Carter swings, Hancock rocks and the Jazz Festival opens with a nod to its past
September 1, 2007
BY MARK STRYKER
FREE PRESS JAZZ WRITER
Violinist Regina Carter and pianist Herbie Hancock opened the 28th annual Detroit International Jazz Festival Friday night with a sound that’s largely been missing from the first night of the event in recent years -- jazz.
The last few festivals have used Motown R&B as a kickoff. But organizers have gone back to basics, downplaying crossover in favor of the core tradition that has made the Detroit festival such a vital cultural achievement. Starting with Carter and Hancock gave the festival, one of the largest free jazz festivals in North America, a welcome and immediate jolt of the real McCoy, even if Hancock was in his funky, populist mode. Actually, Hancock’s nearly two hour set was burnin’, but more on that later.
Carter and Hancock were also part of a broader agenda. One of the festival themes this year is a “Rumble in the Great Lakes,” a friendly competition between Detroit and Chicago. Carter, one Detroit’s favorite daughters, and Hancock, born in Chicago, are the first of many musicians from both cities featured this weekend. Carter, who won a MacArthur “genius” grant last year, is also the 2007 artist-in-residence, appearing Sunday with Kenny Barron and Monday with the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra.
She started the festival with her quintet, christening a new festival stage at Cadillac Square before a crowd of thousands sprawling back into Campus Martius. The evening also brought some of the loveliest festival weather in memory: clear skies, low ‘70s, a breeze as sweet as Carter’s violin tone.
Carter was in a nostalgic mood, concentrating on swing-era material from her 2006 recording, “I’ll Be Seeing You: A Sentimental Journey,” dedicated to her late mother. She opened with Rodgers and Hart’s “You Took Advantage of Me” at a gentle stroll, giving the melody to clarinetist Darryl Harper, a lyrical player unfortunately under-miked much of the set. Carter built her solo from punchy riffs and hummable ditties, quoting familiar songs by Percy Grainger and Ferde Grofé -- the names might be unfamiliar but you’d recognize the tunes.
The clarinet-violin blend is unusual: dark, smoky, redolent of a gin-soaked joint from a time when men wore fedoras. The haze grew thicker with “Anitra’s Dance,” a tightly scored, curlicue number descended from Edvard Grieg that the John Kirby Sextet transformed into a jump tune in the ‘30s. The rhythm section -- pianist Xavier Davis, bassist Matthew Parrish and drummer Alvester Garnett -- which elsewhere played a one-size-fits-all modernism -- bounced along in style.
Carter is a bit of a throwback. Her solos are unstudied constructions with clear melodic phrasing and hot, on-the-beat swing. Playing with little vibrato and bluesy slides, she recalled the pre-bop violinist Stuff Smith, even on a slick bebop blues by Lucky Thompson. Still, there was less fire Friday than I’ve heard from her in the past. She rarely sounded relaxed, and had to restart the ballad, Ravel’s “Pavane for a Dead Princess,” because of on-stage feedback.
The group was at its best on the closer, also called up from the ‘40s, “Little Brown Jug,” recast as a calypso. Carter began with Bach-like arpeggios that glided into barbecue-sauced ideas and a “Reveille” quote. She pushed her rhythm section and it pushed back. Then from the back of the stage came her former mentor, Detroit trumpet hero Marcus Belgrave, who blew snaky ideas and peppery accents over a swampy shuffle beat. He heated up the stand and then slipped away like a fox.
Hancock, too, was foxy. One of the great pianists in jazz history, he put aside his post-bop legacy for the night. His V-8 powered quartet -- featuring the pan-stylistic conception of African-born guitarist Lionel Loueke, the animated electric bassist Nathan East and powerful drummer Vinnie Colaiuta -- was built to boogie. But Hancock also found lots of room for rugged and heady improvisation. The fun was watching him squeeze advanced harmonic and rhythmic concepts into the corners of the music without dampening the shake-your-booty grooves.
Every piece but Hancock’s solo reading of his own iconic “Maiden Voyage” was driven by funk, rock or world beat rhythms and excited dialogue within the quartet. Hancock switched fluidly between acoustic piano and a variety of synthesizers, including an over-the-shoulder keyboard he employed like a guitar while prowling the stage. The history books say Hancock is 67, but his attitude, energy and invention all suggested a much younger man: He came to party.
After his loquacious spoken introduction, the quartet launched into an extended version of “Actual Proof,” an open jam from Hancock’s “Head Hunters” days in the ‘70s. His acoustic piano solo rode the doubled-up funk beat and the memorable recurring rhythmic hook, shifting into a higher gear with each repetition. His darting right hand lines merged into rolling tremolos and dissonant chords that sliced the beat into asymmetric chunks.
The music was loud, fast and occasionally overstuffed -- Loueke, East and Colaiuta are vibrant but busy players, not always as patient as their boss. Still, Hancock’s elemental blues “Watermelon Man,” heard in an insinuating arrangement braised by an elongated 17-beat pattern devised by Loueke, felt as open as the prairie.
A virtuoso, Loueke drew a striking range of colors and textures from his guitar, often employing a liquid, keyboard-like attack and a high-pitched tone that belongs only to himself. On one vaguely African piece, he played a long a cappella introduction, using vocal chants, glottal clicks, rhythmic tapping and deftly integrated counterpoint on his guitar to create a mysterious nest of melody and layered rhythm.
The biggest disappointments were several tunes from Hancock’s recent pop record “Possibilities.” East took up the vocals, singing “Stitched Up,” “When Love Comes to Town” and “I Just Called to Say I Love You” in an informal, nasally falsetto; along the way, the adventure fell by the wayside.
On the other hand, Hancock’s solo version of “Maiden Voyage,” which opened with some impressionist night-music straight out of Ravel’s "Gaspard de la Nuit,” was full of surprise, the earthy “Cantaloupe Island” was sparked by Hancock’s oblique way of playing in the cracks of the rhythm and the encore, Hancock’s mega-hit “Chameleon,” was some 20 minutes of a good-time groove.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...JAZZFEST082007
Linear Mode
