCIATES 173 Brighton Avenue, Boston, MA 02134 phone: 617-254-0007 fax: 617-782-3577 [email protected] www.tedkurland.com all-star band Bridgewater had assembled for the recording: dynamic reeds player James Carter, bassist Christian McBride and drummer Lewis Nash. “This was my dream band,” says Bridgewater. “I got to work with these musicians who I’d been dying to play with. I thought, I can’t miss. With this band I can have a hard-swinging, touching celebration of Billie’s music.” Bridgewater sings into the nuances of such songs as “Good Morning Heartache,” “Lover Man” and “Fine and Mellow” with an allure that’s equal parts sexy, spunky and sublime. “This was the first time when I wasn’t concerned about having a particular sound of voice,” Bridgewater says. “I was just singing from my gut. It was all so swinging and so soulful.” Other highlights include the haunting “You’ve Changed” with Carter blowing smoky soul to complement Bridgewater’s moving vocals, the spunky “Mother’s Son-in-Law” with McBride dueting with the coquettish singer, and the uptempo “Miss Brown to You” featuring Nash’s drumming prowess. Over the course of her career, Bridgewater has paid homage to monumental figures of the music world, recording albums dedicated to Ella Fitzgerald (the Grammy Award-winning Dear Ella, 1997), Horace Silver (Love and Peace: A Tribute to Horace Silver, 1995) and Kurt Weill (This Is New, 2002). But with Eleanora Fagan—the follow-up to 2007’s brilliant Red Earth: A Malian Journey that melded the music of Mali with jazz—Bridgewater delivers one of the most remarkable recording performances of her career. “Dee Dee is a spirited dynamo and a soulful balladeer,” says liner note writer Dan Ouellette. “She sings with a razor-edged voice; she scats with abandon; she makes you cry. She even chokes up herself upon descending into the ghoulish drama of ‘Strange Fruit,’ which serves as the album’s poignant finale. She gives a moving read with a sparse arrangement supporting her.” Instead of playing it safe and recreating her performance in Lady Day, on Eleanora Fagan, Bridgewater reacquaints herself with Holiday, shining a new ray of love on the often-misunderstood jazz icon. “I wanted the record to be a collection that would not be like the music of the show,” she says. That philosophy is in keeping with Bridgewater’s approach to all of her projects: “I want to move forward, just as I’ve done with each of my albums. To not go backwards, but progress. Constantly.” Christian McBride For his Mack Avenue recording debut, the 36-year-old bassist / bandleader / educator / artistic director / Grammy Award winner CHRISTIAN McBRIDE delivered the remarkable Kind Of Brown, a 10-track album featuring his new TEDKURLANDASSOCIATES 173 Brighton Avenue, Boston, MA 02134 phone: 617-254-0007 fax: 617-782-3577 [email protected] www.tedkurland.com acoustic jazz quintet Inside Straight, comprised of old friends, pianist Eric Reed, alto saxophonist Steve Wilson and drummer Carl Allen, as well as newcomer vibraphonist Warren Wolf, one of McBride’s former students. Produced by McBride, Kind Of Brown is a collection of hard swing-to-bluesy groove tunes that the leader says he put together to give the members of his new ensemble “something to sink their teeth into.” He adds, “I wanted to present solid melodies with some decent chord changes that could be good vehicles for the guys to blow on.” While McBride has helmed a longstanding acoustic / electric quartet—label mate and tenor saxophonist Ron Blake, pianist Geoffrey Keezer, drummer Terreon Gully—the bassist extraordinaire decided to create a new quintet that was focused on playing straight-ahead acoustic jazz. Formed in June 2007, the group made its debut at the Village Vanguard in New York, marking the first time in 10 years that McBride appeared there as a leader. “For the occasion I wanted to put together a special group,” he says. “I had no intention of forming a future working band, but during that week people raved about the show and kept telling me that the group had to be documented.” While various labels courted the quintet, McBride decided to hook up with Mack Avenue. “I was not interested in signing an old, classic recording contract,” he said. “But Mack Avenue made it clear that it was not only excited about me joining its family of artists, but also wanted to give me the freedom to be creative, which would be beneficial to both parties.” Recorded in September 2008 at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley, Calif., Kind Of Brown stands as McBride’s first album as a leader since his 3-CD Live at Tonic outing for Ropeadope Records in 2006 and his first studio recording since 2003’s Sci-Fi for Verve Records. However, McBride has been anything but idle during this period. He’s been active as a sideman, most recently touring with the Chick Corea / John McLaughlin Five Peace Band project (also featuring label mate Kenny Garrett and either drummer Vinnie Colaiuta or Brian Blade). He’s not only developed into a top-tier solo artist who is equally adept on acoustic and electric bass, but he’s also been the go-to bassist, with support duties ranging from Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea to Diana Krall and Sting. In addition, he has been at the forefront of jazz education, including serving as an artist in residence at festivals (most recently 2008’s Detroit International Jazz Festival and the Monterey Jazz Festival); artistic director at various arts centers and museums (including co-director of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem and the creative jazz chair for the Los Angeles Philharmonic); and as artistic director of the JAS Band Academy (Jazz Aspen Snowmass, Band Edition). TEDKURLANDASSOCIATES 173 Brighton Avenue, Boston, MA 02134 phone: 617-254-0007 fax: 617-782-3577 [email protected] www.tedkurland.com Kind Of Brown opens with “Brother Mister,” which McBride says is the perfect opening tune for a gig or a record. “The chordal sequence is a basic 12-bar blues,” he says. “I started playing a version of the song with my quartet when we’d have a guest play with us, but it never had a melody. So, for this recording, I put a melody over the chord changes, changed keys from F to E and it came out nice.” McBride and Inside Straight deliver a buoyant, exciting take on the Freddie Hubbard number, “Theme for Kareem.” “I always had a soft spot for Freddie,” McBride says of the late, legendary trumpeter. “Carl was instrumental in me getting to play with Freddie when I first moved to New York. Carl was kind of like my sponsor. He recommended me to Freddie, who initially felt that an 18-year-old player wasn’t ready for the big time. But he took a chance with me, and it was a great thrill to play with him. I wanted to record at least one Freddie song on Kind Of Brown. I decided to do ‘Theme for Kareem.’ It has a lot of meat on it, and it’s hard because the chord changes go by real quick. It’s a tricky song by a great composer.” The gently grooved “Rainbow Wheel” is a tune McBride came up with while playing chord changes on the piano. “Jazz players love playing minor thirds, but I thought, how many songs go up and down in major thirds? So that’s what I did. It reminds me of the way Freddie played.