November 2011 | No. 115 Your FREE Guide to the NYC Jazz Scene nycjazzrecord.com Fred • Enrico • Russell • Auand • Festival • Event Ho Pieranunzi Garcia Records Reports Calendar John Coltrane is rightly considered one of the innovators in jazz even though his career as a leader lasted only a brief, if remarkably prolific, decade before his tragic death in 1967 at 40. But most critical acclaim is heaped on the period before New York@Night 1964. Ascension, recorded in 1965, is considered by many the end of Coltrane as a 4 legitimate jazz musician, as he moved away from his roots into the burgeoning Interview: Fred Ho avant garde and free jazz scenes. But another group see Coltrane’s shift in this direction helping to propel these new forms, not least because of his championing 6 by Ken Waxman of such musicians as Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, John Tchicai and Marion Artist Feature: Enrico Pieranunzi Brown, now all legends in their own rights. This month two tributes (at Le Poisson Rouge and Jazz Standard) will recreate Coltrane’s controversial work with allstar by Laurel Gross 7 casts of musicians from across the modern spectrum, a living testament to the On The Cover: John Coltrane’s Ascension music’s continuing impact. For our cover story this month, we’ve spoken with by Marc Medwin participants from the original Ascension album plus other musicians who have 9 done their own interpretations and those involved in the upcoming tributes. Encore: Lest We Forget: Two other controversial figures are baritone saxophonist/composer Fred Ho 10 (Interview), whose political statements and inclusive musical blending have Russell Garcia Sam Jones resulted in some monumental works over the past few decades, and Italian pianist by Andy Vélez by Donald Elfman Enrico Pieranunzi (Artist Feature), who mixes the classical music of his native Megaphone VOXNews Europe with his adopted jazz in a mélange that challenges the assumptions of both by Denny Zeitlin by Suzanne Lorge art forms. Ho appears at BAMCafé with his long-standing Afro Asian Music 11 Ensemble and the Guggenheim Museum with the newer Green Monster Big Band Label Spotlight: Listen Up!: while Pieranunzi performs twice at Merkin Hall, once with his jazz trio and then solo, interpreting the music of Baroque composers. 12 Oscar Peñas Auand We also have features on composer Russell Garcia (Encore), bassist Sam Jones by Ken Waxman & Carlo Costa (Lest We Forget), Italian imprint Auand (Label Spotlight), which curates a mini- festival in town this month, a Megaphone by multi-disciplinarian Denny Zeitlin 13 Festival Report: Belgium • Detroit • Guelph (at The Kitano for a weekend) and more festival reports from around the world. CD Reviews: Travis LaPlante, Bill Frisell, Chip White, Paquito D’Rivera, Laurence Donohue-Greene, Managing Editor Andrey Henkin, Editorial Director 14 Andrea Wolper, Dead Cat Bounce, Chico Hamilton, Claudia Quintet and more On the cover: John Coltrane’s Ascension cover (photograph by Chuck Stewart, courtesy of Universal Music) 38 Event Calendar Corrections: In last month’s NY@Night, Pauline Oliveros’ Roland V Accordion is 45 Club Directory not midi-controlled; the instrument is digital. Miscellany: In Memoriam • Birthdays • On This Day Submit Letters to the Editor by emailing [email protected] 47 US Subscription rates: 12 issues, $30 (International: 12 issues, $40) For subscription assistance, send check, cash or money order to the address below or email [email protected]. The New York City Jazz Record www.nycjazzrecord.com Managing Editor: Laurence Donohue-Greene To Contact: Editorial Director & Production Manager: Andrey Henkin The New York City Jazz Record Staff Writers 116 Pinehurst Avenue, Ste. J41 David R. Adler, Clifford Allen, Fred Bouchard, Stuart Broomer, Tom Conrad, Ken Dryden, New York, NY 10033 Donald Elfman, Sean Fitzell, Graham Flanagan, Kurt Gottschalk, Tom Greenland, United States Laurel Gross, Alex Henderson, Marcia Hillman, Terrell Holmes, Robert Iannapollo, Francis Lo Kee, Martin Longley, Suzanne Lorge, Wilbur MacKenzie, Marc Medwin, Laurence Donohue-Greene: Russ Musto, Joel Roberts, John Sharpe, Elliott Simon, Jeff Stockton, Andrew Vélez, Ken Waxman [email protected] Andrey Henkin: [email protected] Contributing Writers Thomas Conrad, George Kanzler, Matthew Kassel, General Inquiries: [email protected] Gordon Marshall, Sharon Mizrahi, Sean J. O’Connell, Dr. Denny Zeitlin Advertising: [email protected] Contributing Photographers Editorial: [email protected] Jeff Forman, Peter Gannushkin, Jason Guthartz, Robert Adam Mayers, Calendar: [email protected] John Rogers, Willy Schuyten, Chuck Stewart, Jack Vartoogian All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission strictly prohibited. All material copyrights property of the authors. THE NEW YORK CITY JAZZ RECORD | November 2011 3 NEW YORK @ NIGHT The prepared piano is still a young instrument, not Whenever Anthony Braxton sojourns in the city much more than 50 years old if counting from John attendance is de rigueur for avant ’guardians’ and his Cage’s Sonatas and Interlude and its proponents outrank four-day Tri-Centric Foundation series at Roulette’s its innovators. Sylvie Courvoisier and Denman new space in downtown Brooklyn was no exception. Maroney have codified their own syntaxes for it and After three nights of eclectic stagings, Saturday (Oct. Andrea Neumann has taken it to a wonderful extreme. 8th) premiered a concert reading of his opera Trillium J Magda Mayas may be the latest to find something new (Acts I & III) for a 32-piece orchestra of strings, by reaching into the big box. Even the visual cues are woodwinds, brass, piano, percussion and 12 bel canto unpredictable in her performances as small gestures vocalists. Soon after a solo English horn entered from can result in fairly loud ringings, more muscular the rear of the audience, the orchestra filled the two- movements in softer roars. Like those other piano tiered space with hefty yet levitating ‘harmonies’ manipulators, her time is rarely spent on the keyboard. alternating with vocal recitatives of repeated notes in A trio with trumpet and drums - Nate Wooley and chromatic modulation. The libretto’s narrative was Tony Buck - at I-Beam Oct. 14th nicely complemented obtuse, a through-composed muddle of archetypal her playing field. She tends to favor quick and quiet characters delivering pithy, often tongue-in-cheek rhythms, as does Buck, or, like Wooley prolonged aphorisms on diverse subjects, as when a baritone tones, all by the providence of strings rubbed, plucked detective intoned in his best Inspector Clouseau accent: or pounded into vibrating. Wooley was stoic, letting “Everyone here is now a subject - except myself of tones and silences hang in the spirit of Bill Dixon. course.” Unfortunately, the underlying orchestration Buck, shells and bells positioned on drumheads, was often disguised dialogue, making it even more difficult often as melodic as his playmates. Even when the to disentangle the ‘storyline’. Each long act (45 and 65 tempo increased, the music was remarkably without minutes, respectively) followed a similar structure, emphasis: they played fast as if they were playing based on a traditional written score leavened with slow, rhythm and tone stripped of accessories. Meter improvised orchestral sections initiated through and melody weren’t factors of one another, they shared Braxton’s unorthodox gesticulations: triangles, circles, a spectral continuity. And when it was done (and airport runway signals and the like. Fittingly, the final before it started again) it seemed left to the audience to line about a starship captain could be applied to the applaud or allow a silence signaling a second part. composer himself: “You have to admit, [he] was an - Kurt Gottschalk original.” - Tom Greenland T E N . C I S U M N W O T N P h W o O t o D / b y n i J k a h s s o u n n G n a u t G h r a e r t t e z P Magda Mayas, Nate Wooley & Tony Buck @ I-Beam Anthony Braxton’s Trillium J @ Roulette The Respect Sextet marked a surprising 10 years of Sunday (Oct. 9th) saw Saint Peter’s Church’s 41st service at Le Poisson Rouge Oct. 11th with a set of annual (almost) All-Nite Soul, the city’s oldest jazz medleys (and compositions that seemed like medleys) regular festival, held this year in honor of Randy befitting their enigmatic working methods. The band Weston. Following evening vespers, the pianist gained notice in many corners with its 2009 release emphasized jazz’ African roots and global reach by Sirius Respect, in which they mashed Sun Ra and introducing a Ghanaian talking-drummer, a Moroccan Karlheinz Stockhausen. That approach ran through sintir player, a Chinese pipa player and others before their anniversary concert. They opened with “Grape bringing out his stellar ensemble with Alex Blake Pie for Dragomeni...Ya!” from their self-released 2002 (bass), Lewis Nash (drums) and Candido (congas) for a disc (respectacle.), which seemed a medley even if they rousing hour-and-a-half set. And that was just the weren’t playing recognizable themes. Tight tempo and beginning. With an ongoing commitment to community thematic changes set a surprising and convincing outreach and musical ministry, the “jazz church” has standard. They went on to put a toy flute in Fred spawned an extended family spanning cultures and Anderson’s “3 on 2” (which they recorded on their generations, inspiring visiting performers to make 2005 album Respect in You) and to craft a melodica/ deep