A gorgeous Thursday for jazz, as the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra regaled a big crowd at Meijer Gardens and Detroit’s Michael Malis Trio a tiny audience at The DAAC. The Crane Wives’ Ben Zito caught ’em both for Local Spins.
Jazz Night: Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra played Meijer Gardens on Thursday. (Photo/Anna Sink)
EDITOR’S NOTE: Ben Zito is best known to West Michigan audiences as the bassist for folk-rock’s The Crane Wives. But he’s also a serious jazz aficionado who attended two contrasting Grand Rapids jazz shows on Thursday as a guest reviewer for Local Spins.
Support our coverage of
West Michigan's music scene
For some reason now forgotten to me, my middle school band instructor gave me a Wynton Marsalis album – I assume for inspirational purposes. It turned me on to jazz at an early age, and I nearly burned a hole through the CD.
BEN ZITO
LocalSpins.com Review
Naturally then, I was very excited to get the chance to watch the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis perform live at Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park on Thursday.
Man, can that orchestra play. Except for when he was introducing songs, I found I wasn’t even listening for Marsalis. I was lost in anticipation for the next soloist to step up or for either one of the two singing trombonists, Chris Crenshaw or Vincent Gardener, to croon into the mic again.
They were tight, practiced, and in a word: perfect. Just like listening to the album.
However, for as polished and as pristine as the sound was, I felt there was something missing.
For me, jazz is a collection of musicians talking to each other through their instruments about whatever feeling a song is trying to express. As a member of the audience, you’re hoping you get the chance to listen in on an interesting conversation between fantastic conversationalists.
The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis seemed a lot like a group of excellent conversationalists with nothing much to say. The musicianship was undoubtedly impressive, and the easy to follow beats made you want to get up and dance. I felt the music was more catered to the toes of the audience than to the minds.
The Michael Malis Trio at The DAAC. (Photo/Ben Zito)
Because the compositions didn’t overly challenge the listener (except for one beauty by bassist Carlos Henriquez), it was a very family friendly/casual listener type of environment. Not that there is anything wrong with playing songs that encourage casual listeners to dance. It just wasn’t the kind of jazz I’ve come to appreciate. In short it was all very bubblegum and Coca-Cola. And I had a taste for whiskey.
I left Meijer Gardens after the first set for the Division Avenue Arts Collective (DAAC) to catch the Michael Malis Trio out of Detroit. Led by pianist and composer Malis, this group had the challenging music I was thirsty for.
Songs like “Strut” set the intangible sensations of everyday life to music. In that song, Josef Deas swaggers down the fretboard of his upright, while Alex White marches pure confidence with his ‘catch-me-if-you-can’ time signature changes. Michael ties it all down with the melodies and calls out the changes.
The audience isn’t even in the room as the three of them tell each other what it means to “Strut.” They laugh, they yell, they sing their parts as they play. They have sheet music, but God knows what’s on it. This music can’t be written down.
THE VIBE
The Meijer Gardens crowd on Thursday. (Photo/Anna Sink)
It was perfect outdoor concert weather for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, with a lot of families in the crowd – grandparents included. A few high school jazz band members showed up. Overall, a very polite and appreciative crowd that knew to clap for the soloists.
The DAAC, meanwhile, was barely occupied with three or four groups of friends, all of whom became silent when the music started and raucous when the solos sang out.
THE NIGHT’S BIG MOMENTS
Vincent Gardner and Chris Crenshaw singing and soloing on back-to-back tunes during the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis set, showcasing the depth of talent in the group.
THE BANTER
“This is a composition that came in yesterday (courtesy of bassist Carlos Henriquez), and we took a look at it today.” – Wynton Marsalis, before the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra played it to perfection.
“We’re going to play a suite of original music called, um, who the —- cares.” – A laughing Michael Malis.
JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER ORCHESTRA: THE LOCAL SPINS PHOTO GALLERY BY ANNA SINK (6/20/13)
Email John Sinkevics at jsinkevics@gmail.com.
Copyright 2013, Spins on Music
Loved this review . . . partly because it is so real and partly because it was from an unexpected source. I tire of jazz that is not ‘jazz’… as described in this review. I hear a lot of jazz and solos and musicians and most of the real ‘jazzers’ are trying to find a way to keep working and try to hard to please a public that is mostly grooved in to other kinds of music. BUT, I heard a group out of Detroit that played in Leland in the winter. I was there to photograph and didn’t expect much . . . but they did more real jazz than I’d heard in a long long time. The audience was enraptured by it. This was not a ‘jazz audience’… but a group of folks looking for some place to go mid winter in a closed down summer vacation town. The kicker however, is that the next day they played again at a hotel nearby and served up competent but far less interesting ‘smooth jazz/ R & B. I wanted the guys who played the night before to show up. sigh… Jazz is a tough world. You often play to an empty house.. unless you are Wynton or one of the other well known folks… and even then, you rarely get to do your real stuff. 🙂 Anyway, thanks for the review.