Tag Archives: NPR

Stream the Chris Potter quartet Live at the Village Vanguard

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Haven't finished listening but Chris' Potter's jazz suite Sirens is starting out strong, with a modal vampy thing going, Trane and bop influences and some blues cries in Potter's soloing, but not too derivative.  Now at around 4'40, holy molé it's starting to smoke!

You can stream it at NPR.

 

If you're in NY, last set tonight in 20 min (I'd guess sold out), last night is tomorrow Feb. 10.

Now at 9 min, Iverson is doing a beautiful chordal thing, now putting a line over it in the treble, kind of McCoy influenced but with a bit more impressionist color and a mellower vibe.  This is the stuff, folks.

Thanks, NPR, for making it it little less painful for a jazz fan not to live in NYC.

Debussy on NPR's Performance Today this week...

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Claude Debussy's birthday is Wednesday the 22nd.  NPR's Performance Today is featuring him today through Weds.  You can stream today's show here.  (The player will open hour 1; for hour 2 of the show, click at bottom right.)  Currently (end of the 2nd hour) a really superb performance of "The Perfumes of the Night and Morning of a Festival Day, from Images, The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Shao-Chia Lu, conductor.  I haven't listened intensely to the orchestral Images; in this performance, it's really lovely.  Certainly when I listen to La Mer (for both musical quality and influence, one of the key works of classical music) I want more orchestral Debussy in that vein; this Images fits the bill all round, harmonically, melodically, rhythmically, timbrally, the main qualitative difference (the musical content is of course different) being that it is overall calmer.  Perhaps there's something special about the Concertgebouw and Debussy; my favorite La Mer so far is the 1976 Phillips recording, in which they are conducted by Bernard Haitink.  It's on Phillips CD 438-742-2 (bargain two CD set, if it's still available), which also has Haitink conducting them in Images, Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune, Jeux, Dances for harp and orchestra, Rhapsody for orchestra and clarinet, and some short pieces).  Earlier in the show pianist Marc-André Hamelin played three preludes beautifully; I have and greatly enjoy Pascal Rogé playing some of these on CD, and was enchanted by Radu Lupu live, but after this I will probably search out some Hamelin on record.  He's not afraid to be expressive, including rhythmically.  The Rhapsody for saxophone and orchestra, with Hamelin playing the orchestral part on piano, came off less well to my ears, probably not because of the performance but either because it is a more ungainly piece of music, or because it needs the orchestra to sound right.

All or much of the portion of the show that features Hamelin seems to have been recorded live, in a concert hosted by PT host Fred Childs, that also features interesting conversation between him and Hamelin about the music.  Today's show began with two pieces by Hamelin that I enjoyed... in a style that is reminiscent of the side of Debussy that is more involved with stacks of thirds and relatively diatonic melody (rather than fourths and fifths and pentatonic melody), but with a bit more chromaticism (though soft-edged) and to my ears somewhat more standard harmonic progressions, bringing in some of the more restrained aspects of nineteenth-century romanticism, as well as a slight whiff of classic thirties-through-fifties classic jazz and American popular music.

Tomorrow's show will feature Hamelin playing more preludes and a duet with clarinetist Richard Stoltzmann, among other things, so I'd say tune in or stream it.

 

 

Billy Hart quartet Live at the Village Vanguard in 2009

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Jazz fans should not miss the opportunity to download an mp3 of a 70 minute set by the Billy Hart quartet playing live at the Village Vanguard in New York on Sept. 23, 2009.  I really enjoyed a couple of sets from this run at the Vanguard, possibly including this one.  If I find my listening notes I may post some impressions of the live gig.  Billy Hart, drums, Ethan Iverson, piano, Ben Street, bass, Mark Turner, tenor sax.  Lots of thanks to the group for making this available, and not just as a stream but as a free download.  Reward them by buying one or more of their CDs...I'll post a review when mine arrives.

All four of these guys are fantastic players, with very individual approaches.  They listen to each other and interact a lot, too.  A bit of silly trivia is that I thought Ben Street looked like a dead ringer for House (of the TV show), though he's a bit less so in photos.

Incidentally, Iverson's blog, Do the Math, is essential for jazz fans, especially jazz piano fans.  He is willing to stick his neck out about what he likes and doesn't, the perspective of a player is fascinating and invaluable, and the interviews with musicians (like Keith Jarrett, Jason Moran, Wynton Marsalis...) and others are fantastic and create irreplaceable first-hand anecdotal documentation of parts of jazz's history.