Corea is an inveterate innovator and bold explorer with a profound historic consciousness.
On the jacket cover of his latest CD, The Vigil, Chick Corea, portrayed as an ever vigilant knight on horseback, is equipped with a new suit of shining armor with a trusty lance at his side, a jazz Lancelot whose Holy Grail is, was and always shall be the pursuit of constant renewal and enlightenment.
Although the armor isn’t as impressive for Sir Chick and his trusty steed (definitely not Don Quixote’s Rocinante), this amusing, knightly image is reminiscent of the chivalric hero on the medieval-themed cover for Corea’s classic Romantic Warrior, the high-energy, 1976 jazz/rock release and best-selling album for his band Return to Forever.
Celebrating his new band and a batch of new compositions and arrangements on The Vigil (Concord/Jazz), our romantic warrior/jazz knight errant brings his record tour (or pilgrimage) to Hartford to perform at 7:30 pm on Sunday, September 21, at the new Infinity Music Hall and Bistro, a state-of-the-art entertainment magnet designed to attract patrons to the new Front Street entertainment district.
A key player in the master plan to energize the city, the venue is the urban counterpart to Dan Hincks’ rural Infinity Music Hall and Bistro, which has enjoyed great success since 2008, nestled picturesquely in its bucolic but musically bustling setting in Norfolk.
As the first jazz giant to play on stage at the Capital City’s newest, widely hailed venue, Corea, a 20-time Grammy Award winner and National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master, rides into town at the head his new elite corps of Chick Corea Chevaliers featuring: British saxophone wonderTim Garland, tenor and soprano saxophone, bass clarinet and flute;Charles Altura, electric and acoustic guitar; HadrienFeraud, bass; andMarcus Gilmore (grandson of the legendary drummer Roy Haynes) on drums.
Like their leader, these warriors take no prisoners.
All are champions whether jousting in rock, jazz, jazz/rock or with their deeds of derring-do when galloping through grooves and kaleidoscopic moods from the mysterious to the galactic, fluently mixing electric and acoustic tactics. For the studio recording, guest appearances were made by percussionist Pernell Saturnino (appearing on three of the CD’s seven tracks) and, on one track each, saxophonist Ravi Coltrane; Chick’s old pal and collabortor, bassist Stanley Clarke; and the keyboardist/composer/leader’s wife and colleague, singer Gayle Moran Corea.
Some of the originals are inspired by what Corea, always an inveterate innovator and bold explorer with a profound historic consciousness, calls legacy figures. His piece "Royalty," for example, is dedicated to Roy Haynes, whom he describes as a “hero, mentor and friend”, and his "Pledge for Peace" is what he calls a prayer inspired by John Coltrane.
Part of Corea’s vigil is his perpetual homage to such personal icons as Haynes and Coltrane, also including such other demi-gods cited in his liner note comments as Duke Ellington, Art Tatum, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker and Miles Davis. Corea’s philosophy is rooted in creativity, freedom of expression and the desire to “defy the existing norm,” and also embraces, he writes, “all music that inspires—a new style, a new technique, a fresh improvisation every day in a new way.”
Whatever genre boundaries the fearless, frequent flyer chooses to cross at will, he has never abandoned his home base as a great, electrifying acoustic jazz pianist. If you love this facet of his kaleidoscopic artistry, then you’ll be crazy about yet another one of his recent Concord releases, the superb, three-CD package, Trilogy, which presents his acoustic piano prowess in live concert performances around the world from Slovenia to Spain with his super trio featuring bassist Christian McBride and drummer Brian Blade.
Whether mining new gold from old standards right from the opening track’s “You’re My Everything” to the grand finale, “Someday My Prince Will Come”; or reimagining a prelude by the iconoclastic Russian composer/pianist Alexander Scriabin, or discovering new, visceral vibrations in such classic Corea anthems as “Spain” or “Armando’s Rhumba,” the pianist creates a constant stream of expressive invention for more than three and a half hours.
With currents rapidly flowing and inventive surprises surging from fleeting moment to moment, you can never step in the same river twice.
Nonetheless, Trilogy is not just about Corea’s individual tour de force, as imposing as that may be. It’s also very much about the exciting interaction, mercurial wit and deeply intuitive empathy uniting the three collaborators.
Whether in the wry, witty romps through the Thelonious Monk tunes “Work” and “Blue Monk,” or Corea’s newly-minted homage to the late flamenco guitar genius Paco de Lucia, or on a never before recorded original sonata, the trio pieces crackle with brilliant dialogue among these three exceptionally well-matched, matchless improvisers. McBride’s big, booming double bass, with its powerful resonance and burning sense of swing and thematic inventiveness, is the perfect foil and musical alter ego for Corea, as is Blade’s razor-sharp, rhythmic energy and inexhaustible ingenuity.
The best way to take in this king-size Coreafest is simply through binge-listening, absorbing all three discs in one single, gluttonous sitting, much like binge-viewing multiple episodes of “House of Cards.” Tickets for Corea in his latest creative incarnation are $69.00 to $89.00. The new Infinity Music Hall is at 32 Front Street in Hartford. Information: infinityhall.com. Box office: (860) 560-7757.
Brit Hero Conquers Connecticut
Evan Parker, a revolutionary saxophonist and pioneering figure in the early days of the British free jazz scene, conquers Connecticut with back-to-back appearances at New Haven’s Firehouse 12 on Friday, September 19, at 8:30 and 10:00 pm, and at Hartford’s Real Art Ways at 7:00 pm on Saturday, September 20.
Parker, who began on alto saxophone at age 14 (his first alto hero was Paul Desmond), was originally a botany student at Birmingham University. Botany got bumped, however, after the young Brit took a trip to New York City and, in a transformative life experience, heard the Cecil Taylor Trio cultivating its wildly exotic, verdant, atonal turf.
Instead of immersing himself in greenery, Parker has devoted his life to conducting advance research on the science of the free jazz saxophone, experimenting with a wide-array of daring techniques ranging from circular breathing to multiphonics. His trans-Atlantic career has included collaborations with fellow explorers in improvisation ranging from England’s Derek Baileyand Germany’s Peter Brotzmann to such eminent American researchers as Anthony Braxton and John Zorn.
Parker, a 70-year-old native of Bristol, England, will be joined at Firehouse 12 by guitarist Joe Morris and trumpeter Nate Wooley. Tickets: $20.00, first set; $15.00, second set. Information: firehouse12.com and (203) 785-0468. Firehouse 12 is at 45 Crown Street.
Parker makes his premiere appearance in Hartford at Real Art Ways on opening night for the multi-arts center’s Improvisations series. Hosted by trumpeter Stephen Haynes and Joe Morris, who also doubles on guitar, Improvisations centers on collaborative improvised music. Haynes and Morris are not only the curators of the acclaimed series, which is marking its fourth year, but also sit-in with their handpicked guests in the monthly performances devoted to creating original works on the spot.
Besides the iconic Brit saxophonist, the fall schedule for Improvisations features: vibraphonist Bryan Carrott, October 26; Mess Hall with Morris, guitar; Steve Lantner, keys; Jerome Deupree, drums/percussion; and Haynes, cornet, November 14; and percussionist Chad Taylor, December 7. Tickets for each event: RAW members, $12.00; non-members, $15.00, available at the door. Information: realartways.org and (860) 232-1006. RAW is at 56 Arbor Street.
The Return of “Sweet Sue”
The globe-trotting saxophonist “Sweet Sue” Terry returns to her old stomping grounds in Hartford as she leads her quartet at 8:00 pm on Saturday, September 20, in a free concert at the Artists Collective at 1200 Albany Avenue.
"Sweet Sue" Terry has gone international, performing at top venues around the world.
A searing alto saxophonist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, singer, bandleader, lyricist, blogger, author and Dorothy Parkeresque wit, the multi-talented Wilton native and protégé of jazz great Jackie McLean, Terry honed her jazz skills as a studious undergraduate by day at the University of Hartford’s Hartt School (class of 1981), and by night as a stunning saxophonist lighting up Hartford’s heated jazz scene from the late 1970s to the early 1980s.
Hardly out of her teens, she was much at home in high-caliber, male-dominated jam sessions at such red-hot venues as Al Casasanta’s legendary 880 Club. Terry, who was named Hartt School’s Alumna of the Year in 2001, was, in a historic step, the first graduate of the jazz studies program that McLean, the legendary saxophonist/educator, founded on the UofH campus. The groundbreaking program is now called the Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz.
Since her formative Hartford years, Terry has gone international, making numerous recordings as a side person and leader and performing at top venues around the world. While enjoying critical acclaim and success, she’s never lost that initial catalytic urge to constantly excel that so obviously inspired her as a young, bright undergrad jamming all over the Hartford scene from smoke-filled clubs to Bushnell Park, venues that frequently reverberated with her smart, soulful sound.
Terry, who’ll double on saxophone and clarinet, leads her Sweet Sue Special Band featuring the celebrated bassist Bob Cranshaw, guitarist Vic Juris and drummer Steve Johns. Free passes are available at the Artists Collective and at the door. No reservations. Information: (860) 527-3205.
Wizard String Theoretician at Yale
With his left hand frenetically plucking bass lines and strumming rocking rhythms as his right hand simultaneously functions like a concert pianist playing reams of beautiful melodies, thickly-textured chords and dizzying arpeggios, the wizard Colombian-born harpist Edmar Castaneda is a one-man band.
Castaneda, who was born in Bogotá in 1978 and came with his parents to the States in the early 1990s, brings his high-powered, emotion-drenched jazz harp artistry to New Haven at 8:00 pm on Saturday, September 20, as he performs solo and with his trio at Yale University’s Sprague Hall.
Prepare to be dazzled. A dynamo string theoretician, he embraces everything from world folk to John Coltrane, Art Tatum and Frederic Chopin, sometimes all in the same dramatically unfolding chorus.
With his hands a blur flying all over the strings of his portable Columbian folk harp (smaller than the classical harp), the self-taught virtuoso rips into beautiful, freewheeling improvisations, inspired by a diverse array of influences. Along with jazz, these include: Colombian, Ecuadorian and Venezuelan folkloric traditions, African and Brazilian rhythms, the tango, flamenco, hints of the dreamy modalism of Alice Coltrane, the infinitely expansive, explosive elements of John Coltrane, the prodigious pianistics of Art Tatum, the romanticism of Chopin and bravura passages evocative of Paganini’s demonically inspired prestidigitation. Castaneda’s trio mates are trombonist Marshall Gilkes and drummer/percussionist Dave Silliman, with a special guest appearance by vocalist Andrea Tierra.
More than anything—even more than his pyrotechnics--the music is about Castaneda’s celebration of and belief in the power and the glory of the groove. Castaneda’s credo is delivered with a virtuosity verging on ferocity of a very wonderful kind, transforming his performance into a ritualistic event in which the harpist becomes the music itself, happily immersed body and soul in the beat and the beauty of his own spontaneous creation.
The concert is presented by Yale Concert Bands and Creative Concerts, a non-profit organization that for many years has produced high quality concerts in New Haven featuring such towering figures as McCoy Tyner, Keith Jarrett, Sonny Rollins and Dave Holland. Tickets: $25.00 and $35.00, available at music-tickets.yale.edu, (203) 432-4158, or at the box office at 470 College Street.
Iconoclastic Contrabassist at UMass
Mark Dresser, the noted avant-garde double bass virtuoso, presents a solo concert at 8:00 pm on Thursday, September 18, in The Solos and Duos Series in Bezanson Recital Hall at the Fine Arts Center at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
Dresser, who has worked with innovators ranging from Ray Anderson to John Zorn, has expanded the sonic possibilities of the contrabass through the use of unconventional amplification and extended techniques. Tickets: $10.00 general; $5.00 students at the box office; or (800) 999-UMAS.
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