Zion 80 – Bronx Music Heritage Center – July 19, 2015
Zion 80 has some Matisyahu lineage, but is a strictly instrumental combo. They channel Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, among others, through the lens of Fela; it’s an intense groove and LOUD (at least it was inside this small venue). Bobby Sanabria, a big cheese in the Bronx Music Heritage scene, sat in on drums.
Jon Madof
Marlon Sobol
Bobby Sanabria
Jessica Lurie
Shanir Blumenkranz
Bill K – Onekahakaha Park, Hilo – July 9, 2015
This evening event, which included dinner, was part of the doings of the Pacific Ecosystems meetings, run out of Stanford U. by Peter Vitousek. Since Bill K. was the name that someone seemed to recognize, I went with that for the title.
Bill K
Kalani Aki
Lono
Joe Camacho / Darlene Ahuna – Cooper Center, Volcano – July 4, 2015
The 4th of July is big doings in Volcano, with various festivities and everyone local out to talk story. At a certain point, I’m not sure who the bigger name is among the entertainers. It sure wasn’t the bass player. Some impromptu hula dancing added a hunk of gusto to the affair.
Joe Camacho
Darlene Ahuna
Bob Banks
Raenette Hernando – Puna Hongwanji Mission, Kea‘au – July 3, 2015
The Obon ceremony is a Buddhist rite where the recently departed ancestors are remembered and honored. The ceremony seemed to be modeled after more familiar Christian church services; we felt like we shouldn’t go the festivities without first participating in the service. The entertainment started off with the Puna Taiko drummers, who were not on long enough for my liking. The Bon dance proper followed; it is a circular sashaying affair around a central tower. After the drummers, we scored some local scarf, watched for a bit, and were done.
Raenette Hernando
Richard Zazzi – Punalu‘u Bake Shop – July 3, 2015
We stopped into to the Punalu‘u Bake Shop for a bite to eat, and were pleasantly surprised to have live music, so out came the sketch materials for a quickie.
Richard Zazzi
Paul Burt – July 2, 2015
There’s not too much to write about this one. Burt is my Big Island buddy for various capers, also a bowl turner. I’d hoped to catch him in action carving out curlicues on the lathe in his home workshop; instead he was doing a relatively un-flashy operation, sanding a bowl. Which generated so much dust (he is masked!) that I didn’t stick around long enough to go into details on the sketch.
Paul Burt
Christine Lavin / Don White – Cole Auditorium, Greenwich Library – May 17, 2015
This was a weird hybrid kind of gig. Lavin was the known quantity going in, and the obvious draw; White much less so. Each is an independent performer, with a fair amount of humor in the songs, or is it music in the jokes? They recognize themselves as kindred souls, and it makes its own kind of sense; the collaboration is minimal, it’s more like a tag-team approach. We sat in the front row, so were fair fodder for the onstage antics. Toots got dragooned into coming up to turn the pages of a giant picture book; I interrupted the sketching to join the on-stage chorus for the major production number, Lavin’s “Sensitive New-Age Guys”.
Christine Lavin
Don White
José James – Prospect Park – June 12, 2015
Our attendance at this concert was partly nudged along by Jake. He knows he has to be careful about what he touts to me, and exercises appropriate restraint (especially if I gotta go Brooklyn!); this one worked out well, considering. The thing to consider is that the headliner was Esperanza Spalding. It goes without saying that it will be too dark to sketch any second acts at the PP Bandshell. She’s waaaaay into her concept albums at this point in her career. And that set was, well if you can’t say something nice, retreat to “I don’t get it!”, totally the case here. And the bass was too loud (I know it’s your instrument, honey, but you need someone to advocate for the balance!). I had primo seat for sketching while cooler heads were back there laying on blanket on the grass. So by the middle of her set, when I (and the others) wanted to leave, I physically couldn’t get to them, as the crowd had swelled to clog up all outward access (note to safety managers at the bandshell – aisles must stay clear!) Sorry for all the rant, and that doesn’t even include the driving logistics nightmare tales (yes, plural!). James, though, was a revelation. I’ll be more than a bit skeptical about someone who got to jazz via hip-hop (and more so if he thinks, as stated in an interview that he didn’t necessarily want to be “labeled” as jazz because people would think ….. wait for it…… Michael Bublé!) But he pulled it off, and even slung some guitar in the process. The band was all players, no scratchin’, etc., and the set included a far-ranging blend of styles, all delivered with suitable reverence. So that was nice. Even before I did my post-gig research, James had scored some Gambino cred points by having Nate Smith as the drummer; I’d caught him long ago as part of a Dave Holland combo, and remain impressed with his chops. Unfortunately, once again I cannot find the name of a player (the keyboard) for correct credit, oh well.
José James
Nate Smith
Solomon Dorsey and
Takuya Koroda
Ku-umba Frank Lacy / 10³²K – Rubenstein Atrium – February 26, 2015
Much as I resist quoting from official promo materials, this concert was so far out on the unique scale that I’ll relinquish. First, the name of the trio, “10³²K ” refers to “the Planck temperature, at which matter ceases to exist, and conventional physics breaks down, when strange things, unknown things, begin to happen to phenomena we hold near and dear, like space and time”. Their shtick is to select a historic but perhaps overlooked figure influential on modern jazz as a touchstone, and compose based on this inspiration. For this gig, the starting point was Skip James, “a Mississippi Delta blues artist who recorded a hit album in 1931, and then disappeared from the music world for the next 33 years. Discovered in a hospital in 1964 by three young blues enthusiasts, James spent the last five years of his life as one of the most celebrated figures of the mid-60s folk-blues revival”. So this throws up a whole bunch of dots to connect; the resulting suite hardly fits my conception of delta blues, but that’s not the idea. The addition of vocalist Justin Hicks and his powerful blues moanings somewhat clarified the musical pedigree, but that was but one of several dimensions explored on this night.
Ku-umba Frank Lacy
Justin Hicks
Andrew Drury
Kevin Ray
BackCountry Jazz – Cole Auditorium – February 21, 2015
Once again Bennie Wallace has put together a sterling presentation, this year focusing on the music of Duke Ellington.
Bennie Wallace
Donald Vega
George Mraz
Billy Drummond
Luisito Quintero
Bobby Broom
Charenee Wade
