Louis: A Silent Film with Live Music
The Chicago Symphony hosted the world premiere of Louis last evening, and I had snatched the (literally) last available ticket.

The film, which is written, directed and producted by Dan Pritzker, is based loosely on the early years of Louis Armstrong in New Orleans. The movie is shot beautifully by Vilmos Zsigmond in blend of colour and black-and-white which works very well for invoking the early days of film. A key part of the production is of course the score, and the live music with both a thirteen-piece orchestra featuring Wynton Marsalis as well as piano solo recitals by Cecile Licad with an emphasis on pieces by 19th-century composer Louis Moreau Gottschalk. The combination of a silent movie with a stong live band is something to behold -- if you can catch the movie and performance in a city nearby, go!

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Dianne Reeves: Strings Attached at the CSO
Another trio concert at CSO, but very different from the most recent classic piano trio. Tonight was once again a chance to see Dianne Reeves (wikipedia) but this time accompanied simply by two guitarists: Russell Malone and Romero Lubambo (wikipedia).

Given that Dianne Reeves (who we had seen in just a few month earlier in our neighbourgood) has plenty of stage presence, the format made for a more intimate concert yet with plenty of groove at times too. The three had been touring in Europe for 25 shows, and it was a really nice performance and a great way to end the week. Recommend if you can catch them somewere.

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Brad Mehldau at the CSO
Just got home from a wonderful concert by Brad Mehldau at the CSO. This was long overdue as I kept reading about Mehldau. And even though he performs quite regularly around here, I had never seen him. Big mistake.

The first set was performed as a (strictly acoustic) trio with Larry Grenadier on bass and Jeff Ballard on drums. After several compositions by Mehldau and a brazilian samba piece, the first set closed with a rendition of 'Holland' from Sufjan Stevens' album Michigan which was truly beautiful. The second set had Mehldau performing solo, again with several compositions of his own as well as one from Neil Young's classic 'The Needle and the Damage Done' leading two two pieces from the Sound of Music including an amazing, yet really different 'My favourite things' that just hushed a piece of the central melody along with a strond rhythmic element. Lovely. And then to cap it all off, four encores.

Highly recommended.

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Dianne Reeves at Dominican
Yesterday afternoon, we had another chance to see Dianne Reeves (wikipedia). This time, it almost felt like she came to us as she was headlining at the annual trustee benefit concert at Dominican University, a small college about a mile from our place. And as in 2007 and 2003, she did not disappoint. Great voice, great stage presence. Highly recommended.

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Wayne Shorter at the CSO
Just got home from the 'An Evening with Wayne Shorter' concert at the CSO, part of this year's tour apropos his 75th birthday. The man is a legend and one my favourite musicians for both his own Blue Note work from the 60s and of course his participation in the legendary Miles Davis Quintet of the same period.

Shorter (ts, as) was playing with his quartet of recent years: Danilo Perez (p), John Patitucci (b) and Brian Blade (dr). And playing they did. Shorter has such a soft lyrical tone, which accentuates both the rhythmic and harmonic quality of the side men. Very enjoyable concert, fairly 'modern' and free in style. And no standards or old material. Oddly enough, not one spoken word: neither greeting nor good byes or just an introduction of the band. Recommended.

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SFJAZZ Collective at CSO
Went to the CSO yesterday as a nice way to end a frantic workweek: first a beer or two after work, and then off for some Jazz.

Yesterday's program was the SFJAZZ Collective: eight individuals, all noted in their own right, coming together for a few weeks each year to play as an ensemble. The program generally consists of two halfes: one with material by a modern composer -- Wayne Shorter is this year's pick -- and new original compositions by the band members.

This was a special treat as Wayne Shorter's compositions from the 1960s, both from the bands he lead and as a member of the legendary Miles Davis Quintet, have always been some of my most favourite modern pieces. At the same time, it gave me a chance to finally see Joe Lovano on ts and Stefon Harris on vb. Other band members were equally impressive: Dave Douglas tp, Miguel Zenon as, Robin Eubanks tb, Renee Rosnes p, Matt Penman b, Eric Harland dr. Favourite new composition of the night: 'Angel's Shares' by Penman.

All in all a nice evening out to cap off a busy week.

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Another Herbie Hancock concert
Herbie Hancock was in town to open this year's Chicago Jazz Festival with a concert at the CSO last Thursday. This time he came with a mostly-electric setup featuring Nathan East on bass, Vinnie Colaiuta on drums and Lionel Loueke on guitar. I found it at times a little heavy on the synthesizers, but it was evident that Hancock and the band enjoyed themselves during the two hour set. A nice concert, all in all, and again very different from his last two concerts.

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Madeleine Peyroux at Ravinia
Returning from Toronto, we went straight to Ravinia to see one of my favourite vocalists: Madeleine Peyroux who didn't disappoint. Lovely afternoon / evening as Ravinia is such a treat: summer, lawn, picnic and excellent live music. Let's see if I get out there another time this year.

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Dianne Reeves
We saw Dianne Reeves (wikipedia) earlier at the CSO.

Looking the what I wrote in 2003 in one of the earliest entries here, I notice that she is touring with the same (excellent) band composed of Peter Martin (acoustic and electric piano), Reuben Rogers (acoustic and electric bass) and Greg Hutchinson on drums. This may explain some of the coherence on stage...

Anyway, wonderful concert, wonderful artist and definitely highly recommended as a live performer.

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Too hot to Handel
We went to see a performance of Too hot too Handel [1], a Gospel/Blues/Jazz/Rock rendition of the Messiah, at the Auditorium Theater on Saturday.

Two choirs comprising 120 singers, a full jazz (big) band with drums, electric and acoustic bass, electric organ, piano and about twenty brass instruments as well as an equal number of strings in the symphonic section, plus vocalists Rob Dixon (tenor), Victor Trent Cook (counter tenor) and Alfreda Burke (soprena) made for a very full sound in this beautiful theater.

For apparent scheduling problems, the performance was moved from the Christmas season (in which Haendel's original Messiah is rather popular) to the Martin Luther King birthday weekend, which is appropriate enough. Even though quite a few seats were empty, the musicians had little problem to get the audience onto their feat with a fine performance, and a rousing finale. Recommended.

[1] Not sure where the Umlaut went missing there. Oh well.

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Patricia Barber
Went to see Patricia Barber and her band at a fundraiser for the Oak Park Arts Council, and in particular its scholarships program. I had seen Barber before at her usual venue, the Green Mill. I am still somewhat divided about her music: some material is really good and innovative. I particularly like how she transforms standards, and how she can rock rather hard. Some of her stuff, on the other hand, leaves me unimpressed. But she's definitely worth watching given the opportunity.

The surprise revelation of the evening, though, was Ars Nova, a standard quintet (tenor, alto, piano, bass, drums) composed of a mix of current students of the local high school OPRF as well as former students now spread across area music programs as well as Berklee. They played a set of modern classics and were really impressive. No web site to link to, unfortunately.

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Dee Dee Bridgewater
A few weeks ago we went to see Dee Dee Bridgewater at the Jazz Showcase downtown. She performed material from her recent Grammy-nominated album J'ai deux amours covering, well, French material. The show was ok, but somewhat uninspired.

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Billy and me
Went to see 'Billy and me' on Friday at the CSO. A celebration of Billy Holiday, directed by Terri Lyne Carrington and performed by five fine vocalists: Rita Coolidge, Niki Haris, Joan Osborne, Dianne Reeves and Rokia Traore. A little multimedia-ish with a few short readings, photos and film segments. This part didn't flow all that well as the 'acting MC', Rita Coolidge, completely bombed that part. On the other hand, the vocal performances were all outstanding. We went as we wanted to see Dianne Reeves another time after a truly breathtaking last concert a few years ago, and she did not disappoint. However, the others vocalists were very fine too, and I should check out some of their recordings. Musical arrangements, and performances, were really good. Some pieces were a little 'funked up', in particular I'll be seeing you in a world-music alike flavour with really nice horns (Rob Smith, tp and ts; Tineke Postma, ts and ss) and rhythm section (Paul Bollenback, g; Mitchel Forman, kb; James Genus, b; Munyungo Jacksone, pc) and everything driven by Terri Lyne Carrington at the drums. All in all a very nice concert.

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Sonny Rollins at the CSO
Forgot to mention that we went to see Sonny Rollins at the CSO last Friday. Great tickets in the second row -- a gift -- made for a nice show. The man has still a lot of energy left at age 75, and one of the nicest sounds on the tenor. But somehow the group as a whole didn't seem all that coherent. Still a pretty nice evening out.

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Directions in Music with Hancock, Brecker, and Hargrove
Gee -- the blog is a pretty sober reminder that I didn't seem to have gotten out enough to live concerts since the last entry almost a year ago. Just like then, it was once agin time for Chicago's own Herbie Hancock, this time with Michael Brecker and Roy Hargrove in the second round of their Directions in Music series. They played at the CSO last night -- for a full two and half hours.

The concert was pretty good, yet had some rought edges -- but I think I give it slightly better marks than the Globe and Mail's review from the Toronto concert earlier this week. Hancock does have a unique blend of combining lucid, poetic sequences with powerful and funky grooves; I could listen to him over and over again. I had never seen Brecker before, who was pretty impressive as was Hargrove who I'd seen twice before (once leading his band). Terri Lyne Carrington was her usual excellent self at drums, and Scott Colley was fine on base. The program was a good blend of classic hard bop and modern. combined with an updated version of fusion. I was a little ambivalent towards the electronic part at first, but warmed up to it. Oh, and it was the first time I've seen musicians announce two iMac G5 computers as instruments. All told, pretty good. I look forward to the album -- given that the live concert from their last tour garnerned a Grammy, I guess we'd see something in store by Christmas.

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Herbie Hancock
Just back from seeing Chicago's own Herbie Hancock at the CSO. Very, very nice -- playing with his quartet (Gary Thomas: fl, ts; Scott Colley: b; Terri Lyne Carrington: dr) with special guest Wayne Shorter on tenor and soprano.

I guess it has been almost a decade since I saw him last back in France, but he clearly is one of my all-time favourite musicians. The repertoire tonight spanned material from his awesome 60s recordings on Blue Note to the newer material from the 90s, and it was all delivered in such a lyrical way that is really unique to him. Seeing Wayne Shorter live was also neat; I don't think I've seen him since maybe 1987 or so in London. Gee, I'm starting to sound really old. Anyway, Hancock will play one more next week with Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette. I should see if I can still get tickets...

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Jane Monheit
Last night, we went to the pretty North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie, a 'burb north of downtown Chicago, to see Jane Monheit. She played a really nice, but rather short, set of just over an hour, and one encore. The auditorium appeared to be of an average age of least twice hers, if not twice mine (well, maybe not that old) and didn't quite get into it, despite the material being rather heavy on standards.

Which is too bad, because she is really good, with a very wide vocal range and unbelievable control. She did a few pieces from her previous albums as well as some that should come in the fall -- she recently signed with Sony and just finished recording a first album for them. Lisa got us awesome seats in orchestra pit -- second row, to the side. Close up and personal. Real nice, all told, and just too bad the audience didn't get more into it.

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Nice concert
Cassandra Wilson was back in town at the CSO on Friday. Decent concert with a lot of 'rhythm' -- driven by Teri Lynne Carrington on drums and the very impressive Jeff Haynes on percussion. A mostly acoustic night with Reggie Veal on bass with Brandon Ross on guitar and banjo, the real surrise was Gregoire Maret on harmonica playing as if he was the lead trumpet or sax player in a classical quartet and quintet. The material was in large part from the latest (and most excellent !!) album, Glamoured, and well arranged. All the faster, funker pieces had a lot of drive to them. Unfortunately, where we sat towards the back of the main floor and under the balconeys, the sound was somewhat muffled. All in all a fine evening out.

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Wow!
Just back in from seeing Dianne Reeves with her quartet (Peter Martin, p; Reuben Rogers, b; Greg Hutchinson, dr) at the CSO. Does she ever have a stage presence. One of the better live concerts I have seen. Oh, and the voice. And the charm.

Opening act was Roy Hargove with his quintet, which was pleasant too. I think the previous time we saw may have been in a quartet setting, and Justin Robinson on alto added a lot tonight.

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