At the pulsating core of Ronnie Scott’s stood a slick Curtis Stigers, intoning his moving tribute to American jazz pianist, Gene Harris, entitled ‘Swingin’ Down at Tenth & Main’: the packed crowd behind rows of beacon-like red lamps were his wings, tipped with the photographed presence of others of jazz’s glitterati who have graced this stage.
Jazzfest Berlin (formerly Berlin Jazz Festival) celebrated two events this year: its 50th anniversary and the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall.
They say that fortune favours the brave, and right now in jazz circles they don’t come much braver than flautist Roland Sutherland.
Even at Passing Clouds, a funky, vibrant venue that embodies the best of cosmopolitan Dalston, it’s not often you find a Saturday night crowd dancing enthusiastically to the funeral music of a Ghanaian tribe.
The contention that jazz has lost its political edge was clearly upended by some well-chosen words at the start of this absorbing performance.
The Chicago altoist Steve Coleman has distilled his source material down to an essential four or five notes, together with a linking rhythm and stress.
There are those singers who like to experiment with sound or put a highly “personal” slant on material and those whose delivery is less idiosyncratic, respecting the songwriter’s craft with its emphasis on telling a story, but at the same time not losing individuality.
Less than 24 hours after the finale of this year’s EFG London Jazz Festival you would have thought that live jazz would have been the last thing on most Londoners’ minds.
Having grown through the repressive times of the Soviet Union, when foreign artists had to be minibussed from the all-seeing-eye of Moscow to the Lithuanian capital, this festival, now in its 27th edition, does not want for either large, passionate, engaged audiences or adventurous programming.
Playing the night after the close of the London Jazz Festival may be the shortest of short straws for many musicians fearful of possible audience exhaustion following ten days of gigs.
