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Concert: Carnegie Hall Jazz Band
Friday, 8:00 p.m.
Kimberly Stephans, Reviewer
Jon Faddis walked to the front of the stage, and with his casual flair, started the concert with the humorous manner for which he is well-known. As he turned and prepared to count off the first tune, he realized that the gold mute he needed was not onstage with him. Calling out to Pierre Dutot in the audience he asked, "Ou ést mon cup mute? (Where is my cup mute?)." He comically suggested that it had to be that mute, because it matched his gold-plated trumpet. He had loaned the mute for a concert earlier in the day. While awaiting the arrival of the mute, he had a few words with the audience and introduced the band. Finally, the mute arrived and the concert began with Slide Hampton's arrangement of the Frank Foster tune, Shiny Stockings. This tune is well-known as part of the Basie repertoire. The arrangement featured modern devices such as time changes, modern voicings, changes of style, and reharmonizations. At one point, Faddis wandered back and joined the trumpet section for a chorus, then strolled back out front again. At the end of this musically exciting arrangement, he took the lead trumpet line up the octave, adding sizzle to an already exhilarating chart.
The next tune was You'd Be So Nice to Come Home To, a Cole Porter composition arranged by Mike Abene, featuring tasteful solos by Terell Stafford, trumpet, Frank Wess, flute, and "the man with the hippest name a jazz musician could have," according to Faddis, Todd Coolman, on bass.
Trombonist John Fedchock, saxophonist Frank Wess, and trumpeter Byron Stripling were the soloists on a Jim McNeeley arrangement of Ellington's The Mooche. Stripling's played a burning plunger solo as he hunched over with his bell pointed straight down to the floor in tribute to the late Cootie Williams.
The Hoagy Carmichael tune, Jubilee, was up next, introduced by Faddis in his "Louis Armstrong voice." Scott Wendholt and Terell Stafford played the outstanding trumpet solos in this arrangement by Dick Hyman, written in the style of Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven recordings.
Lew Soloff came down in front of the band for the next tune, Randy Sandke's arrangement of Ellington's ballad Azalea, a favorite of Louis Armstrong. Soloff's musically interesting and expressive playing on this mellow and soulful tune was appropriate for the arrangement,
A modernized, adrenaline-filled version of Louis Prima's Sing, Sing, Sing followed. Another arrangement by McNeeley, the chart preserved the excitement and energy of the original, but contained many interpolations of the familiar motifs in fascinating ways. Some of the alterations included different rhythms and key changes, sharing of the motifs across the band instead of being contained within a section, and new and interesting counterpoint. Soloists were John Riley, drums, and Dick Oatts, saxophone.
A rearrangement by Slide Hampton of his own Frame for the Blues, originally a major hit for Maynard Ferguson's Birdland Dream Band, featured Renee Rosnes on piano, bassist Todd Coolman, and bass trombonist Douglas Purviance. Also featured were Faddis and the entire trumpet section, along with a young friend of Faddis', Omar Butler. Faddis' contributions were significantly different from the original recorded licks by Ferguson, adding his own style and musical vision to this work. The solo by 19-year-old Butler was also a treat, played with great conviction, musicality, ease, and control.
Giant Steps by John Coltrane, arranged by Frank Foster, featured solos by Gary Smulyan, saxophone, Slide Hampton, trombone, and Scott Wendholt, trumpet. Faddis created a stir by joining the sax soli, a harmonized version of Coltrane's recorded solo, up an octave or two. Hampton also earned audience approval with his solo, a strong and agile performance at break-neck tempo.
Before the final tune, Faddis told the audience a story about one of Duke Ellington's most well-known compositions, Take the 'A' Train, and how it was once announced on the Lawrence Welk show as Take a Train. From this came the title of the final tune, a medley of Ellington's "train songs" called Duke Takes a Train, arranged by Sandke.
This was one of the most phenomenal aggregations of jazz talent in a big band to have ever appeared at an ITG conference. It was an event that will live on for a lifetime in the memories of those in attendance. (Kimberly Stevens, M.M. student, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana) |
