Category — monterey jazz festival

Septeto Nacional de Cuba created a joyful, sexy party atmosphere in Dizzy’s Den on Saturday night. The audience inside was enthusiastic; outside, a crowd thronged in front of the doors, hoping to get in. The music had people dancing in the aisles. The crowd was so thick, and the music so delightful, that our photographer only managed to snap one photo!

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

The largest crowd at the Garden Stage during the Monterey Jazz Festival was there to see virtuoso ukulele player Jake Shimabukuro. The crowd filled every seat, crowded the aisles, stood and sat in the empty grassy areas to either side of the seats, stood behind the bleachers and peeked between members of the audience, even climbed trees in order to get a look at the Hawaiian sensation. Volunteers and staff members stood at the side of the stage and peeked through viewing holes in the backdrop (see below) to catch a glimpse. Shimabukuro may not play straight-ahead jazz, but the crowd clearly didn’t care; every song he played was met with wild applause.

Shimakuburo covered rock songs and added his own flair to them. His epic version of “Bohemian Rhapsody” was touching and deeply contemplative,  pulling in both elements of Freddy Mercury’s unique vocal style and Brian May’s trademark guitar work while clearly making them his own. His version of “My Guitar Gently Weeps” similarly took a well-known, guitar-centric work and made it fresh, new and profoundly emotional.

What is most amazing about Shimabukuro is the rich, fully rounded nature of the sounds he pulls from the ukulele. The ukulele has no bass strings; frequently, rock songs transposed to the ukulele seem ethereal but also missing something. Despite his lack of bass strings, however, Shimabukuro made every piece of music rich, moving and in the case of the cover songs, wholly his own.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

In 1994, the Monterey Jazz Festival revived their commission program, commissioning a work by Billy Childs (Concerto for Piano & Jazz Chamber Orchestra). In 1998, the Monterey Jazz Festival again commissioned Childs; this time he arranged a set of original compositions from Bobby Hutcherson. Saturday night marked the third time Childs premiered a Monterey Jazz Festival commission piece before an anticipatory audience.

After of Jason Moran’s controversial, polarizing and admittedly challenging Monterey Jazz Festival commission piece “Feedback” in 2009, jazz fans might think that the selection of Childs was a safe choice. However, Childs made his own daring decision, writing a composition that paired his quartet with minimalist ”new music” string quartet Kronos Quartet.

Childs warmed up the crowd with two traditionally flavored and spellbinding jazz pieces. The first was the Grammy-nominated “Aaron’s Song,” written for his son in 1997. The second, “Hope, in the Face of Despair,” had an unexpected provenance — it was based on Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel about the Holocaust, Maus. The music wavered between the two emotional states, ending at a balance point between hope and despair. By the time Childs welcomed Kronos Quartet to the stage, there was a palpable sense of anticipation in the air.

What seemed like an out-of-the-box choice, however, was not quite as offbeat as it appeared. Kronos Quartet are no strangers to jazz; they’ve performed with Pat Metheny and the Modern Jazz Quartet.

Childs said he wrote the music “not with any storyline in mind, just what I was feeling.”  The often angular strings of Kronos Quartet layered a sharp, sometimes harsh sound over the warm tones of Childs’ quartet, adding a surprising but not displeasing jolt to the music. (The two quartets didn’t seem thrown by the low-flying prop plane that flew overhead shortly after they began, adding its own surpising counterpoint to a quiet string-and-piano section.)

Childs struck a perfect balance with his piece, injecting the unexpected to intrigue jazz fans looking for something innovative while maintaining a solid footing in the world of jazz that pleased the traditionalists.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

Since vocalist Gretchen Parlato won the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Vocals Competition in 2004, buzz about her has been steadily building. Her warm voice has drawn praise as “striking the balance between precision and flexibility.” On Saturday night, jazz fans poured into the Nightclub room at the Monterey Jazz Festival to find out what all the buzz was about.

Parlato’s voice is warm, but also distant, and would not be out of place on either a straight jazz or a Thievery Corporation album. Her backing band gives the music a lush, loungey feel. Parlato gives them the room and the freedom to each have their own turn in the spotlight; Taylor Eigsti especially drew applause and cheers from the audience with his free-form, delicate and airy piano solos on numbers like the band’s cover of Herbie Hancock’s “Butterfly.”

Gretchen Parlato has been compared to Astrud Gilberto, but her voice is both deeper and warmer, while maintaining Gilberto’s trademark dissafected distance. The Gretchen Parlato Band has not yet covered “The Girl from Ipanema,” but after last night’s performance, it’s clear that if they did it would be remarkable.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

The hypnotic sound of Rudresh Mahanthappa’s Indo-Pak Coalition on the Bill Berry Stage at the Monterey Jazz Festival on Friday night was another fine example of the ways jazz can infuse itself with other musical influences without losing itself. Individual pieces transformed from sparse and ethereal to driving and deeply textured and back again.

Mahanthappa leads seven musical projects, including this one. While anyone else’s attention might be split by so many disparate efforts, it’s clear from his top-notch performance Friday night that saxophonist Mahanthappa pours his full energy and talents into Indo-Pak Coalition.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

Imagine watching a man beat-boxing for 15 minutes. Now imagine that it’s the most awesome musical performance you’ve ever seen. If you saw The House Jacks on the Garden Stage at the Monterey Jazz Festival, you don’t have to imagine – you saw it. Jake Moulton performed epic feats of beatboxing, “tuning the snare,” switching drumsets on the fly like switching patches on the drum machine and doing credible-sounding synthesizer hits that seemed well beyond the human vocal range.

For attendees hearing The House Jacks from the midway area, it was easy to assume they were a full band. This spectacular a capella group calls themselves “a band without instruments” and live up to that motto. They showed that you don’t need instruments to be good. It was never noticeable that instruments were missing.

The band’s music tended toward the heartrending, ending with a moving ballad written after a band member had lost an uncle and cousin. It was a musically and emotionally satisfying conclusion to their set.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

Grammy-nominiated French “Afropean” act Les Nubians seemed an eyebrow-raising choice for an arena set at the Monterey Jazz Festival; the duo are often categorized as a soul or world music act. However, Hélène and Célia Faussart also pull substantial jazz influences into their music.

Les Nubians use their music to spread a message of peace and love, and that spirit was evident in their performance. It seemed like the sisters invited the audience to be a part of their musical family, immediately finding an easy rapport. Their warm, crowd-pleasing set brought a soulful groove to the Arena Stage.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

San Francisco’s Jazz Mafia is a confederation of musicians who perform in a number of different configurations, ranging from solo acts to a full-scale orchestra. Last year, Jazz Mafia outfit The Shotgun Wedding Quintet performed at the Monterey Jazz Festival to a strongly polarized audience. While some thought that the band’s music was “nothing even remotely related to jazz” and lambasted their use of hip-hop influences, stating “When jazz mafia combine some jazz with rap music, There is no jazz there!!!!!!!” new fans contended that the band were “incredibly skilled composers and arrangers, and they fuse genres because they can do it so well.”

This year it was clear: the Jazz Mafia has found its audience at the Monterey Jazz Festival. There was an air of palpable excitement in Dizzy’s Den as they approached jazz with crackling energy and a deep connection with the audience. They declared themselves confidently to the world with the sweeping symphony “Brass, Bows and Beats” and  garnered a standing ovation from the enraptured audience.

This configuration of the band was comprised of over 40 musicians, including a full string section, seven vocalists, and a turntablist. The band combined a punk-rock spirit and exceptional musical talent for a performance that was edgy and innovative without losing its jazz roots.

Bandleader Adam Theis and the rest of the Jazz Mafia showed they are masters at synthesizing elements that are normally in opposition. The sprawling band juxtaposed discipline and freedom, sounding incredibly tight while feeling easy and loose. The fully orchestral composition didn’t just use the string section for show, nor did it skew into an overload of traditional classical; as a fierce violin duet showed, these string players are also actual jazz musicians. They didn’t just appropriate hip-hop to use it as a condiment in jazz, nor did they try to add depth to hip-hop with jazz elements; they found a sweet spot where those two forms flowed together naturally.

If you’re worried about the graying of jazz, listening to the Jazz Mafia will put your mind at ease. “Brass, Bows and Beats” is a truly epic achievement and an exciting evolution in the world of jazz.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

“Hi, my name’s Nellie!” Nellie McKay said in little-girl fashion as she bounded onto the stage. “What’s yours?” The audience, many of whom were curious but skeptical, laughed. Over the course of her set, however, McKay showed she’d brought her jazz chops and won the audience over with a combination of good cheer, loopy humor and ferocious talent.

McKay began her set with a spare, almost acapella version of the standard “The Very Thought of You.” McKay’s voice has often been compared to Doris Day’s, and while they are similar, McKay’s voice is warmer and smokier than Day’s. Throughout the set, the multi-talented McKay also showed off her instrumental skills as she switched back and forth between piano and ukelele.

The song that won the audience over was an exceptionally jazzy twist on Gershwin’s “Do, Do, Do,” originally from the musical “Oh, Kay!” and sung by Doris Day in “Tea for Two,” the film version of the musical “No No Nanette.” During the song, McKay allowed the members of her backing band (trumpeter Willie Murillo, saxophonist Mark Vishner, guitarist Cary Park, bassist Will Harvey and drummer Ben Bynum) to take the spotlight with a short and seemingly spontaneous jam.

Once McKay had the audience on her side, she began mixing up her set with songs ranging from reggae to Patsy Cline-style country to the Hatian merengue of her whimsical “Bodega.” McKay even edged into potentially controversial satire with her acerbic “Mother of Pearl,” which was greeted with loud whoops from the audience. But she returned again and again to a core of traditional jazz motifs, including a Dixieland-style tune (acclaimed by a roar from the crowd) and several more Doris Day covers such as “A Wonderful Guy.” While many in the audience may have arrived as skeptics, they left as fans.

For more information on the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our Monterey Jazz Festival page. For coverage of the 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival, see all our Monterey Jazz Festival posts. For more photos from this and other performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival, see our 2010 Monterey Jazz Festival set on Flickr.

Dave Brubeck and Bobby Militello at the 2009 Monterey Jazz Festival. View the whole set of Monterey Jazz Festival photos on Flickr.

This weekend’s big event is Monterey County’s top music festival: the 53rd Annual Monterey Jazz Festival. As usual, there’s more exciting acts playing than you could possibly pack into a weekend, including jazz stalwarts like George Wein and his Newport All Stars, Ahmad Jamal and Harry Connick, Jr.; up-and-comers such as the John Clayton Trio and Gretchen Parlato and surprising choices such as contemporary classical act Kronos Quartet, show tune-hip hop artist Nellie McKay, and afrobeat duo Les Nubians. See the official Monterey Jazz Festival site for the full list of artists and the schedule. Bookmark our Monterey Jazz Festival tag to and return throughout the weekend to follow our Monterey Jazz Festival coverage!

Friday

Local metal act Dirty for Doris? and Vulture King play this Friday’s metal showcase at Jose’s Lounge Underground. 9pm, 638 Wave St., Monterey. $5.

Saturday

Soak up local arts and crafts at the Monterey Bay HarvestFest Arts & Crafts Faire at Custom House Plaza. Meet the artists, enjoy live entertainment, dine on food from local vendors and get information on the sponsor, Pacific Repertory Theater, from staff on site. 9am-5pm, Custom House Plaza, Monterey. Free.

Get your blues on with the Groove Hounds at Bullwacker’s. 8:30pm, 653 Cannery Row, Monterey. No cover.

Catch great jazz without leaving Big Sur as Fernwood Resort hosts San Francisco world/jazz music artists the Hands on Fire Band, featuring James Henry. 9pm, Highway One in Big Sur, no cover.

Sunday

Missed Roger Eddy in his Monterey Jazz Festival performance? Monterey’s straight-ahead jazz group, Along Came Betty, has performed previously at the Monterey Jazz Festival. See them today on the back porch at the Big Sur River Inn. 1pm-5pm, Highway One in Big Sur. No cover. (Thanks to Janet Lesniak for the catch!)

MY Museum celebrates International Talk Like a Pirate Day with the first official MY Treasure Hunt. Pirates and their families will follow treasure maps around downtown Monterey to uncover secret treasures. Afterwards, enjoy the Pirate After Party with barbecue and live entertainment for the whole family. The hunt begins at 3pm at MY Museum, 325 Washington St., Monterey. $30 for adults, $15 for children. Space is limited; call 649-6444 to reserve.