Arriving with barely a minute to spare from The Bussey Building where I'd witnessed a stunning show from Brian Jackson & The New Midnight Band, this was a Cosmic Jam that once again came together in a hurry but I don't think suffers in the slightest as a result. Sometime the most spontaneous....
Native Dancer have a great name ( I think) even if it's cribbed from Wayne Shorter (the album he made with Milton Nascimento no less), and the music is also worthy of that audacious theft. Though a name is all they've borrowed, all the other elements are sufficiently scrambled as to remain traceless, though I'd venture there's everything from broken beat to Joni Mitchell, Weather Report to pop woven in to their sound.
Most of the rest of the show isn't quite so contemporary, but next week I'll definitely be playing some/a lot /all of the new Rebirth album which had me seriously mesmerised this afternoon...... Big album alert.
However the Intuit collaboration with Andy Bey definitely deserves a reboot as it's something I probably only played a couple of times back when it came out in 2004 and for me has all the hallmarks of a classic. Metheny's "Have You Heard" is the first of two jazz tunes that have that upful buoyancy that I cherish and need to keep me smiling through the dark days of winter. Ditto the smile factor with Woody Shaw's "Rosewood", and Bobby Hutcherson's version is just as strong as the composer's more horn-heavy original.
More contemporary flavour jazz with Woodland Conclave, (another name I find rather leasing) and the epic "Celebration Of Live (Song For Simon)" Did they mean life? Who cares, they manage the transition between rolling waltz time to sprightly samba fusion very sweetly, and keep the groove hummin' all the way down the track.
Having played an epic, there wasn't quite room for all of Ryo Kawasaki's oddball jazz-funk "The Breeze And I " , I wanted to squeeze in a trio of MPBistas with soulful measures of Brazilian groove before the top of the hour and a dive into classic Cosmic Jam horizontalisms.
Second hour segue, a classic hippy space jam/ cinematic jazz workout, Spirit's "Ice" is a long time favourite. Put it this way, I played it long before I heard Common's "Resurrection" (which I also love) that sampled the hook deftly. Sparkling.... Toninho Horta's "Diana" has all the classic melodic/harmonic traits of the Minas Gerais sound I love so deeply and I don't think I'd ever really absorbed that tune before, loveliness. Marion Brown's version of Stevie's Visions is another Cosmic Jam perennial though following it with the evergreen "You Are My Starship" felt very right, even more so the Oliver Nelson beauty that follows....
Last half hour swings from classic 2-step, by way of a "free soul" nugget from the land down under, an Hawaiian reissue, and another from Athens Of the North to a righteous soulful conclusion from Arabi. Sounds outernational?Maybe it is, but mainly it's just soul.
Until next time
Love, peace and harmony
P.x
1.Native Dancer - Love
2. Intuit ft. Andy Bey - Planet Birth
3. Pat Metheny Group - Have You Heard
4. Bobby Hutcherson - Rosewood
5. Gil Scott-Heron&Brian Jackson - Alien (Hold On To Your Dreams)
6. Woodland Conclave - Celebration Of Live
7. Ryo Kawasaki - The Breeze And I
8. MPB 4 - Cravo E Canela
9. Claudia - Toca Chiquinho
10. Marina Lima - Coracoes A Mil
11. Spirit - Ice
12. Toninho Horta - Diana
13. Marion Brown - Visions
14. Norman Connors - You Are My Starship
15. Oliver Nelson - A'Zurte
16. The Futures - Ain't Got time For Nothing
17. Skylight - Get It Happening
18. Linda Evans - I Am Gold
19. Mike Lundy - Rhythm Of Life
20. Straightjacket - The Best Part Of Loving
21. Arabi - Three Times
