Jazz Next 7 Days – Soundboard
French-American Peace Ensemble
Wed., June 19, 9:30 p.m.Jazz
This transatlantic quintet didn’t choose its name to bury the hatchet on that whole “Freedom Fries” thing—it’s just about the members’ nationalities and their belief in music’s power to bridge cultural and linguistic differences. The American contingent consists of bassist William Parker and drummer Hamid Drake—arguably the most powerful, adaptable, and hard-grooving rhythm section in free jazz—and veteran New Orleans saxophonist Edward “Kidd” Jordan. They’ve often worked together, developing a strong rapport; all three will play in a quartet with pianist Cooper-Moore at this year’s Chicago Jazz Festival. They’re seasoned exemplars of 60s-derived free jazz, and they’ve done as much to expand its vocabulary as anyone. They’re joined by fantastic French reedist Louis Sclavis, who across a long career has proved adept at free improvisation, film scoring, contemporary classical music, and moody postbop. He’s a precise, measured improviser with a lyrical heart, but he can also vent some inner fury. He’s made many recordings for ECM, whose house production style sometimes cloaks his work in an emotional chill, but on his latest, Sources (a chamberlike trio session with keyboardist Benjamin Moussay and guitarist Gilles Coronado), he plays with crackling intensity even at his most controlled, which ought to allow him to match the power of his American cohorts. The fifth member is French pianist Francois Tusques, a forward-looking veteran whose vocabulary includes free jazz, jagged Thelonious Monk-inspired bebop, and classical technique. The question of how these five players will come together is half the lure of this show—the other half, of course, is that they’re all astonishing talents. —Peter Margasak
$15
Nate Wooley, Paul Lytton, and Tim Daisy
Thu., June 20, 9 p.m.Jazz
Percussionist Paul Lytton is almost 27 years older than trumpeter Nate Wooley, but they’ve built a strong musical relationship atop their shared roots in jazz, finding common cause in rigorous explorations of abstract sound and free improvisation. One of the ways they’ve kept their collaborations energized and unpredictable has been to invite guest players—including Swiss bassist Christian Weber, guitarist David Grubbs, reedist Ken Vandermark, and electronics improviser Ikue Mori. For last year’s superb double CD The Nows (Clean Feed), Vandermark and Mori each joined Wooley and Lytton for a trio session, and you can hear the duo bending and pushing in different ways to accommodate these very different guests. With Mori involved they emphasize texture-rich sound, creating eddies and crags within the electronicist’s liquid output: Wooley employs his most abrasive vocabulary (sharp squeals, unpitched blubbering), and Lytton uses his kit like an elaborate washboard, rubbing, scraping, and thwacking. When they work with Vandermark, the music is more like free jazz, with a relatively pronounced rhythmic thrust and clear linear interplay between the horns. Joining the duo tonight is Chicago percussionist Tim Daisy, who’s adept at the clattery rustling that Lytton helped pioneer but tends to act as more of a propulsive force. I can’t begin to predict how things will shake out with him, and that’s precisely the point. —Peter Margasak
$10
773-772-3616
Fred Lonberg-Holm & Stale Liavik Solberg
Wed., June 19, 9:30 p.m.Jazz
This ad hoc improvising quartet kicks off the latest Chicago visit from young Norwegian percussionist Ståle Liavik Solberg, whom I first encountered when he played with cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm in his wittily titled quartet VC/DC (whose instrumentation is voice, cello, drums, and clarinet). He makes a stronger impression on the excellent new trio recording Three Babies (Peira), an improvised session with British keyboardist Steve Beresford and Swedish reedist Martin Kuchen. He deftly rides the music’s ebb and flow, swiftly noticing and latching on to patterns suddenly introduced by his partners—he might uncork a staccato clatter to match Kuchen’s wheezy soprano squirts or whip up a harsh, scraping metallic din to blend with Beresford’s abrasive electronics. The guy has instincts and ideas. Tonight he’s joined by Lonberg-Holm, bassist Jason Roebke, and keyboardist Jim Baker; the quartet will play two sets. —Peter Margasak $7
Nicholas Payton XXX
Thu., June 20, 8 & 10 p.m., Fri., June 21, 8 & 10 p.m., Sat., June 22, 8 & 10 p.m. and Sun., June 23, 4, 8 & 10 p.m.Jazz
The flap that trumpeter Nicholas Payton provoked a couple of years ago—when he rejected the term “jazz” in favor of “Black American Music,” decrying the familiar word’s archaic associations and racist baggage—has pretty much died down. In 2011 he released Bitches, an R&B-driven collection with more drum programming and keyboard playing than horn blowing, but his fantastic new trio record, #BAM Live at Bohemian Caverns (BMF), sounds a lot like what most folks would call “jazz”; though Payton may not use the word, his magnificent playing has earned him the right to call his music whatever he wants. Joined by veteran drummer Lenny White and bassist Vicente Archer, Payton doubles on trumpet and Fender Rhodes—often playing both at once—to lead a session where the grooves are as deep as the improvising. On a concise reading of Monk’s “Pannonica,” where Payton duets with Archer, his striated trumpet tone gives his lyrical tenderness an appealingly brittle bite. Payton’s “The African Tinge” is one of several pieces that’s all about stretching out and expansion: his distorted electric piano creates a dark, smoldering vibe punctuated by psychedelic exploration, for a total effect that’s redolent of mid-70s Miles Davis. As much as I dig the album, this stuff is meant to be experienced live, where White’s funky attack and Payton’s huge, plush sound (on either instrument) can surround you. —Peter Margasak
$25-$50
