This week saxophonist Ravi Coltrane debuted as a leader of a quartet at the esteemed landmark club The Village Vanguard. For decades, this small basement club has been the site of numerous famous live recordings. Newark jazz radio station WBGO has partnered with the Vanguard to broadcast a few sets live from various performers during their stays at the venue. Ravi’s performance can be heard after the fact on the WBGO On Demand website or the NPR music website. Listening to the show today was fun, and here is my own breakdown of the goings-on:
Host Josh Jackson introduces the group, and makes the listener feel right at home (possibly because we are right at home). He also does some live blogging during the set, which includes the names of the tunes:
Amalgams (from the upcoming release Blending Times)
Round Two
Trading Duos
One Wheeler Will (by Ralph Alessi, written for Ravi’s son William)
Jagadishwar (by Alice Coltrane)
Giant Steps (by John Coltrane)
Tangent: Ravi went to college at The California Institute of the Arts. There Ravi lived with David Ake and Ralph Alessi, two jazz pros that have carved out their own niches; Ake in education and scholarship (although he’s a first-rate player), and Alessi within the NYC performing scene.
As a saxophone stylist, Ravi occupies a space where competition is fierce. When we consider some of the in-demand saxophonists around that stand at the top of the idiom, we think of Ravi, as well as Branford Marsalis, Joshua Redman, Mark Turner, Dave Liebman, Joe Lovano…the list goes on. Ravi is an incredible saxophonist, and it seems like he’s got his own thing that he’s into, which is an extension of the type of harmonic knowledge his father had brought into jazz and that many musicians are now familiar with. This statement isn’t meant to take anything away from Ravi. He’s not a mere practitioner of the idiom, but one of its true guardians. In this music, the heavy harmony and thought that came out of Post-Bop pioneers like his father, is now in a mature, readily accessible state. There are wildly inventive permutations of hexatonics, trichords, and structures based on spontaneous rhythmic groupings and displacements that arrive unexpectedly and then disappear, but this nerdy stuff is always handled with poise. During the first four selections, the music ebbs and flows between temperamental and spacey, groovy and fragmented, opaque and translucent. This is the emotional palette of “Post-Bop” 1960s jazz. Drummer E.J. Strickland comps and colors the music confidently, and pianist Luis Perdomo shows that his wide-open approach to playing modally can propel the music into new territories with just a few quick chords.
It’s true that Ravi has a career that owes a lot to his family, but he remains a favorite jazzman in his own right in part due to the homage he pays his parents. I attended his mother Alice Coltrane’s show at NJPAC in the fall of 2006, just a few months before she passed away. Highly publicized, and highly transcendent, the NJPAC performance showcased Ravi, as well as bassist Drew Gress (who is featured in the Vanguard quartet performance as well). At NJPAC, Jack DeJohnette held it all together on drums, and Reggie Workman showed up for one selection. Like John, Alice’s music was an outgrowth of her spiritual erudition. During the Vanguard set, this music is something Ravi only jovially called “Bombay meets Detroit.” He also divulged that growing up, her musical preferences were “elusive” to him, but now he’s appreciative of her depth and sincerity. After her song “Jagadishwar,” the band went into the chords of “Giant Steps” for a closer. Perdomo took the first solo, full of rapid flights, with clarity and more structure than is typical of most solos on this piece. It’s true that a jazz musician isn’t worth much if they can’t tear it up on the chromatic thirds relations progression. While I sometimes don’t dig performances of this song because they often become robotic, I did like this selection the most. With Ravi’s quartet, the musicians are perfectly at home with difficult music but the emphasis is always to make it their own. This is Ravi’s bag now.
I only wish I had been there in person to experience the vibe inside the Vanguard, where I’ve caught some excellent, inspiring performances over the years. A short list includes:
The “Joy of Sax” Quintet plus rhythm trio
Marcus Roberts Trio
Mulgrew Miller Trio
Host Josh Jackson introduces the group, and makes the listener feel right at home (possibly because we are right at home). He also does some live blogging during the set, which includes the names of the tunes:
Amalgams (from the upcoming release Blending Times)
Round Two
Trading Duos
One Wheeler Will (by Ralph Alessi, written for Ravi’s son William)
Jagadishwar (by Alice Coltrane)
Giant Steps (by John Coltrane)
Tangent: Ravi went to college at The California Institute of the Arts. There Ravi lived with David Ake and Ralph Alessi, two jazz pros that have carved out their own niches; Ake in education and scholarship (although he’s a first-rate player), and Alessi within the NYC performing scene.
As a saxophone stylist, Ravi occupies a space where competition is fierce. When we consider some of the in-demand saxophonists around that stand at the top of the idiom, we think of Ravi, as well as Branford Marsalis, Joshua Redman, Mark Turner, Dave Liebman, Joe Lovano…the list goes on. Ravi is an incredible saxophonist, and it seems like he’s got his own thing that he’s into, which is an extension of the type of harmonic knowledge his father had brought into jazz and that many musicians are now familiar with. This statement isn’t meant to take anything away from Ravi. He’s not a mere practitioner of the idiom, but one of its true guardians. In this music, the heavy harmony and thought that came out of Post-Bop pioneers like his father, is now in a mature, readily accessible state. There are wildly inventive permutations of hexatonics, trichords, and structures based on spontaneous rhythmic groupings and displacements that arrive unexpectedly and then disappear, but this nerdy stuff is always handled with poise. During the first four selections, the music ebbs and flows between temperamental and spacey, groovy and fragmented, opaque and translucent. This is the emotional palette of “Post-Bop” 1960s jazz. Drummer E.J. Strickland comps and colors the music confidently, and pianist Luis Perdomo shows that his wide-open approach to playing modally can propel the music into new territories with just a few quick chords.
It’s true that Ravi has a career that owes a lot to his family, but he remains a favorite jazzman in his own right in part due to the homage he pays his parents. I attended his mother Alice Coltrane’s show at NJPAC in the fall of 2006, just a few months before she passed away. Highly publicized, and highly transcendent, the NJPAC performance showcased Ravi, as well as bassist Drew Gress (who is featured in the Vanguard quartet performance as well). At NJPAC, Jack DeJohnette held it all together on drums, and Reggie Workman showed up for one selection. Like John, Alice’s music was an outgrowth of her spiritual erudition. During the Vanguard set, this music is something Ravi only jovially called “Bombay meets Detroit.” He also divulged that growing up, her musical preferences were “elusive” to him, but now he’s appreciative of her depth and sincerity. After her song “Jagadishwar,” the band went into the chords of “Giant Steps” for a closer. Perdomo took the first solo, full of rapid flights, with clarity and more structure than is typical of most solos on this piece. It’s true that a jazz musician isn’t worth much if they can’t tear it up on the chromatic thirds relations progression. While I sometimes don’t dig performances of this song because they often become robotic, I did like this selection the most. With Ravi’s quartet, the musicians are perfectly at home with difficult music but the emphasis is always to make it their own. This is Ravi’s bag now.
I only wish I had been there in person to experience the vibe inside the Vanguard, where I’ve caught some excellent, inspiring performances over the years. A short list includes:
The “Joy of Sax” Quintet plus rhythm trio
Marcus Roberts Trio
Mulgrew Miller Trio
Al Foster Quartet
Tom Harrell Quintet
Bill Frisell – Joe Lovano – Paul Motian
Joe Lovano Five
The Village Vanguard Orchestra
Further down the line, if I can’t make it to the Vanguard this holiday season (THE BAD PLUS ARE HOSTING DURING NEW YEAR'S, PEOPLE!!!), I’ll be tuning in after January, when guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel and his group take the stage. It’s been a year now since I plopped down in one of the seats at the Vanguard, and I find myself chanting “There’s no place like home – There’s no place like home – There’s no place like home!!” in anticipation of the next time.
Tom Harrell Quintet
Bill Frisell – Joe Lovano – Paul Motian
Joe Lovano Five
The Village Vanguard Orchestra
Further down the line, if I can’t make it to the Vanguard this holiday season (THE BAD PLUS ARE HOSTING DURING NEW YEAR'S, PEOPLE!!!), I’ll be tuning in after January, when guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel and his group take the stage. It’s been a year now since I plopped down in one of the seats at the Vanguard, and I find myself chanting “There’s no place like home – There’s no place like home – There’s no place like home!!” in anticipation of the next time.
