Last night at the Loft

It was a big affair. The place was full to overflowing when I arrived. I was late after the Ben Winkelman concert. I arrived to John Mackey & co blowing on Have you met Miss Jones. It’s a standard blowing tune and a favourite with its early take on Coltrane changes (read Giant steps). There was a break and Ben Winkelman arrived with his trio. They played their odd-timed samba and it was a blowout in this lively, jazz-aware audience. Then John Mackey sat in for Beautiful love then Alex Raupach for the next and gradually the bands changed through to the early morning and people had work and were leaving and the night was ending.

They ran over 100 gigs at the Loft. I must have got to at least 80 as did Brian and Keith and Robyn and Geoff and the regulars. It was a small and idiosyncratic venue, but clean sounding, comfy for an intimate audience and it had that grand piano. We heard some excellent music, international, interstaters and locals. The Loft continues in a combined series with Pauline’s Canberra Grammar Gallery series. It will be at Smith’s Alternative every Thursday from 16 January. Each night a band, 8-10pm, then a jam. Charged for the band; the jam is free for all. There’s a grand piano, stage, lighting, PA, beverages, café tables. Nice venue and with any luck it may spread the jazz message more widely. I’m looking forward to this new era in Canberra jazz. Thanks to the Loft team for their work over recent years and for the coming coordination at Smith’s. Luke Sweeting and Andy Butler and Jack Palmer who ran it early on; then Alex Raupach and Tom Fell. Thanks to Dr Tim Nielsen who lent the piano and premises. Have I missed anyone? Also to Pauline for the parallel Canberra Grammar Gallery series. Their last gig is next Thursday with ex-Canberra, now Parisian guitarist, Daniel Hunter. Not one to miss. Then Christmas and Smiths next year. It’s teams like this and their musos who study and perform, who make this mature and intelligent and too little recognised artform possible.

Sun-free Sunday

It was a lovely, warm, sunny day outside. Night venues always look dingy during the day, and Vivaldi is a classic cabaret venue. The Loft crew were sponsoring their first Loft at Vivaldi Sunday-afternoon jazz session. It was a decent turnout with the regulars but also a range of new faces. The music was excellent. A friend joked that that this music should start late and run to morning, but these guys are professionals and it was well played regardless of the time. I came especially for the recreation of a favourite classic album, Oliver Nelson’s Blues and the abstract truth, in the second set. Alex Raupach had transcribed the CD. The band was the right line-up. The solos were performers’, but the heads and horn harmonies were the originals. I found the first chords of Stolen moments a bit spooky, as the horns swelled just as I remembered and the rhythm section sat cool like the original. Then Butch and Butch and Cascade and Teenie’s blues. I had to leave early but I’ll hear the rest later from a recording. Suffice to say, to my ears, they were true to the original and with a ghostly similarity in the heads. I came for the Abstract truth, but first set was just as good. I had shivers at the first lush chords of the first tune by Luke. They played another two by Luke and one each from Jack and Alex. Jack’s was called Agent Cooper and was unsurprisingly guitar-based. Alex’s was conceptually witty: a new melody over the chords of Billy Strayhorn’s Upper Manhattan Medical Group (UMMG), dedicated to the Loft, with the title Upstairs in the Majura Medical Centre (UMMC). The two others were very different styles and somewhat surprising to me from this crew. First was a cover was a Wayne Shorter’s Aung San Suu Kyi, a floating groove with whisps of soprano sax from John. The other was a work of colour and presence rather than groove, mystical rather than earthy. This was some wonderful music for an audience of old hands and newcomers, and despite the unhealthy retreat to the dark on such a nice day, it was a big success. Loft at Vivaldi had it first outing with Alex Raupach (trumpet, flugelhorn), Matt Handel (alto sax), John Mackey (tenor, soprano saxes), Tom Fell (baritone sax), Luke Sweeting (piano), Jack Palmer (guitar), Max Alduca (bass) and Luke Keanan-Brown (drums).

Amongst the community

Thanks to Brian Stewart at Cyberhalides Jazz for the sharp pic

It’s Saturday and I’m still spinning after a very pleasant jam session at the Loft. It was a fundraiser-jam. The jazz community was friendly and the music ranged from touching to boisterous. There were enough, but not too many, bassists and pianists and drummers and horns and vocalists, and even a violinist to challenge my jazz ear (and a very capable player with a jazz conception, too). I managed perhaps 4 or 5 tunes. Mostly they were pretty comfortable swingers or blues, but I remember an over-reachingly fast Stella that I deliberately took up a notch when I felt the band was rushing (live dangerously) and a lovely What are you doing for the rest of your life, sung by Rachel Lole deliciously underplayed by Luke Sweeting and somewhat overplayed by me. I’ll blame it on struggling to read the chart under low light. Otherwise, there was some very entertaining playing on the standards which are the staples on nights like this: amongst others, Green Dolphin Street, Anthropology, There will never be another you, Blues of Alice, All blues, Donna Lee, If I were a bell, Oleo, Straight no chaser, even Girl from Ipanema, and the almost inevitable finale of Tenor madness. There were lots of players moving in and out on various instruments. I particularly noticed the pianists and Andy Campbell on guitar, and of course I watched the bassists, but there was good playing and nice solos all round. My thanks to Phill Jenkins who is always generous with his nicely setup gut-strung bass. My guess is the fundraiser covered the rent and the piano tuning, maybe not much more, but so what - it was a great community event for both players and listeners. For the students who play together often, it was a chance to let their hair down, and for me it was a chance to play with a range of very good musicians. Thanks to Andy and Luke for organising it.

And just a note about my gig last night. It’s not worth a full post, but it’s notable for me as my first real gig as a doubler, ie, playing electric and double bass on one gig. It leaves you a bit schizophrenic, but I loved playing electric again after several years of only double. My Yamaha TRB-6P is a fabulous instrument. I set it to fat Pastorius mode (lots of bass, little treble, bridge pickup) and played sixteenth-note fingerstyle on jazz and jazz-rock and funk and even some reggae. E-bass: this is my old school. Electric and acoustic basses are such different instruments, especially when the e-bass is a 6-string. It was a great workout and the good cheer from the jam carried over to a most enjoyable gig.

Onyabike

I hadn’t heard of Pan Francis, but I knew I’d like them. They were a visiting band from Melbourne. They were in a favourite configuration: sax trio with that open, unbordered sound that comes from not having a chordal instrument and with the strong and more equal role for each player. They had interesting and varied backgrounds, including National Jazz Awards and classical training and even Big Day Out. They had a promotional pic that was wonderfully amusing and sharp and primary colourful. Talk of collective improvisation, quirky melodies, thumping beats and deconstructions of rock and pop classics had me sure to be in the audience. When the first tune was from Bad Plus, I was sold. These guys are busy and vibrant and well versed in their instruments. But also playful and aware of music of their less jazz-obsessed peers and they are having a good time. Not that it’s an easy listen, but it’s capable and interesting and contemporary and aware and I like that.

Jon played alto sax, which fitted nicely for a lighter, more flighty sound than would a tenor. He’s classically trained and a finalist at the National Jazz Awards and an Arts Council grant recipient, so he’s got chops. You could hear it in the extended range and the sequences that spoke of a harmonic awareness at the level of each note he played, but there were also squeaks and screams for the passion. I was intrigued by long intervals of solos in whole note triplets, one time with a bass playing on 1-3- for a strangely floating effect. Michael was strong and edgy on bass with a lovely rig borrowed from Phil Jenkins (Acoustic Image & EA). His role is bliss for an adventurous bassist: free to improvise as an equal, often holding the groove, but also passing it to drums or even sax for ostinato lines, and lots of solo time. He’d busily range rapidly over the fingerboard with nice intonation, but equally drop to the quietest of repeated notes for effect. Very nice, and he was so obviously having a great time. Also busy and inventive was drummer Nick. He’s the one with history at Big Day Out, so has a rock heritage. I certainly felt it: matched grip on the sticks and some rock-style rolls and fills. There was a clear jazz sensibility there in his freedom, but it was not gentle and subdued from jazz training but more loud and grubby. It was a nice blend for a gritty band crossing over into pop deconstructions.

I mentioned Bad Plus’ Bugs (or more fully, Keep the bugs off your glass and the bears off your ass [sic]). Other non-originals were a Bud Powell bebop called Wail, which sounded very contemporary and un-‘40s although hinting at its history. I was searching for the reasons here: the alto that was more fluid and indefinite or the bass lines that seemed more 2 note patterns rather than bebop 4s and that avoided the obvious statements of chords. Then a fabulously complex Paul Williamson tune with a complex time feel and unison staccato melody, and a funky 12-bar feel from band Fly. Then Spiderbait’s Buy me a pony and Pink Floyd’s Bike [obscure title alert] which I particularly enjoyed for its jolly, melodious tune with deceptive twists. There were originals by both Michael and Jon. Jon’s Loneliness was balladic. Jon’s Untitled (and due anytime now) was a dark ballad with a film noir flavour. Michael’s J’s track was a slow rocky feel with latin accent. I think I got the title wrong, because Michael’s Obituary didn’t feel to me at all funereal, but more light and cloudy with a contemporary melody that reminded me of Ornette.

All round, an interesting journey from capable players in a this open and adventurous format. Not easy, but I enjoyed it immensely. Jon Crompton (alto sax), Michael Story (bass) and Nick Martyn (drums, percussion) played as Pan Francis at the Loft.

Loft, as in NY

Carl Morgan played at The Loft the other night with his Quintet. I haven’t been to New York, but Carl has, and this seemed to me to be just what I’d expect in that aggregation of little bars with players from around the world experimenting at the forefront of the art. I loved it and it’s probably unique in Canberra; very special.

But this is not music for the fainthearted. It’s demanding for both performers and audience but it’s also engaging and satisfying for both. The rhythms are complex, the melodies are contorted and busy and the flow of the compositions is none too clear at first glance. I was trying to count the first tune of the night: I thought maybe 14 but there seemed to be occasional extra beats here and there. There were. Talking to James the drummer afterwards, he told me it was a 4/4 (I was floored by this) played in 5-7-4 totalling 16 (this sounds more likely). Likely, but none too easy to fathom or to play. The grooves were syncopated-modern with just one or two walks that take on a delicious quality amongst the broken beats. James was just playing around the groove and implying the rhythm with skills and subtlety aplenty. Bassist Alex had some ostinato lines or was playing on 1-2+, a common latin-like beat, but in the contemporary jazz idiom, and embellishing with fills and long intervals. I suppose all this is classified as polyrhythm, but it’s certainly rhythmically complex. A drummer next to me noted pianist Steve played rhythmically, but I noticed more his solos that were obscure to my ears: closely spaced lines that repeated, regular but not quite sequences, busy and constant, not flourishes but a moody activity that buzzed and bent the underlying harmonies. Again, I’ve heard this before but on recordings, not locally, and my ear places it somewhere around the bleeding edge. The front line of Carl on guitar and Mike on tenor were more clear in relationship to harmony, although both were melodically challenging and had expert chops. Carl and his constant overdriven guitar tone were solid and even, framing lines that were smooth, although phrased and intervallically jumpy, and making lovely use of fretboard positions to move through modes, and throwing in those occasional devastatingly fast flourishes (that had me laughing in elation) or just plain modestly fast lines (still gems). Mike was more constant in melodic concept, often using sequences to move around the tonality, and with a physical presence that reminded me of Jamie Oehlers, bending knees into the low tones and arching back for higher runs. Alex was similarly physical, bending into the bass for the thumb positions and sometimes remaining crouched into the body, and thinking back, Steve was well bent over the keyboard too.

The tunes were originals, several by Carl but also by Mike and Steve, and just one by a US sax player, Dave Binney. Not all tunes had such a difficult conception of time; one seemed a 32 bar tune (or thereabouts); one was a walking swing. I thought I noticed development between a few of Carl’s tunes. I think it was Wheel that was an earlier composition, and relatively (I do mean “relatively”) sedate and less complex. Whatever, this was a brilliant evening of challenging compositions and playing at the forefront of contemporary jazz, at least here in Canberra, and heard in a nicely intimate environment. That pretty much adds up to bliss to my ears.

Carl Morgan (guitar) led his quintet comprising Mike Rivett (tenor sax), Steve Barry (piano), Alex Boneham (bass) and James Waples (drums) for a session at the very intimate new venue, The Loft.