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NBAF Review: Wynton Marsalis Soars with Jazz Classics
National Black Arts Festival REVIEW. Wynton Marsalis and his Quartet with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. Saturday in Symphony Hall. www.nbaf.org.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Day Two of the National Black Arts Festival wasn’t the wished-for epic premiere but, as a more modest event, it came off to sweet perfection.
Saturday in Symphony Hall, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and NBAF had planned to offer the world premiere of a symphony by Wynton Marsalis, a work that was ballyhooed as the jazz master’s first strictly orchestral score.
But Wynton is as famous for missing new-music deadlines as for blowing his trumpet. A few weeks ago, it was announced that he hadn’t finished; the premiere is now scheduled for November.
So with a giant hole in the NBAF program and few options, Saturday’s show took the easy train: an hour-long set of jazz classics, with Marsalis and his quartet center stage, backed on some numbers by the ASO.
Marsalis’ many fans packed the hall to capacity, and they knew what to expect.
“Cherokee” and “Django” — one a thrill-seeker’s dream of fast runs and sweet longings, the other an intense ballad about the swinging Gypsy guitarist — opened the evening. These were displays of the band’s extreme virtuosity, in all its paradoxes: hyper-disciplined and ultra-sophisticated, flamboyant and “hot” yet somehow cool in temperature. Everything was improvised off the charts yet everything spoke of complete control.
For Marsalis, “classics” means music from before the era of modern jazz. J. Fred Coots’ “For All We Know” (1934) came with a halo of swooning violins and sounded like a nocturne, a lovely still night with a light breeze, a few starlight twinkles from Dan Nimmer at the piano, some at-ease heartbeats plunked from bassist Carlos Henriquez, a bit of billowing flute wafting into the night.
“Classic” also connotes a sense of place, a feeling of home: New Orleans, in spirit, hovers around Marsalis’ music, and they gave the famous old “Second Line” march an airing, with Walter Blanding’s soprano sax singing the most joyously mournful lines and drummer Ali Jackson pounding out enough volume to fill several city blocks.
Part of what makes the NBAF special is the critical mass of talent that gathers each summer. Marsalis pointed to some of his celebrated friends in the hall, including choreographer Judith Jameson and actor Samuel L. Jackson.
When Marsalis acknowledged Ivy League intellectual Cornel West, who is not shy in crowds, and poked a little fun at his oversized ’70s hair style, the Princeton professor stood brandishing a giant metal afro pick, to the audience’s roaring delight.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment | Categories: Classical Music
Comments
By James Schneider
July 21, 2008 12:30 PM | Link to this
Great concert!! I took my three kids including 15 yr. old trumpeter Ben Schneider and Wynton was most gracious after the concert and gave the up and coming musicians big hugs some sage advice about practicing.
By Peter Stelling
July 21, 2008 4:40 PM | Link to this
This comment is in response to Pierre Ruhe’s review of the new ASO recording of LA BOHEME, which appeared in the AJC on Sunday, July 20 under the headline, “ASO’s Encore show revisits Boheme album”.
Mr. Ruhe’s review of this recording, the first new recording of Puccini’s opera to be made in the United States since the landmark Beecham recording over fifty years ago, is a generally good one. I wonder how he manages to write good reviews that at the same time have an overwhelming undertone of negativity and lack of enthusiasm?
I would like to quote a paragraph from Ira Siff’s review of the same recording which appears in the July issue of OPERA NEWS: “French soprano Norah Ansellem, an artist of great musical sensitivity, is a natural Mimi. She phrases artfully but not artificially and has an organic feel for portamento. Her “Mi chiamano Mimi” is nicely measured, with the crucial “Ma quando vien lo sgelo? section expansive and touching. Ansellem sometimes presses her voice beyond its comfort zone, causing her vibrato to slow down in higher passages, a lapse most pronounced (predictably) in the big moments of Act III. Elsewhere Ansellem offers some plush tone and uses her beautiful floated piano to great advantage. In “Donde lieta usci” the soprano plays the emotional “Cuffietta rosa” card to perfection, making it clear the lovers will not part, and she employs an appropriately pallid tonal color for the death scene. This is intelligent, well executed work.” I would say that this is a much more thorough evaluation of Norah Ansellem’s portrayal of Mimi on the recording than the one provided by Pierre Ruhe in yesterday’s AJC.
The rest of the OPERA NEWS review is equally more informative. I highly recommend to all readers of Ruhe’s review of the recording to proceed to the OPERA NEWS website and read Ira Siff’s review in its entirety. Once you have read it, you will definitely want this recording!
By Warner
July 22, 2008 10:26 AM | Link to this
Your colorful column was very good and I thank for it. Most write ups are all about rap and rock and other nonsense so it was a pleasure for this 86 year old big band swing addict.
I saw one of his concerts at Chastain Park many years ago. He had his big band and they were terrific. Problem was that young party goers would not stop talking so that we could enjoy his artistry. I even had asked the loud one behind our seats to please tone it down. They just looked at me as some kind of nut.
So keep up the good work Pierre, I am now one of your fans.
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August 19, 2008 6:35 PM | Link to this
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