Big weekend of music in these parts. It started last Friday with Steve Lacy at Henry Ford Community College in Dearborn. A marvelous performance throughout: a trio with Jean-Jacques Avenel on bass and John Betsch on drums. Lacy's soprano sounded very warm and rich, with frequent overtones in all registers, and ideas unfolding effortlessly. Avenel was also impressive as a soloist, and Betsch consistently added texture without dominating. The most unusual piece they did had Avenel on thumb piano. The main impression I have is of a very focused, integrated trio creating challenging yet inviting music together. A beautiful evening.
Saturday was the first Edgefest at three venues in Ann Arbor. I hope this will become an annual event . It featured some local bands during the day which I was unable to make, but I did see the three headliners that evening. I had seen the Charlie Kohlhase Quintet several months ago and really liked their ability to move outside of conventional structures and back again. They were just as good this time. A lot of wit and intelligence energize thrir music.
Next, the Rova Saxophone Quartet stretched compositional structures even further, sometimes sounding very free, though it was hard to tell what was written and what was improvised. The piece I liked best featured all straight horns (stilll in a Lacy groove from the previous night): three sopraninos and a soprano.
After Rova I wanted to hear some drums, and I was not disappointed. The Dave Douglas Tiny Bell Trio was the last headliner; they were sensational, especially drummer Jim Black. I had seen Black with Bloodcount and was very impressed, but he was simply a phenomenal driving force in this trio setting. Everything he did sounded fresh and a little unexpected, from the Eastern European rhythms often heard in this group to a very wide range of unusual sounds. During the break I went onstage to look at his equipment. In addition to a standard kit, he had shakers, rattle-type things, strings of beads, chains, bowls, wooden gadgets that sound like rustling castinets, and other gizmos, doodads and contraptions (sorry for all the technical jargon). This guy is just amazing to watch. But Tiny Bell is by no means a one-man show. Douglas created a wide array of sounds himself on trumpet, and Brad Shepick (is this how he spells his name now?) was excellent on guitar, especially on the intense jazz-Balkan improv pieces.
Very exciting music.