Jazzaomoart
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Macdonald Stewart Art Centre
Guelph Jazz Festival

Take "Jazz" and "Love" and "Art". In Spanish, they can be rolled up into one word – Jazzaomoart – and that's the nom-de-art of a Mexican visual artist who appeared at the 2011 Guelph Jazz Festival.

Jazzaomoart Vázquez was introduced to Festival-goers at a Wednesday afternoon session at the colloquium by jazz musician and journalist Alain Derbez, who showed a video of a number of Jazzaomoart's works and of him in action. Although he has also created sculptures and more standard murals, Jazzaomoart is best known for actually improvising to the music created by jazz musicians (Mexican and international) – creating brush-stroke paintings and paper sculptures inspired by what he is hearing.

According to Derbez, Jazzaomoart tries to live his life like jazz, emphasizing freedom and improvisation. This has led to at least one right-wing Mexican politician to destroy one of Jazzaomoart's sculptures in a Mexican city, because it was considered politically dangerous. (Jazzaomoart was present at the session, but didn't speak for himself at any time, perhaps because of a language barrier.)

On Thursday morning, in a workshop entitled Mirar el ruido (To See the Noise), Derbez collaborated with the members of Tilting: Nicolas Caloia, Jean Derome, Isaiah Ceccarelli, and Guillaume Dostaler, to create a musical improvisation to which Jazzamoart could create the corresponding visual improv.

The open gallery on the main floor of the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre was cleared out and several wall hangings protected with a barrier.  Jazzamoart had prepared a number of paper rolls in advance and had more plain paper ready. The musicians started playing off each other, and he moved around them, crumpling and folding paper into interesting shapes, and creating a network of long strips of paper. He started unrolling already-painting rolls and attached those with masking tape near the walls. He painted on the plain paper with long, shiny black strokes using a medium-width brush – strokes that moved down and crossed around the paper to create an intricate pattern.

Read more: 2011 Guelph Jazz Festival: Jazzaomoart

Tilting: the Nicolas Caloia Quartet, and
Paul Plimley-William Parker-Jean Martin
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Cooperators Hall, River Run Centre
Guelph Jazz Festival

The Guelph Jazz Festival makes a point of connecting the musicians it brings to the festival in novel combinations.

This was particularly obvious on the Thursday of the 2011 festival, where the day-time program showed another aspect of the evening's performers, where the last  evening show featured three artists who have rarely played together, and where the two unrelated halves of the evening performance nevertheless complemented each other.

First up on the evening bill was Tilting, a Montreal quartet led by bassist Nicolas Caloia, with Jean Derome on bass flute and saxophones, Isaiah Ceccarelli on percussion, and Guillaume Dostaler on piano. The quartet is the heart of the much larger (30-piece) Ratchet Orchestra, also led by Calioa. The festival blurb indicated that this quartet shares the larger orchestra's same commitment to juxtaposing structure and improvisation, and you could hear that in the their performances at Guelph.

In the evening, Tilting played originals by Caloia; however, if you had attended the festival colloquium that morning, you would have heard quite a different repertoire from the group: pure free improvisation lasting about an hour, inspiring and being inspired by the on-the-spot drawings and paintings of a Mexican visual artist named Jazzaomoart . (See related article.)

The three pieces in the evening set were more focused, and used Derome's talents particularly well. He started out on baritone sax in the first piece, moved to bass flute for the second piece, and ended up on alto sax for the last piece. He brought out a richness of tone in all three instruments, and ensured the pieces moved you both emotionally and intellectually.

Ceccarelli introduced the first piece with an echoing drum solo with a beat that was never quite predictable. Caloia added a bass undertone several minutes in, and then Derome's baritone sax strode in – authoritatively and definitively. It eventually moved into a duet with Dostaler's piano, the sax curlicuing around a slow piano vamp. The unresolved tension continued as both gained in intensity, and the piano took over. Then the bass moved in for an extended electronically-altered solo bowing, echoing the sax solo near the beginning. The drums strengthened, the bass moved back to a steady beat, and the baritone returned to its initial strong riff steadily deepening before it ended.

Read more: 2011 Guelph Jazz Festival: Tilting, and Plimley-Parker-Martin

Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
Saturday, September 10, 2011
River Run Centre
Guelph Jazz Festival

Preceding Henry Threadgill at the Saturday night concert at the 2011 Guelph Jazz Festival was the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, an eight-piece group of brass instruments plus drums. The Ensemble is also from Chicago – in fact, seven of the eight musicians are brothers – and also has a notable bass brass undertone (from sousaphone and euphonium in its case). However, those are its only similarities to Threadgill.

The Ensemble started by lining up at the front of the stage – all but the drummer at the back. Three trumpets, two trombones, and one euphonium surrounded their largest musician, Tycho Cohran. He carried a giant sousaphone which was almost as large as he was. (The sound technicians, perhaps stumped how to mic the instrument, had ended up taping a vocal mic inside the huge bell). Cohran had an outstanding upper-body muscular development, which he needed to carry an instrument that was clearly extremely heavy, especially while dancing on tip-toe while playing it (he thankfully put it down several times at appropriate breaks in the concert).

It was an impressive sight, and an impressive wall of sound ensued, which could best be defined as a cross between brass band and hip-hop. I particularly loved the sousaphone which provided a clear bass line without ever turning oompah.

I had only heard of the Ensemble as a (popular) club band, and it became painfully obvious very quickly that this was indeed its metier. Their music was infectious and well-suited for dancing. The musicians shared out the announcing / singing duties; each of them was energetic, and did his best to get the audience up and dancing and clapping. The songs and their lyrics were upbeat, politically progressive, and hopeful.

Read more: 2011 Guelph Jazz Festival: Hypnotic Brass Ensemble

IMOO Concert #31
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Umi Café

 The official Improvising Musicians of Ottawa/Outaouais (IMOO) announcement described it as a "Quiet Music" show. The musicians: Linsey Wellman on flute, bass clarinet, alto sax and coffee mug, Craig Pedersen on laptop and various electronics, and Ryan Purchase on (muted) trombone, guitar, leaky ice-cube-tray water drum, percussion, and spoken word, delivered exactly what they promised. The show was an exercise in ear-training, where the audience and musicians all had to dig deep into their listening skills, as the trio competed with the air conditioning system and subdued street noise outside Umi Café for quietness.

It was the kind of show one might expect following the informal pre-show discussion between OttawaJazzScene.ca editor Alayne McGregor and Craig Pedersen, about whether the lip smacking from eating his delicious Umi sandwich could be made loudly enough to serve as an unamplified sound element in a concert. I started on the wrong foot, by wondering aloud what the unusual clutter in the corner of the Umi Café that I would have to deal with in my photographic compositions was (an ice cube tray on a clothes rack). I was soundly corrected by Ryan Purchase that it was a musical instrument. A leaky one, but that's the way it worked best.

Read more: IMOO's "quiet" concert #31 ends a successful first year

Tribute to Charlie Parker
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Kailash Mital Theatre, Carleton University

Wednesday night's tribute to Charlie Parker was a bit less of a success than the other concerts in the 2011 Carleton Jazz Camp series.

There was good ensemble playing, and sizzling solos by trumpeter Dave Dunlop on "Little Suede Shoes" and trumpeter Nick Dyson on "Star Eyes". Guitarist Tim Bedner, who played the only chordal instrument against a wall of brass, also stood out for his fluid solos that underlined the melody in the music.

And the concert also showed how strong Parker's music remains despite its familiarity. In fact, listening to the pieces reminded me of watching a Shakespeare play – at the point when you're taken right out of the story by how familiar a line is, and how often you've seen it as a book title or a cliché in conversation. Hearing en masse the compositions that Parker wrote or made famous was a reminder of how much they've not only permeated jazz, but also fit into general life as CBC radio breaks and incidental music.

Read more: Tribute to Charlie Parker at the 2011 Carleton U Jazz Camp concert series