Canb Jazz Fest 4

I arrived back at Smiths while The Vampires were playing and can I say I was dumbfounded.  A deep groove, tons of effects, one tune with background samples, seemingly improvised little passages from each of the front liners, sax and trumpet, then unexpectedly paired, unison or rather octave lines in synch, all against a moving or repeated bass part, I'm assuming improvised but now not so sure, and sparse but expressive drums.  Bevan asked me later if I noticed the delay on snare.  I hadn't but delays were obvious on the front liners often, and an octaver playing down on the bass, but not the only effect there and not the only effect on all but drums, but maybe there were more on drums.  Dunno.  But entrancing.  They mentioned recording with Lionel Loueke.  It's a path to international awareness and they deserve it.  Well travelled, plenty of festivals in Europe and Americas.  And regular tours in Australia.  We were lucky enough to get one. Dub was mentioned.  Was this that?  Certainly the PB tone was very soft thuddy.  That fits?  Whatever, I was enamoured and enlivened.  Great stuff and refreshingly different.  Joss or other?  There's jazz training, of course, but this is not swing, but so what.  Refreshing the artz.  So in he end, a great few days.  Thanks to Nigel, Beth, Bevan.  A local gathering of great worth and I believe we can look forward to another next year.

The Vampires appeared at the inaugural Canberra Jazz Festival at Smiths.  They comprise Jeremy Rose (tenor), Nick Garbett (trumpet), Noel Mason (bass) and Alex Masso (drums).

Internationale

Vazesh were a different experience again.  This is jazz as world music as international (if not really internationale).  This is meditative, pensive, slow and built on the alternative sound of the tar.  Tar is a Persian instrument, guitar-like but more resonant, more trebley, plucked but with a different pick, thicker, more rounded, more pointy.  It all started with bass clarinet for an extended period, then a bass entry with bow and harmonics, then the tar, then into a groove at low tempo (~minum=40?).  After perhaps 15 mins a change to tenor sax.  Calm and unexcited. There's a message here and it's not post-bop.  Nice and not quite as different as I suggest.

Vazesh are Hamed Sadeghi (tar), Jeremy Rose (sax, bass clarinet), Lloyd Swanton (bass).

Face to face

There's always music before the chat although this chat was different.  First the music.  Host Jeremy led his band with Steve Barry, Noel Mason and Alex Hirlian in a quite professionally prerecorded setting.  These are very good players and this was a very satisfying modern jazz outing.  A wonderful drums entry from Alex, into a plaintive tenor melody, then a response, all in an 8-feel, then stops and starts on  a bridge and an end head and into a tenor sax solo.  Nice, punctuated, syncopated bass, swapping 8-bar piano and sax solo passages, then into piano with long 8th note lines, sax triplet drops, driving, busy, then some concurrent soloing, busy drums and a fade to end.  Really nice, but not the topic of the chat.  Instead that was Jeremy and Zoe Haupmann, artistic director of SIMA, talking of various things: the effect of COVID on musos and clubs, the use of streamed concerts, the intimacy and centrality of playing live with others and to an audience, engagements with live streaming, prerecords and struggles with tech.  The fact that you don't have to leave home.  But as Zoe said, she'd done enough gardening and surfing.  They talked of coming albums, coming shows, coming bookings as musos and as venue.  Talking hopefully of audiences also dying to get out to hear music live and happy to give support to venues and players.  Noting that Melbourne and Wangaratta jazz festivals were cancelled this year while Europe and the US is picking up for shows and tours.  Zoe has bookings to record with Ian Moss and festival gigs booked for next year with Missy Higgins and Ian Moss.  She spoke of the joy of bookings being received; "good to have hope" despite multiple reschedules.  But also of fears of lost musos and venues.  And of the particular demands for early/mid career musos and their limited opportunities for networking.  That always there is "no substitute for that live experience" and how we've learnt these things through COVID.  I learnt that the old (not original!) Basement is now Mary's Underground.  The performative ritual of musos and the concert experience of sitting still without checking phone as a liberty, some thing special, a sense of community, as something spiritual.  These are special moments and aren't forgotten: a feeling, unique and rare, precious.  Reminiscing on old time gigs with hubby Evan.  "Can't wait [for gigs to return]"  said Zoe.  And this chat also launched of the Jeremy's Face to Face video series, but it was not much discussed.

Jeremy Rose (tenor) performed with Steve Barry (piano), Noel Mason (bass) and Alex Hirlian (drums) then chatted with Zoe Hauptmann (artistic director of SIMA, bass) for the Earshift Festival.

Bringing the world together

There were many representatives of the Australian world jazz community at the Loft when the Vampires came to play. Normal Vamp bassist, Alex Boneham, was not available so the catholics were represented by Lloyd Swanton and Wanderlust by Fabian Hevia (who happened to be in town). So we could expect reggae and Latin American pulses. I hadn’t expected Stanwell Park. I love the eclectic crosses of styles that we call world jazz - this blend of jazz sensibility with rhythms and grooves and melodies from beyond the Euro traditions. The visitors did a great job. I was floored by Lloyd, lightly played and fed by profound reading and easy playing chops. These were not easy charts to sit in on. Fabian mentioned 13 and 7 and perhaps 9 and I heard some very complex and unexpected syncopations and contorted ostinatos. Lloyd pulled them off with relaxed glances at the charts; stunning. Drummer Alex is all eyes, watching with a blank face and spelling out understated but nicely contorted rhythmic responses to the front line. Fabian was restrained. He’s never too overstated, and a few passages on cajon were richly defining of the tunes and enhancing of the grooves, but he seemed pretty unobtrusive this night.

The Vampires front line comprises the two composing horn players. Jeremy, on alto, had written most tunes; Nick, on trumpet, several others. They played 12 tunes in two sets. The tunes were short and purposeful but also richly embroidered and worldly attractive. Life in the fast lane could have been written by Ornette, and thinking back, Ornette’s influence was clear elsewhere, in rabid free, unison calls and a bluesy perception. The first tunes were warm-ups: few chords, easy changes, lovely simple and attractive melodies. I’d been surprised by the first tune starting with solo bass, given Lloyd was sitting in, but he is a master. The third tune was all Dave Holland to my ears: slower, less bouncy, thoughtful and opening up with rich solos and a counterpoint melody. Chellowdene was a bouncy uptempo 2-feel. Chellowdene is a street in Stanwell Park. I don’t know the reference but the patter suggested it’s shared, at least by Fabian. Euro schmarp was a take on adopting Norwegian fashion. Heston was rich with collective improvisation in the front line over a call-response bass line. On through the second set to the Ornette references. Jeremy’s alto was embroidered, frequently running solos with chords that moved chromatically, sidestepping the harmony, so plenty of dissonance. Nick was less dissonant but fast, clearly spoken and passionate. Trumpet and sax each lend themselves to their own statements and melodic inventions.

The Vampires were on tour for their third CD. I’m on tour as I write this, the day after the gig and on the XPT to Melbourne. The Vampires seem a long way away, but the world is all around us and the melodies and sympathy of this music, and the sheer skills and musicianship are still in my ears. This was wonderfully attractive music, wonderfully played, but also with skills to dream of, to luxuriate in the grooves and dream with the melodies. How deceptively easy it all is.

On this occasion, at the Loft and on this tour date, the Vampires comprised Jeremy Rose (alto), Nick Garbett (trumpet), Alex Masso (drums) with Lloyd Swanton (bass) and Fabian Hevia (percussion).

Vamp

I thought I had the Vampires sorted. Dub and reggae rhythms with highly syncopated melodies and some fairly short but very sweet and capable jazz solos. Despite their name and a relaxed readiness to settle on a groove and several clear vamps against drums solos, I didn’t particularly feel the Vamp-ires’ vamps defined the band. This was more a broad contemporary crossover. An all-ages band (tongue-in-cheek alert) appealing to jazz aficionados along with a pub set. There’s a lot of this around, partly to earn cash and partly to merge catholic interests of creative musicians into their more esoteric jazz studies. Nothing new, really: Diz crossed to latin; Miles crossed to rock; Herbie crossed to funk; Bad Plus crossed to grunge. Contemporary jazz is a melange and all the better for it. So I’d set them in the reggae camp, but there were the delicious trad-style collective solos, a fairly free outing during the second set and to top it off, a clear rock feel to finish. I’m chastened and promising not to put bands in boxes in future, but I’m elated. Great stuff and eminently entertaining and intellectually satisfying to boot.

The Vampires are a quartet of alto and trumpet fronting bass and drums but this outing added a Melbourne mate, Shannon Barnett, on trombone. So the front line was that much richer in harmonies and solos and tonal and conceptual contrasts. Trumpeter Nick Garbett was a wonder, playing with embrochure and squeels and squeaks, or blaring with rapid-fire lines that flared easily over changing chords. He was a finalist in the recent Australian Jazz Award at Wangaratta for brass, so I’m not the only one to recognise these skills. I’d caught Shannon Barnett at Wang but not in so intimate a setting, and was looking forward to this gig. She didn’t disappoint. Her solos were authoritative and nicely developed, with clearly-imagined melodic lines, often as calls-and-responses, and displaying intervallic and rhythmic intelligence and rich with dynamics. Jeremy was on alto for the night, less proud and bell-like than the brass, but equally inventive and humanising the harmonies with the more carnal reed tone. This was modern jazz dissonance meets pop sensibility: medium tempo, mobile, constant, often atonal. Alex 1, Masso, was all eyes and ears, quiet and admirably controlled for a drummer, but constantly aware of his surroundings and playful with those out-of-synch reggae beats. Some deliciously odd little fills caught my attention as did several solos played against front line vamps. But as bassist, it’s no surprise that Alex 2, Boneham, was the vamp master of the night, holding some very demanding bass ostinatos. I was surprised that his bass was so present given it was not amplified. It was miked through the PA, but that had little effect where I was sitting and the bass was easily heard for solos and accompaniment. Some nice solos, too, reaching right up high then easily moving the length of the fingerboard with pleasant and talkative ideas. All this over original compositions from Nick and Jeremy. Lots of syncopation in the heads; some extra bars thrown in here or there; some vamps or easy chord changes; some fairly short spaces for solos. There was a love song, and a doleful tune for Haiti, and a playful song for a dancing mother, and a few that were just clever and attractive, with their mostly off-beat reggae grooves.

Sydney met Melbourne via Jamaica with a touch of US and it was great entertainment and much satisfaction. A very promising start to another season of jazz at the Gods. The Vampires are Jeremy Rose (alto sax), Nick Garbett (trumpet), Alex Boneham (bass) and Alex Masso (drums) and good mate Shannon Barnett (trombone) sat in for the night.

Cyberhalides Jazz Photos by Brian Stewart

This is personal

Second sets can often be the strongest, and that’s how I found the performance of Jeremy Rose last night at the Loft. It was actually a slightly strange night with a small audience and a band that must have been a bit disappointed. But I noticed during the second set that the band was different: more settled, unpressured, warmer, quieter, more free-flowing, easier grooves and interactions. Given little audience, you can play somewhat to yourself. There’s still some obligation, but it’s more intimate and personal, and anyway the audience was musos so they understood.

This was a CD release tour and the music seemed to be all from the pen of Jeremy. It was a wide range of originals in various times and honest styles, feels and melodies. Well placed with passion, but also with location. Immersed in history, within the great modern tradition and touching on early modern, and located in place with clear references to Jeremy’s Scandinavian connections but also with new world energy and brashness. “Never wear red pants at a bull fight” was reminiscent of Mingus in tune and title, alternating between bass riff and walk, with a bluesy overlaid sax. “Prelude” was a smoothly flowing introduction; “In transition” was boppy modern against a rapid walking bass; “Avant garden” was in 14. Jeremy introduced “My space” as influenced by a composition teacher in Oslo who was interested in maximising ideas from melodic fragments considered as horizontal lines. The outcome was a 4-bar melodic snippet that mutated harmonically in 3/4 time. I enjoyed the harmonies in this music: gently moving and an interesting chordal base for solos.

Jeremy has an easy fluency on alto and soprano saxes and an ease with dissonance that I noticed especially on the snake-charmer-like soprano. Jackson Harrison’s playing was sustained and sometimes fragmented, variously fighting the beat or riding it, stating ballads with sweetness or up-tempos with some contention. Abel Cross sat in for Alex Boneham on this tour and did a great job on some very demanding numbers. He was playing a stubby Czech-eze bass with a delightfully soft presence in accompaniment, although I would have preferred a bit more volume. James Waples was tellingly disjointed, inventive and apt. I enjoy the contemporary willingness to play away from standard sound mixes so I was intrigued with a passage of fast, free playing by bass and piano against sustained hi-hat patterns. James’ solo at the end on the night lifted the house in a crescendo of thought and power that incessantly grew to lift off then suddenly ended as he stopped to retrieve an errant bass drum. I’ve observed just a few players who can’t help but take off in solos and I think they must be naturals, or at least naturals in solo structure. This solo was like that.

It was a strange night with that diminutive audience, but it lent it a unique presence. The event was somewhat disappointing, but in response the music was intimate and connected. Jeremy Rose (alto, soprano sax) led a quartet with Jackson Harrison (piano), Abel Cross (bass) and James Waples (drums) playing his own compositions at he Loft. Jeremy returns to Canberra at the Gods in a few weeks’ time with the Vampires. And don’t miss anything at the Loft: it’s infrequent but it’s the most adventurous modern jazz around town at the moment.