Home : Plato's Words : July 2001

July 2001

Summer is here! June was absolutely filled with music here in Vancouver as it always is this time of year with our Jazz Festival. I love our festival and really try to go and listen to as much music as I possibly can in between my own gigs during those ten days.

One of the hightlights for me was attending a workhop led by pianist Kenny Werner. I could have listened to that man for hours, speaking about his concepts and thoughts on being an artist. So many things he said seemed to point directly to me as I recognized myself in the scenarios he used. He suggested several things that were actually quite simple and straightforward but which I had never thought of on my own before. I am going to try a new attitude with regard to how I view myself as an artist; a new approach to working on music in general. I was not able to attend Kenny's concert in the evening but during the workshop he and his trio played a couple of pieces that were divine.

A concert that I was able to attend during the festival and which I found deeply moving was Maracio Faraco, a Brazilian guitarist/vocalist and songwriter who currently lives in Paris. His band was fantastic and the songs as well which ranged from bossa nova rhythms to sambas to everything in between. I am such a sucker for a beautiful melody and at one point in the concert I was moved to tears. Maracio's band left the stage while he began to play a gentle guitar rhythm over which he whistled a most haunting melody that really choked me up. Much later in the song he actually had the audience whistle the melody with him which might sound very "Vegas" but it wasn't at all. He was very natural with the audience and none of his banter with us appeared to be a schtick. It was lovely to hear him speak about his songs and their origins in his rather broken English and the audience seemed to fall in love with his warm personality as well as his beautiful music.

In the same way that I am a sucker for melody I am a sucker for a killer groove and that's what I got to hear in Toronto guitarist Kevin Breit's band at a packed outdoor concert on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. They played a really quirky repertoire with the band really digging in and aggressively playing in a way that dared the audience not to move to the solid groove that they were laying down.

That was a fun band to hear!

One of the afternoon CBC concerts that I went to hear was The Bob Murphy/Campbell Ryga Quartet who thrilled my ears with the beautiful standard "I Loves You Porgy" from Gershwin's PORGY AND BESS. Bob played with such sensitivity as though playing a lullaby to someone in need of soothing comfort. Campbell as always played with that gorgeous tone on his soprano saxophone and presented the melody and then played with the melody as only a great musician can.

On the last night of the festival I went to The Vancouver East Cultural Centre to hear the Kurt Rosenwinkle/Mark Turner group. They played originals written by both guitarist Rosenwinkle and saxophonist Turner that really sounded fresh and new. It was very exciting to hear the two co-leaders rip through unison lines at furious tempos that they pulled off with ease before launching into their improvisations, each fueling the other with cascading lines in counterpoint that made for some thrilling harmonic moments. Rosenwinkle played beautiful textural guitar chords and really seemed to paint in sections of a piece. That is how I viewed his playing; like an artist with a brush and pallette: a ripping line of color here, several patches of dense tone there, a bold stroke here and a long gentle sweep of fading colors there until each songs seemed to end up sounding complete and satisfying with each color in perfect balance with the others.

Have a great summer! I am going to go and work on some of the things Kenny Werner talked about...

Karin