Featuring Wynton Marsalis
Date 18 January 2003
Venue Usher Hall
Address Lothian Road
Reviewer Pat Napier
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Lincoln Center Jazz
Orchestra with
Wynton Marsalis © Keith Major |
The compliment to Edinburgh was all the more special because it included, in pride of place, that much-loved Fife-born saxophonist Joe Temperley. The packed house, knowledgeable and enthusiastic, truly appreciated Wynton Marsalis's elegantly crafted words of love and respect for Joe's musicianship and integrity before Joe's haunting three minute solo.
In another compliment to Joe, the Fife Youth Jazz Orchestra played an hour long concert in the foyer, so we were given to a two-for-one treat, especially when, having heard them, Joe and a couple of colleagues joined them, playing Tenor madness and Cannonball Adderley's Worksong. What a treat for these talented teenagers and just the thing to get everyone in the mood!
It was a night of superlatives, of memorable music from the very first moment on stage. The first two numbers, Love is no more and Jack the Bear, showcased the whole 15-piece orchestra's multifarious talents, starting atmospherically with Wynton Marsalis, Carlos Henriquez on bass, Herlin Riley on drums and Richard Johnson at the piano, then opening out into the whole band, ending with Marsalis making amazing, tortured sounds on his trumpet.
This first number also set the scene for unscheduled stuff, when Henriquez played some unexpected bass music causing Joe to comment to Walter Blanding sitting next to him. Henriquez' flight of fancy was picked up by the rest and they were all off in fine style. Later on, Joe and Walter did their own thing together during a spot in Jump. Joe was chuckling at catching everybody out but, naturally unfazed, they all responded magnificently.
It's unfair to pick out anybody or any special number. It was all marvellous. The front row, the saxes, also displayed their mastery of the their other instruments, making the most intriguing and exciting sounds by combining things like soprano sax and piccolo or by Riley hitting his sticks on the edge of his cymbals to make bell sounds. And so much, much more. Riley, the brilliant, archetyal jazz drummer, the flamboyant yet sensitive anchor of the band, was showcased twice in Ted Nash's arrangement of Art Blakey's Hank's symphony.
The music took us north from New Orleans in John Coltrane's Song of the underground railway, painted a vivid circus picture, told the atmospheric tale of late night dangers in the sultry Deep South and gave us the fast-paced, swinging Fletcher Henderson arrangement of Ravel's Bolero which he'd done for Benny Goodman.
Both the LCJO and its Artistic Director, Wynton Marsalis, more than live up to their formidable reputations. The LCJO is a designated Cultural Ambassador of the USA. Marsalis, in his 40th year, was designated a United Nations Messenger of Peace by no less than Kofi Annan himself in 2001. He is still the only artist to win both classical and jazz Grammy Awards in one year - not once but twice - in 1983 and 1984. He lives for his music so passionately that he became the first jazz artist to be awarded the prestigious Pulitzer Prize in music for his work Blood on the fields in 1997.
Despite these awards, Marsalis has built an intelligent, committed orchestra with a sense of fun and joy in their music, where every man listens to each number intently and appreciatively, turning round to see as well as to hear their colleagues during featured spots, then picking up on these.
And it's the music which will be remembered and savoured for many a long day. Is it possible that the jazz glory days might return to the Usher Hall? I wish, I wish...
© Pat Napier. 19 January 2003
Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra website