UPLIFT Monty Alexander

UPLIFT
Monty Alexander
Alexander's Auspicious Label Debut (JLP Records) Gives Listeners a Front Row Seat
To Live Piano Perfection Alongside The Ace Rhythm Section of Hassan Shakur, Herlin
Riley and Frits Landesbergen
Jamaican jazz piano virtuoso Monty Alexander is acclaimed the world over for his seemingly
extraterrestrial technique and sublime, heartfelt swing. Now with the release of his Jazz Legacy
Productions debut Uplift, the pianist opens his personal concert archives to eager listeners
everywhere, for an unforgettably riveting recorded affair.
"Music is a healing force," Alexander says, on the eve of the album's release.
"My hope is that by the end of a concert, and by the end of this album too, everybody will be taken
with a feeling of uplift. That's what I always want to do."
Featuring performances from Alexander's acclaimed live concerts over a three-year period. Uplift
includes tracks the prodigious pianist has made his own over a storied, fifty-year career. From
heartfelt renditions of standards like "Come Fly With Me" and "Body And Soul," to affecting
originals like "Renewal" and "Hope," the album grooves hard and wide, much like Alexander
himself. "I like to paint a rainbow of many emotions during a program," Alexander says. "You'll hear
me play some blues with a good, old backbeat like 'One Mint Julep," and then I play "Django," which
is a very reverential piece to me, having known so many of the musicians associated with it. For me,
almost everything I play has a personal reference."
Alexander was born in Kingston, Jamaica and felt the gravitational pull of music at an early age.
"When I was a kid in my Country, I used to hear the folk bands play Calypso music and other songs
made popular by people like Harry Belafonte," Alexander explains. "Every time I came into contact
with the musicians playing that music, there was always joy. And that was my whole experience
with music and what led me to be a musician in the first place."
Self-taught and unable to read traditional music notation, Alexander's seemingly unorthodox
approach to the piano would not prevent him from attaining widespread global acclaim. He would
make musical waves in his homeland first, (leading the group Monty and The Cyclones), and soon
after, his two-fisted piano pyrotechnics would send him into the musical stratosphere, performing
and or recording with legendary artists like Frank Sinatra, Milt Jackson, Ray Brown, and countless
others. A commanding career as a solo artist would soon follow, with Alexander recording over
sixty albums as a leader himself, and anchoring countless tours to support them.
Uplift finds Alexander at the peak of his creative form, with the kind of musically adventurous set
the esteemed pianist's concerts are known for. The album opens with a swinging nod to Frank
Sinatra on the Jimmy Van Heusen/Sammy Cahn standard "Come Fly With Me," with Alexander's
technical tenacity on full, recorded display. "That tune takes me right back to Frank Sinatra sitting
in the back room at Jilly's when I was playing piano there at the age on nineteen, he says. "I like to
tell people that I'm really a saloon piano player at heart." Other arresting album tracks include the
Monty Alexander Mgmt
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scintillating, shuffle-fied "One Mint Julep," and a stride-meets-Monk take on "Sweet Georgia Brown,"
with a nod to two of Alexander's musical mentors. "The real heroes on that tune for me were Nat
"King" Cole and Oscar Peterson," he explains. "Nat Cole had a real simultaneously hot and cool style
in his fingers, and Oscar Peterson's powerful rhythm and big full orchestral approach always struck
a chord with me as well."
Known for his ability to leap tall chord changes at breakneck speeds, Alexander surprises on Uplift
with a healthy dose of musical variety as well. A mournful reading of John Lewis' venerable jazz
ballad "Django," (complete with mid-song swing interlude), a masterfully-modulating, waltz-like
rendition of the jazz staple "Body and Soul," and nods to his Jamaican homeland on Calypsoflavored tracks like his own "Home" and Blue Mitchell's "Fungi Mama," round the album out with
fire-filled flair.
Uplift finds Alexander in esteemed musical company, courtesy of rhythm section ringers Hassan
Shakur on bass, and Herlin Riley and Frits Landesbergen on drums. "The main thing is that I have
these terrific guys playing with me," Alexander says of his band. "They help me get there!"
Alexander mined his own personal concert archives for Uplift, hand picking album tracks alongside
Jazz Legacy Productions founder John Lee. "I play a lot of shows in Europe," Alexander says, "and
sometimes I return from them with recordings of recent concerts. This time when I went and
listened to the tapes, I was more than pleasantly surprised! So I'm thrilled that John found a home
for the music on his label. He's done a great thing."
After nearly a half-century of piano prestidigitation, Monty Alexander still plays with the same
sense of purpose that guided his career from the start. "It's about telling your story," Alexander
says, "and finding a way to bring life to the experience every time you sit at the piano." One listen to
the joyful noise on Uplift, and you're sure to confirm his mission as accomplished.
For additional information on Monty Alexander,
please visit montyalcxander.com
For additional information on Jazz Legacy Productions,
please visit: jazzlegacyproductions.com
For more information, please contact:
DL Media • 610-667-0501
Jordy Freed • jordvfSidlmediamusic.com
Monty Alexander Mgmt
+1-212-731-9291 - [email protected]
www.rnontyalexander .com
MONTY ALEXANDER-Bio
In a career spanning five decades, pianist Monty Alexander has built a reputation exploring the
worlds of American jazz, popular song, and the music of his native Jamaica, finding in each a sincere
spirit of musical expression. In the process, he has performed and recorded with artists from every
corner of the musical universe: Frank Sinatra, Ray Brown, Dizzy Gillespie, Sonny Rollins, Clark
Terry, Quincy Jones, Ernest Ranglin, Barbara Hendricks, Sly Dunbar, and Robbie Shakespeare,
among many others.
Born on D-Day (June 6, 1944) and raised in Kingston, Jamaica, he took his first piano lessons at age
six but was largely self-taught. As a teenager, he witnessed concerts by Louis Armstrong and Nat
"King" Cole at Kingston's Carib Theater. These artists had a profound effect on Alexander's own
style. He formed Monty and the Cyclones in the late 60s and also recorded on sessions with
musicians who would later form The Ska tali tes.
Alexander and his family came to the United States at the end of 1961. Less than two years later,
while playing in Las Vegas with Art Mooney's orchestra, he caught the eye of New York City club
owner Jilly Rizzo and his friend, Frank Sinatra. Rizzo hired the young pianist to work in his club,
Jilly's, where he accompanied Sinatra and others. There he met Modern Jazz Quartet vibraphonist
Milt Jackson, who hired him and eventually introduced him to former Charlie Parker collaborator
and legendary bassist Ray Brown. Alexander recorded and performed with the two jazz giants on
many occasions.
His musical collaborations span multiple genres and styles. His projects have been as varied as
assisting Natalie Cole in her tribute album to her father, Nat "King" Cole in 1991 (that album,
Unforgettable, won seven Grammy awards), performing George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" under
the direction of Bobby McFerrin at the Verbier Festival in Switzerland, and recording the piano track
for the film score of Clint Eastwood's Bird, a movie about the life of jazz titan Charlie Parker. In
2008, Alexander conceived and directed the acclaimed program Ljords of the West Indies at Jazz at
Lincoln Center. Alexander maintains a rigorous touring schedule worldwide, from jazz clubs to
concert halls and at Jazz Festivals from South Africa to Montreux (Switzerland), and Australia.
In August 2000 Monty Alexander was awarded the tide of Commander in the Order of Distinction
by the Jamaican government for outstanding services to Jamaica in his capacity as worldwide music
ambassador.
To date Monty Alexander has recorded over 70 albums as a leader. His recent albums on the Telarc
label include trio sessions, such as Impressions in Blue, and live concert recordings, such as Gain' Yard.
In the late summer of 2005, Alexander traveled to Bob Marley's Tuff Gong Studio in Kingston,
Jamaica, and teamed up with Jamaican top session players to record Concrete Jungle, a set of twelve
compositions penned by Bob Marley and reinterpreted via Alexander's jazz piano-oriented
arrangements. The resulting union of musical perspectives digs deep into the Marley legend and
brings together the two worlds that Alexander most treasures, building the musical bridges that are
the very essence of his craft. As a testament to his versatility, The Good Ljfe, on Chesky Records is a
collection of songs written and popularized by one of his all-time favorite artists and good friends,
Tony Bennett. His latest release also on Chesky is Calypso Blues, a tribute to his hero Nat "King"
Cole.
Three releases are in the works for 2011-2012: a trio album on JLP records, an album featuring
Monty Alexander's presentation, Harlem-Kingston Express, on the Motema label, in addition to a
piano solo album comprised of Monty Alexander's own compositions on Arbors records.
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Monty Alexander
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By Ted Pan ken
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he adage "absence makes the heart grow fonder,"
George Fludas and a plugged-in Jamaican contingent—Wendel Ferraro on guitar (filling both
coined to convey the kindling effect of separation soloistic and comping roles), Glen Browne on
bass and Karl Wright on drums.
This configuration, documented on the 2011
upon romantic ardor, applies with equal measure
release Harlem-Kingston Express (Motema)
to pianist Monty Alexander's ongoing obsession with Herlin Riley on drums, is the most recent
iteration of a series of Alexander-conceptualized
with the music of Jamaica, his homeland, from efforts over the past few decades to coalesce
"things that reflect my heritage as an Englishspeaking Caribbean person" with the princiwhence he migrated to Miami in 1961, at age 17.
ples of hardcore swinging jazz. "I was bummed
As a Kingston youngster, Alexander re- '70s, when he closed the books on his 300-days- out after it ended with John and Jeff because I'd
called, "I soaked up everything—the calyp- a-year-on-the-road trio with John Clayton and gotten used to that precision, that projection," he
so band playing at the swimming pool in the Jeff Hamilton, he was an upper-echelon stylist, said. "Although other people were fine and good,
country, local guys at jam sessions who wished referred to by Oscar Peterson, himself descend- no one came close to that, and I'm not one to go
they were Dizzy [Gillespie] and Miles [Davisl, ed from St. Kitts and St. Croix, as "my little West scouting." To recharge, he began spending quala dance band playing Jamaican melodies, songs Indian counterpart."
ity time in Jamaica. "I'd go to the studio with Sly
that [Harry] Belafonte would have sung. I was
"You come to America, you try to blend in and Robbie, who know me from way back. It's
fully aware of the rhythm-and-blues, my he- and do what they do," Alexander explained. "At simple music, two chords—but life is in those
roes on piano were Eddie Heywood and Erroll first, I was even trying to speak like American two chords."
Garner, and, above all, Louis Armstrong was my people"—he demonstrated several voices—"so
Later in the "80s, Alexander—whose first
king. I had one foot in the jazz camp and the oth- they wouldn't keep asking, 'Where do you come Jamaica-centric dates were the still-samer in the old-time folk music—no one more valu- from?' But as the years went by, I started express- pled mid-'70s MPS groove albums Rass! and
able than the other."
ing myself by claiming my heritage more. I said, Jamento—slarted to present units with which
Once in the States, though, Alexander com- 'Wait a minute, home is as good as it gets.'"
he could incorporate Caribbean flavors, includpartmentalized, sublimating roots towards estabIn Orvieto, Italy, for a five-concert engage- ing an "Ivory and Steel" ensemble with steel
lishing a jazz identity. By 1970, he was a distin- ment at Umbria Jazz Winter 2010, Alexander drummer Othello Molineaux and hand drumguished voice, with a CV citing long-haul trio spoke in the high-ceilinged sitting room of his mer Bobby Thomas. After signing with Telarc
gigs with various New York A-listers, as well hotel, which evoked a ducal mansion. With him in the mid-'90s, he embarked on a succession of
as consequential sideman work in Los Angeles for the week was a band comprising an acous- recordings on which he reunited with musicians
with Milt Jackson and Ray Brown. By the late tic trio with bassist Hassan Shakur and drummer he'd known since his teens, among them several
MAY 2011 DOWNBEAT
39
dates with guitarist Ernest Ranglin, and one with
Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare. Four other
recordings—Stir It Up and Concrete Jungle reveal Alexander's take on Bob Marley's music,
while Coin' Yard and Yard Movement address a
broader Jamaican spectrum—hearken to mento,
Jamaica's indigenous calypso, descended from
the French quadrille music to which English colonists danced in the 19th century. Mento evolved
into, as Alexander puts it, "a deep country
Jamaican thing" that spread throughout the island, and, as the 20th century progressed, crosspollinated with r&b and jazz, evolving into ska.
As Alexander delved ever deeper into these
rediscovered interests, he found it increasingly
difficult to convene a single ensemble in which
he could satisfactorily convey them. "I would
have a trio of jazz masters, and when I'd want to
play something that reflected Jamaica, whether
calypso or Bob Marley, I couldn't get that thing
because that's not what they do," Alexander said.
"Conversely, the Jamaican guys didn't relate to
the jazz experience. I wanted to give my serf an
opportunity to share my two loves, which is one
love, to coin Bob's phrase."
This feeling had permeated the previous evening's concert. Alexander came to the piano, positioned stage center to the left of Shakur and
Fludas. He opened with Ellingtonian chords,
and launched a chugging train blues, transitioned
to the changes of "Blue And Boogie," then re-
turned to an Ellington medley that resolved into
"Caravan." After brief remarks, a brisk stomp
through "Sweet Georgia Brown" and some
nachtmusik chords, Browne and Wright entered
stage right and laid down reggae riddims. Playing
percussively, Alexander soon segued into Ernest
Gold's "Exodus," blew a melodica, quoted "let
my people go" within his solo, returned to the piano bench and ended with a flourish. With the
trio, he played a shuffle blues, then a hard-swinging blues—midway through the latter, he stood,
pointed to the Jamaicans and orchestrated a metric modulation, quoting "Manteca" in his solo,
before seguing into Marley's "No Woman, No
Cry." The back-and-forth proceeded for another half-hour, before Alexander concluded with
a romping "Come Fly With Me" and a melodymilking rendition of "All The Way."
"Recently I've been doing this with more
commitment than before," Alexander remarked
of the real-time genre-switching. "I'm fulfilled,
because it's my own life experience. It's like
Barack Obama music. We are all cut from the
same cloth."
P
erhaps 20 years ago, Alexander got angry at
someone, intended to hit them, thought better of it, punched the wall instead and broke his
hand. "Ever since that day, I don't play as fast as I
used to," he said. "But instead of playing 20 notes
that may not mean that much, I started playing
six or seven that are soulful or meaningful."
The chops are abundant on Uplift (JLP), a
deeply swinging navigation of the American
Songbook with bassist Hassan Shakur and
drummer Herlin Riley that follows the 2008 trio
date The Good Life: Monty Alexander Plays
The Songs Of Tony Bennett and 2009's Calypso
Blues: The Songs Of Nat King Cole (Chesky) as
companion pieces to his excellent 1997 Sinatra
tribute Echoes OfJilly's (Concord). Rather than
abstract the tunes, Alexander hews to the iconic
arrangements, illuminating the music from within, deploying effervescent grooves, lovely rubatos, a killing left hand, an innate feel for stating
melody, well-calibrated touch, harmonic acumen
and an ability to reference a broad timeline of piano vocabulary stretching to pre-bop. Each interpretation embodies a point of view. Like his
"eternal inspiration," Erroll Garner, Alexander
gives the hardcore-jazz-obsessed much to dig
into, while also communicating the message to
the squares! "civilian."
"In our home, Nat Cole was the voice of
America," said Alexander, who experienced a
transformational moment in 1956 when he saw
Cole play on a package concert in Kingston
with Louis Armstrong. "My awareness of his
piano playing came later; it was just that smooth
voice. At first I confused him with Gene Autry.
I was always connecting one thing with another—'Wait a minute, that sounded like that.'
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That's why for me, even now, it's one world of
music. I try to remove all the lines."
By 1956, Alexander had already spent half
his life entertaining people with music. "I'd emulate people my folks knew who played old-time
stride," he said. "I was playing boogie-woogie
from the get-go, rockin' the joint. I just had fun
at the piano." Later, he would extrapolate a conceptual framework from Ahmad Jamal's 1958
classic "Poinciana." "It was a merging of two
worlds," he said. "Sophistication on the piano, harmonic wonderment and the nastiest jungle rhythm going on in the background. That's
Jamaica. It's about dancin', it's about groovin'—
it's all one thing."
Such formative experiences gave Alexander
a certain ignorance-of-youth confidence when
he started playing in "tough guy clubs" in
Miami Beach. Within a year he was working
at Le Bistro, a two-room joint where he shared
the bill with a Sinatra impersonator named
Duke Hazlitt. One night after a concert at the
Fontainebleau, Sinatra came through with an
entourage, including Sinatra's consigliere, Jilly
Rizzo, and Rizzo's wife, Honey.
"I'm playing, minding my own business, trying to behave and not to be too noisy," Alexander
recalled. "But I must have been kicking up a
storm, because apparently Honey came in and
told Jilly to come hear this kid play. In those days,
I'd come in with all guns blazing. She told me,
'We've got this club in New York, Jilly's, and it
would be nice to have you play in there, kid.'"
About a year later, midway through 1963,
Rizzo finally brought Alexander to his eponymous West 54th Street tough guy bar, which
doubled as Sinatra's late-night office. Just 19 and
residing a few blocks away in the Hotel Edison,
Alexander joined Local 802, situated directly
across the street from the club, and assumed his
place among New York's jazz elite. Within a few
years, he was also working uptown at Minton's
Playhouse and at the Playboy Club.
"I remember sitting at Jilly's piano bar, a
few feet away from Miles Davis and Frank in
deep conversation," Alexander reminisced.
"My crowning point was when Miles came to
me and said, 'Where did you learn to play that
shit?' Next thing, he writes his phone number
on a little matchbook, and we're hanging out
at his house or going to the fights. Miles told
me, 'You got the right complexion.'" Alexander
noted that his bloodline is an admixture of
Lebanese, Spanish and African strains, and
that the ambiguity as to his racial identity had a
great deal to do with his ability to comfortably
navigate various circles in Jim Crow-era Miami
as well as New York City. "At Minton's they'd
say, 'What's this Puerto Rican guy doing who
can play jazz like that?' When I first saw Ray
Brown's picture on an Oscar Peterson record
cover, I saw the smile and the teeth and said,
'Damn, Uncle Jim!'"
More than the familial resemblance,
Alexander was drawn to Brown's consistency,
tone and the truck-coming-down-the-road surge
of his beat, so he tried to be around him whenever
he could. "I got to know Ray better," he recalled.
"I went to see him in L.A. at the Gaslight. When
I got there, nobody's listening, nobody cares, it's
the last set, and they had to play one obligatory
tune. Frankie Capp walks to the drums, Mundell
Lowe picks up the guitar, but the piano player is
boozed-out at the bar. I asked Ray, 'Can I play a
tune?' Within two choruses, he's screaming, he's
groovin' and I'm groovin', and we're as happy as
kids in the candy jar. He said, 'Where are you
going to be this summer? I want you to play with
me and Milt Jackson.'
"When you're in company with people
who are at a certain level, it upgrades your
musicianship. I'd been smitten with the MJQ
since I saw a record with these four dignified
black men on the cover—they looked like funeral directors. I learned about the connections—John Lewis and Ray with Dizzy's big
band, Hank Jones telling Dizzy about Ray. I
took that personal thing on the bandstand. I
felt like I belonged to that crowd."
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n spontaneously orchestrating the HarlemKingston Express band in live performance,
Alexander seemed to be paralleling the bandstand procedures by which both Ahmad Jamal
and Duke Ellington deployed their units to convey their intentions in real time. The pianist
concurred.
"It's a kind of joyful, loving dictatorship," he
said. 'That's why I use musicians who are willing and easygoing, who give me their trust and
confidence and won't question what I'm doing."
More so than instant composition a la Jamal
and Ellington as an m.o. for following the dictates of the moment, Alexander focuses on serious play. "I don't read music, and I play by ear,"
he said. "You can chalk it up to a certain amount
of laziness, because if I really wanted to read,
there's no reason I can't. But when I see paper
in front of me, man, I start sweating. That part of
my brain doesn't function well. I don't know how
to play music that's not coming from my instant,
make-it-up stuff.
"I get bored with a planned format. I can't
repeat the same thing twice. I'm always reaching
for now, live in the now, present tense, and I look
for inspiration from wherever."
This blank-slate attitude inflects the aforementioned trio projects. "I just went in the studio," Alexander said, referencing the 2009 Nat
Cole tribute. '"Haji Baba' is from a movie with
Nat, and I used to sing it walking down the street
when I was nine—I listened to the bridge on that
and on 'Again' to make sure I had it right. But
for the most part, when I play music, I smell it
and see colors. Every song has its own personality, its own soul, and if I can't feel it, I can't play
it with feeling.
"I don't understand what it is that makes me
different, but I feel I have very little in common
with anybody else. I seem to be my own strange
character. If I'm right in my motivations and attitude, amazing things happen."
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41
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
APRIL 5, 201 1
Jazz's Jamaican Envoy
From Ska to Sinatra, Monty Alexander Has Played It All
By WILL FRIEDWALD
It is small wonder that jazz, an American music that draws on a wide range of cultural influences, should have
chosen New York, the most polyglot city on the planet, as its home base for most of its history. And it's equally
appropriate that the Jamaican pianist Monty Alexander, who begins a weeklong engagement at Birdland on
Tuesday, has made New York his home for most of the last 50 years.
Getty Images
Mr. Alexander performed on a Hammond 44 melodion last summer at the Jazz a Vienne Festival in Vienne,
France.
"My music is the product of having experienced different cultures and different vibrations," Mr. Alexander said
Monday in a phone conversation from his Midtown apartment. Most of us first heard the 66-year-old pianist in
the early 1970s, when he represented the new generation of be-boppers and was the pianist of choice for such
modern giants as Ray Brown and Milt Jackson.
Some may remember his earlier career, when he was brought to the city by Frank Sinatra's right-hand man, Jilly
Rizzo, to serve as house pianist at the famous Jilly's; the experience motivated Mr. Alexander to become one of
the major interpreters of the songs of Sinatra as well as the Great American Songbook (he has also collaborated
memorably with Tony Bennett). Yet even before that, while growing up in Kingston, the pianist had yet a
previous incarnation as a session pianist on embryonic reggae and ska recordings.
In recent years, Mr. Alexander has both returned to his roots and united several of these musical facets, most
famously on two breakthrough jazz albums of the music of Bob Marley, "Stir It Up" (1999) and "Concrete
Jungle" (2006). He may be the first—and is certainly the most successful—musician to combine Jamaican
music with North American jazz, but he downplays the achievement as "just being myself."
"Growing up in Jamaica," Mr. Alexander said, "there were two things that happened that I remember distinctly:
The first was all the groovy songs and sounds coming from the USA, and the other were all the rhythms and the
beats that were happening locally with the folks in Jamaica."
The Birdland show is his "Harlem-Kingston Express" presentation, and features a full contingent of multiple
bassists and percussionists, a second keyboardist, and the Israeli guitarist Yotam Silberstein, "to get everybody
moving below the waist," as he put it in his unmistakable Kingston accent.
Mr. Alexander's new album, "Uplift" (Jazz Legacy Productions), opens with "Come Fly With Me," on which he
evokes Sinatra and Oscar Peterson in the same breath, while "1 Just Can't See For Lookin'" honors the piano
innovations of Nat King Cole. The album includes his distinctive treatments of a parade of iconic standards,
among them "Sweet Georgia Brown" (with echoes of both Bizet and Monk's "Bright Mississippi"). He ends by
bringing it all together with Blue Mitchell's "Fungii Mama"—a melody that combines hard bop and calypso,
throwing out humorous nods to Monk and "The Flintstones," without departing from an "I Got Rhythm"
foundation.
"Uplift" also features several island-flavored originals, which are brilliant examples of how to swing, Jamaican
style. "No matter what I'm playing, I like to spice it up," Mr. Alexander said, "whether it's Cole Porter or Bob
Mar ley."
Corrections and Amplifications
Monty Alexander's new album, "Uplift," is on the Jazz Legacy Productions label. An earlier version of this
article incorrectly stated it was on Retrieval Records.
Copyright 2011 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Format Dynamics :: Dell Viewer
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/fdcp/?unique=l 302388233690
Democrat
Chronicle:
What our critics are
listening to
7:21 PM, Apr. 7, 2011]
JASON ISBELL AND THE 400 UNIT: HERE
WE REST. Isbell parted amicably with the
literate Southern rockers Drive-By
Truckers, which was overloaded with fine
songwriters anyway. But his driving guitars,
fiddles and references to collard greens
still feel Southern. The sentiments need no
map: "If there's one thing I can't take, it's
the sound that a woman makes 'bout five
seconds after her heart begins to break,"
Isbell sings on "Codeine." Resignation drifts
through these songs. "All the work I did in
vain, now I'm not the same as I was," a
soldier returning from some unnamed
conflict tells us. It's sad, so many
songwriters today find war a readily
available subject. — JEFF SPEVAK
BOBBY V: FLY ON THE WALL. The 2009
release by Bobby V, The Rebirth, didn't
breathe much life into what had become an
R&B career with only a small pulse. But "Fly
on the Wall" should have R&B fans buzzing.
Single "Words" is a breezy little number that
reminds fans why we liked this crooner in
the first place: He is smooth. But "Words"
pales in comparison to the verbal seduction
in "Sweetness" and the body-swaying
number "If I Can't Have You." With guests
like Plies, 50 Cent and Twista, Bobby V
adds hip-hop soul to his smooth crooner
vibe. Bobby V is back after being on
musical life support. — SHEILARAYAM
MONTY ALEXANDER: UPLIFT. What a
perfect name for this swinging set from
Jamaica's gift to piano jazz. Alexander is
wonderfully versatile, equally at home with
potent, straight-ahead jazz and with the
infectious rhythms of the Caribbean. This
set, culled from three years of live
performances, is mostly in the mainstream,
played with polish, rhythm and invention,
starting with his invitation to "Come Fly With
Me." He updates "Sweet Georgia Brown"
with a tempo even the Globetrotters
couldn't match, and brings a dirge-like
poignancy to the classic "Django." This CD
is "the full Monty." — JACK GARNER
VADIM GLUZMAN: BRUCH. Bruch seems to
be making a comeback. First Joshua Bell
plays the Violin Concerto No. 1 with the
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra in midMarch, and now Israeli violinist Gluzman
records it on his latest BIS release.
Gluzman, a rising star violinist who has also
performed live with the RPO, has a brighter
tone than Bell, but his interpretation also
drips with expressiveness. He takes ample
opportunity for swells, rubatos and accents
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4/9/2011 6:31 PM
GLOBE UNITY: C O L O M B I A
Trust
Sean Smith Quartet (Smithereert)
Cartagena! Curro Puentes & The Big Band Cumbia
and Descarga Sound of Colombia
Various Artists (Soundway)
Manibo Loco
Anibal VelasQuez y Su Conjuncto (Analog Africa)
Resistencias
Ricardo Gallo Cuarteto (Bluegallo Music)
C-olombian music draws on a rich Creole heritage of
indigenous folk musics combined with African,
Spanish, Caribbean and North American influences;
in the hands of creative musicians, it accrues a
distinctive local 'sabor' (flavor).
Cartagena!, named for the Caribbean port city, is
an anthology of rare recordings by "Curro" Fuentes,
the youngest of three brothers to produce for Discos
Fuentes, the country's largest, most influential label
for almost 40 years. Recorded in the '60s and early
'70s, the tracks highlight Fuentes' trademark sound:
booming bass, impressive horn arrangements and
hot improvisations replete with a mixture of local
cumbia, porro and other styles with Cuban salsa
and descarga (improvised) music. The beats are
ferocious and infectious, with impressive soloing on
"Honolulu" (bass), "Salsa Sabrosa" (trumpet and
timbales), "Fiesta de Negritos" (clarinet and
trumpet) and "Cumbia del Monte" (clarinet).
Covering approximately the same time period
as Cartagena!, Mambo Loco documents the style of
Anibal VelasQuez, an influential accordionist from
Barranquilla, another Caribbean port with a strong
musical heritage. VelasQuez modernized guaracha
music by using electric bass, replacing bongos with
an x-ray film-covered caja (traditional drum) and
turning up the tempo to hyperspeed, resulting in a
frenetic dance style well suited to carruval-esque
'ambiente' (mood) of his hometown. Most of the
tracks feature lead and chorus vocals complemented
by the leader's florid, horn-like style, especially
notable on "Que Pasa", a track that, along with
"Cecilia", features inspired piano solos.
Recorded in Bogota, Colombia's capital in the
central Andean highlands, Resistencias is a modern
release by pianist/leader Ricardo Gallo, bassist Juan
Manuel Toro, drummer Jorge Sepulveda and
percussionist Juan David Castano, the third in their
five-year association. It is collaborative in every
sense, including compositions from each member
and emphasizing group interplay over individual
solos. Gallo's writing - featured on five of eight
tracks - is distinctively modern, combining Sturm
und Drang (storm and stress) romanticism with
fractured rhythms and dense, polytonal harmonies
that are rich and suggestive, floating over the
percussionists' intricately layered sticking patterns
and booming low drums while Toro ties it all
together. "Ais", the epic centerpiece, epitomizes
their distinctive approach, attaining a powerful yet
effortless climax.
For more information, visit soundwayrecords.com,
analogafrica.com and ladistritofonica.com. Gallo is at
Drom Apr. 28th. See Calendar.
Sean Smith is a fine mainstream bassist, with a warm
sound and a springy beat. Through the years he's
worked with musicians like Phil Woods, Bill Charlap
and Mark Murphy, all of whom have recorded Smith's
tunes. All of those musicians have in common a
commitment to lyricism and swing, qualities that
Smith himself possesses in abundance.
This investment in melody is the distinguishing
mark of his compositions, which are featured
throughout Trust, his third quartet CD. And it's also
the defining quality of every musician in the group,
saxophonist John Ellis, guitarist John Hart and even
drummer Russell Meissner. The quartet has an airy
collective sound, a transparency with each voice
passing through the ensemble. Smith's compositions
range easily from the playful swing of "Bush League"
to a gorgeous ballad line like "Voices", with Ellis
summoning up an almost Getz-like sweetness when
appropriate. The individual sounds are most apparent
in "Homemade Japanese Folk Song", a particularly
affecting Smith original that's played here as a round,
the melody passing from one voice to another.
The interaction is strong as well, as on the Latinpulsed "Wayne's World", dedicated to Wayne Shorter,
with Smith and Meissner laying down a warm carpet
of bubbling rhythm for Ellis' floating tenor and Hart's
rapidly expanding guitar lines. That interaction is even
more apparent in "Margin of Error", with Ellis and
Hart improvising contrapuntally. It's a solidly
mainstream group, with Smith's compositions and the
collective commitment giving this quartet a distinct
and engaging personality.
For more information, visit seansmithjazz.com. This group
is at Birdland Apr. 4th. See Calendar.
Uplift
Monty Alexander (Jazz Legacy Prod.)
I he prolific Jamaican-born virtuoso pianist Monty
Alexander continues to occupy a singular position in
jazz. Steeped in swing, he readily acknowledges the
influence of Nat Cole and Oscar Peterson in his
aesthetic. But his playing also often features a
Caribbean-flavored rhythm that makes for a mix quite
unlike that of anyone else.
Uplift is a collection of live performances recorded
at various concert halls between 2007-10. The
proceedings start off with a rollicking version of a
classic Sinatra swinger, Sammy Cahn-Jimmy Van
Heusen's "Come Fly With Me", recalling Alexander's
early years in New York when he was house pianist at
Jilly's, a favorite Sinatra hangout; that familiar fingersnapping ease is evident in Alexander's rendition. The
mood switches on John Lewis' "Django". Initially nigh
16 April 2011 | THE NEW YORK CITY JAZZ RECORD
to mournful, mid-song Alexander shifts expansively
into a swing interlude, interpolating phrases from
"Softly As In A Morning Sunrise" before reverting back
to a meditative closing. His take on "Body and Soul"
moves subtly in a waltz-like turn even as he mixes
swing with hints of boogie woogie. Throughout he also
humorously tosses in snatches of other tunes including
"Mary Had A Little Lamb" and "Buttons and Bows".
His own melody "Hope" has hints of elegant
gospel in an Ellington-ian manner. That ability to be
expressive in unusual stylistic combinations is evident
throughout Uplift. Alexander is percussive. He is
lyrical. And sometimes almost simultaneously. Humor
is again evident on "Sweet Georgia Brown" even as his
stride playing is torrid. Together with Herlin Riley's
drum work they make joyful noise.
For more information, visit jazzlegacyproductions.com.
Alexander is at Birdland Apr. 5th-9th. See Calendar.
>-..
.»•:••
Canada Day II
Harris Eisenstadt (Songlines)
Drummer/composer Harris Eisenstadt's Canada Day
H is a chilly, dry wash of melody and understated
rhythm. As with the group's debut on Clean Feed, this
is a little anticlimactic considering the personnel,
which features Nate Wooley (trumpet) and Matt
Bauder (tenor sax). Their underlying virtue here may
be playing with restraint, but one wants a little more
pep and spice.
Much of the work here has a '60s Blue Note feel to
it, with hard-edged rhythms and bluesy, modal forays.
But it also has a muffled quality that the original Blue
Note albums transcend - the parts don't ring out with
the resonance they might. It is all as if kept under glass.
But it is incumbent on us to listen to it on its own terms;
it appears that the music prefers to be taken at
something of a distance and analyzed accordingly,
with some reserve.
The group, which also includes Chris Dingman
(vibraphone) and Eivind Opsvik (bass), veers in many
directions of modern jazz. This would be a criticism
except one can't help but speculate that the musicians'
pan-fidelity to these musical forms, at the price of too
little original and earthy interaction, is part of a greater
scheme intended to make us more careful listeners,
rather than offer an exhilarating listen.
Great care has gone into the composing, with all
the niceties of Monk and Mingus. Also the music has
kind of a pop feel and beat to it. These two things are
good. Also good are the woolly soloing of Wooley and
the changes Bauder rings on saxophone. There are
indeed surprises on this record but they are rather
academic and after-the-thought.
Why the artists would make such an album, in
every way 'cool', is open to asking. It may be a case of
too many great young cooks trying not to spoil the
broth. However that may be, there is something that
redeems this album's subdued perfection apart from
its relative lack or otherwise of appeal to the ear. As a
part of a process, or at least a look at a musical
philosophy in the process of evolving, this is bound to
remain a document of important artists at a crucial,
still-early point in their careers.
For more information, visit songlines.com. This group is at
Ttie Stone Apr. 5th and SALT SPACE Apr. 14th. See Calendar.
NICK BPvVSEY
i: **=im>dt<x-re-, ***=iji>od;
and while 1 understand a musician's prerogative to stretch out in new directions I nrehuret" us the fulfilling entree compared to the iffy- dessert that is Bob \'a Head. (13
tracks; 46:26 minutes) (5 tracks: 69:51 minutes)
>fc!!owjackets ****
Timeline
Mack Avenue
After 30 years the Yellowjackets stiil have plenty to say.
Timeline reunites the band's
longtime members—the de
facto leader and keyboardist,
Russell Fcrrantc. bassist Jimmy
Haslip. saxophonist Bob
Mintzer and drummer Will
Kennedy—who maintain both
their chemistry and jovial jam
approach that smoothly integrate shifting time signatures
and funk)' revival tent licks.
There's even a cameo by a former band member, guitarist
Kobben Ford, on the sleek FerYellowjacke
rante, Haslip tune. "Magnolia."
As contemporary jazz, you'd be hard-pressed to discount the modern bop pleasures of
"Why Is It" or the electro-acoustic buzz of "Tenacity." The band remains stubbornly
hard to categorize and they don't pander to trends— Timeline isn't as catchy as the
more commercial Blue Hats album (WB. 1997) or their collaborations with Bobby MeFerrin. But that musical integrity is what keeps the Yeliowjackets soulful and real. Although personnel has shifted over time, this solid incarnation remains expansive in
their musical vision and they will definitely leave old and new listeners digging on
their template of jazz fusion and ioose-limhed grooves. (11 tracks; 62:15 minutes)
The Cookers ****
Cast The First Stone
Plus Loin Music
COOKERS
•
The Cookers come out swinging haal on
"Cast The First Stone," the first track on their
album of the same name. It's a robust, formidable expression of talent and post bop fervor—the band's name comes from Freddie
Hubbard's 1965 Blue Note live release, tVif&t
Of The Cookem. This band has a
righteous
S.
roster—the front line is comprised of Billy
Harper on tenor sax. Craig Handy on alto sax. and two trumpeters, Eddie Henderson
and David Weiss. The rhythm section is no less esteemed with George Cables on
piano. Cecil McBee on bass and Billy Hart on drums. Plus, the Coltrane-mspired Azar
Lawrence, a shrewd saxophonist capable of harmonic and tonal somersaults, sits in for
four of the seven tracks.
As a .septet, all veterans of the 60s save for Weiss and Handy, they move easily between the gritty and lyrical. Pianist Cables binds "Peacemaker" and especially. "Looking
For The Light" with seductive comping and sensitive solos. The pick hit is definitely
"Croquet Ballet." which soars on a memorable theme and prescient exchanges between the band. Hardly a throwback to the sounds made popular by Lee Morgan. Hulv
hard and Blakey. this collective has, as Weiss points out, a 'play hard and mean it" ethic
thai doesn't disappoint and you can't begrudge them for keeping this hardcore jazz
sound alive. (~* tracks; 61:21 minutes)
T.K. Blue ****
Latin Bird
Motema
Here's a I.atin ja/y record with an abundance of sizzle and invention. Arriving on
the heels of Joe Lovano's tribute to Charlie Parker, Bird Songs (Blue Note, 2011), saxophonist T.K- Blue also takes his inspiration from the Parker songbook and breathes new
swing (along with samba, waltz and Caribbean rhythms) into a tamiliar playlist and a
pair of engrossing originals. Blue's vision is pleasingly eclectic on the very fine "Latin
Bird," his ninth album, thanks to a tight band—pianist Theo Hill, bassist Essiet Okon
Essiet. and the nimble percussionist Roland Guerrero who also plays congas, along
with trap drummers \\lllie Martinez and Lewis Nash. Like Parker. Blue is enamored with
harmonic progression and these tunes flexibility proves how innovative they still are.
The saxophonist yields ample solo space to Hill on a lush reading of Monk's "Round
Midnight" and incorporates sparkling multi-hued rhythms on "Donna Lee" and "Si Si."
the latter featuring the one-of-a-kind trombonist Steve Turre. (11 tracks; 52:22 minutes)
Monty Alexander ****
tptiji
JIJ Records
Jamaican horn pianist Monty Alexander is well known for his two-fisted lyricism and
an arresting technique that combines intensity with effusive swing. A prodigious player
with over 62 released CDs to his credit. Alexander was originally hired by Frank Sinatra
and nightclub owner Jilly Kizzo when he moved to the states at seventeen, nearly 50
years ago. I rplift is a collection of personally selected concert performances by Alexander from the last three years, most featuring bassist Hassan Shakur and drummer Herlin Riley. Nearly every tune intersects at the avenues of swing and soul, highlighted b\
'Come Fly With Me." "Django" and a pair of originals, an Ahmad Jamal-stylet! "Renewal"
and a gospel-dusted "Hope." It's consistently compelling, and it makes you realize thai
anything Alexander plays is bound to come up aces. (10 tracks; 63:02 minutes) •
. :
irishtimes.com - Monty Alexander - Fri, Apr 22, 201 1
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/theticket/201 1/0422/1224295.
Monty Alexander
RAY COMISKEY
Fri, Apr 22, 20 11
Uplift Jazz Legacy ****
Alexander belongs to the old, hard-swinging school of pianists epitomised by Oscar Peterson and
Gene Harris, so a formidable technique is a given. To it he adds a Caribbean accent, a playful
disposition and a capacious bag of musical allusions to fuel it.
Having a good time is the dominant mood of this collection of standards and originals, recorded live
between 2007 and 201 0 with his trio. Good though his grooving unit is, the piano is boss; this is no
trio democracy.
In return you get dazzling good fun. It can be overstated, as in the intro to Django , but more often it's
impishly clever, with multiple examples such as the Carmen opening to Sweet Georgia Brown, the
witty quotes on the waltz-time Body And Soul , Django (again), an allusion-drenched Renewal and an
irresistible / Just Can 't See For Lookin ' to sweep fans up in its well-crafted geniality.
see jazzlegacyproductions.com
©2011 The Irish Times
lofl
4/22/2011 4:48 PM
Jamaica Gleaner News - Monty celebrates 50 years of music - Sunday...
http://mobile.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20110410/ent/entl.php
Jamaica Gleaner
Published: Sunday | April 10, 2011
Home : Entertainment
Monty celebrates 50 years of music
Alexander
Gordon Williams, Contributor
On the eve of the first show to launch his celebration of 50 years as a professional musician, Monty Alexander had no
right being nervous.
The Jamaican jazz great knows his audience. He's treated them to thousands of live shows - in cafes, clubs and
concert halls around the world - and more than 70 albums.
The man who has played with music's biggest names - from Americans Frank Sinatra, Duke Ellington and Quincy
Jones to Jamaica's Ernest Ranglin, Roland Alphonso, Bob Marley and Sly and Robbie - knows his stuff too. After
doing it so long, maybe it's time, after all, to reflect.
"It's something to celebrate," he says of the half century on the blocks. "I'm amazed I've come this far."
Everyone who has watched Alexander work, starting as a teenager in the Kingston studios of Coxson Dodd and Duke
Reid, is clear what the man at the grand piano can do. It's the reason they keep coming back.
Yet Alexander still gets the same compulsion each time he goes out on stage. Anxiety? Probably. Jitters? Probably
not.
"Are you joking?" he blurts out with a laugh in the beginning from his base in New York. "How can I be nervous? The
first time I sat at a piano I was three years old! Sitting at a piano is where I live. It's like going home."
Except, "going home" - especially after some time away - means there's need to prove to those who know him best
that he is the same or even better than the last time they saw him. Alexander never expects the bar to be lowered.
"Every time I go to perform there is a sense of excitement," he finally admitted. "I play music to make people happy.
That's my honour."
Despite the years, the young man who left Jamaica to try his hand in a profession he still embraces with unbridled
passion, is still defending that honour. The road to cultivating it was paved somewhere in the mid-1950s, when the
12-year-old Alexander watched Louis Armstrong at the Carib Theatre in Cross Roads. Like other high-profile American
entertainers at the time who performed in Jamaica, such as Jackie Wilson, Sam Cooke, Brook Benton and Nat King
Cole, Alexander noted that Armstrong served up joy. The audience swallowed whole.
"I saw that and I wanted to do that too," Alexander recalled. "It was a defining moment for me.
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"The biggest thing I have is that I have been given a gift and it is up to me never to forget that I have to share that, to
make even one person smile," he added later. "It's a big responsibility. You have to feel that."
It's what has pushed Alexander over the years. He never had more than a sliver of early formal musical training - four
years of piano lessons, starting around age nine - and he still doesn't read music. He abandoned the classical mould
when it threatened to fence in his rebellious spirit, and set out on a journey that, even today, seems far from over.
At 66, Alexander sounds in the same hurry to explore the world that has made him both successful and happy, a rare
combination in a
profession that can demand sacrifice of one or the other.
"It's the quickest ride," he said of the past 50 years. "It's a blur. The whole journey is a story."
Yet Alexander admitted he hardly stops to take notes. Friends tell him he should write a book. One way he puts dates
to significant career events is by looking at his past album covers. Another is linking those events to others, such as a
world title fight which, as a keen boxing fan, Alexander is able to do.
"Other than that," he said, "it's like one year rolling into another."
It's hardly monotonous. Alexander, listed among the top five in Hal Leonard's book The Fifty Greatest Jazz Piano
Players of All Time', said he is immersed in the discovery of his art. It is filled with fledgling ideas and multiple ongoing
projects, some bubbling over into others. For the first time, he even plans to sing.
The "50th year shows" kicked off last week (April 5) at the Birdland in New York. Others in the city will follow. The
"tour" will branch out elsewhere in the United States.
In the meantime, Alexander is promoting a couple of compact discs (CDs), including Uplift and Harlem-Kingston
Express, a musical journey from his homeland to the African-American cultural hub. They feature music from live
performances in the United States and Europe.
"It's like a train going through Kingston - '60s and 70s - up to Harlem (New York)," he explained. "I bring these two
together."
Alexander is crafting a CD featuring his own compositions - a sort of "Monty Plays Monty" arrangement of Alexander's
songs with him going solo on piano - set to come out later this year. He is also working on a CD, for possible release
next year, featuring names from varying genres - such as reggae crooners Tarrus Riley and Maxi Priest and jazz
singer George Benson - plus several noted instrumentalists like jazz trumpeters Arturo Sandoval and Roy Hargrove.
"I'm kinda bringing the Jamaican vibes to popular music," Alexander said. "You feel the rhythm from home."
Alexander says that effort - with a loose-working title Love Songs From The Islands - will offer a "different approach
entirely.
"People who like '50s and '60s music should like it," he added,
not trapped in a capsule
But "rubbing shoulders with" American greats like Miles Davis, Wes Montgomery and Duke Ellington over decades
has not blinkered Alexander from the present and future. He said he is not trapped in a capsule that excludes
appreciation of modern-day popular music. Some of the sounds that dominate today's airwaves, he admits, do not
satisfy his craving for a well-written song with beautiful melodies. But he accepts that music changes, often a product
of the times.
"It is what it is," Alexander said. "It is people expressing themselves with what they have and what they know.
"It is very, very creative, but it is 99 per cent departure from the continuum of how music was being made through the
decades. The creativity is different."
2 of 3
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Back in the day, Alexander declared, "the music was more of a hopeful thing."
Yet not much has changed about Alexander. He was born on June 6, 1944, known as 'D-Day' during World War II,
when the Allied Forces launched a decisive invasion of Normandy, France that eventually led to the end of Nazi
Germany and WWII.
"That's how we won the war," Alexander said with a laugh. "It was a very significant day in history."
Musician lovers will argue for more reasons than one. Alexander was named after the famous British WWII Field
Marshal Bernard Montgomery. Over the years, the former Jamaica College student has led his own charge,
commanding a mini-army of artistic ideas in a global march to spread joy through music. He refuses to be bogged
down by boundaries - musically and otherwise.
"I don't really live in a place," he said of his travels. "I live in a place of thinking. I try to live in a town called healthy
attitude.
"That's what I do," he added. "I'm a travelling minstrel."
Yet Alexander still longs for Jamaica. New York serves as a hub for his travels. His busy schedule keeps him away
from the island. The last time he visited was to play at the Jazz and Blues Festival in 2010.
These days Alexander fondly remembers "mango trees," lush, rolling hills and "rocking chairs" on countryside
verandahs. But waxing nostalgic doesn't mean he is ready to stop, or even slow down - not even after 50 years. His
"real best friends are musicians," he explained, and the art remains intoxicating.
"I will play 'til the curtain drops," said Alexander, pointing to the success of veterans such as Ranglin, now in his late
70s, and 90-year-old American jazz pianist Dave Brubeck. "I don't think about stopping."
The only worry is keeping his audience happy. He wants to pamper them with every song.
"I try to do that when I play," said Alexander.
"Dig deep down in your soul to make every note touch people."
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CDs of the week: Foo Fighters and Monty Alexander | Music
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Recommend
1
Our critics round-up this week's
biggest music releases...
FOO FIGHTERS
Wasting Light
(Columbia)
****
Dave Grohl's seventh album with his
Foo Fighters is billed as a return to
first principles, haying been recorded
on analogue tape in his LA garage albeit a room that's a garage in the
same sense that an Aston Martin is
a little runaround.
It also reunites Grohl with producer
Butch Vig for the first time since he
worked on Nirvana's Nevermind, and
features Nirvana bassist Krist
Novoselic on bass and accordion on
the album's single slowie, the
nakedly emotional I Should Have
Known.
Yet Grohl has never been less in the
shadow of hjs former band, Foo
Fighters having become big enough
to play Wembley Stadium in 2008 - a
peak Nirvana never reached. If
there's an overall feeling here, if s a
sense of being relaxed with every
point of a long career, ready to have
some more fun.
The band sounds heavier than ever
on screaming metal number White
Limo, and bows to a previously
unsung influence by featuring Bob
Mould of Hiisker Du singing on Dear
Rosemary. Elsewhere, the album is
packed with powerful anthems that
will thrill the multiple festival crowds
that will be treated to a headline slot
this summer.
Back to first principles: Dave Grohl
The closer, Walk, stands out as the
biggest tune, starting with a simple
chug before bursting to life as Growl
screams "I never wanna die!"
repeatedly. It's catchy, optimistic
and thrilling, qualities that have helped to ensure that Foo Fighters have
now been at the top for more than 16 years and will continue to be there A Guitar God in 115
for years to come.
min?
DAVID SMYTH
TV ON THE RADIO
Nine Types of Light
Never shy of genre-hopping, Brooklyn quintet TV on the Radio have an
almost naive fearlessness, even after four successful albums. Their fifth.
Nine Types of Light, merges lo-fi post-punk and ethereal indie with subtle
funk and tops it all with art-school contrariness, singer Tunde Adebimpe's
gorgeous croon, an occasional surrender to rock and what sounds like
Both orchestra and banjo on Killer Crane. It could have been messy but
it's not, even when Second Song adds Dexys-style brass. They travel at a
more stately pace than Arcade Fire and Talking Heads, with whom they
share a certain joyous musicality, but they're undeniably their own men.
JOHN AIZLEWOOD
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4/8/2011 12:13PM
CDs of the week: Foo Fighters and Monty Alexander Music
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ROBBIE ROBERTSON
How to Become Clairvoyant
(Fontana)
Savings up to 90%. Free
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.™»jQa*feoDm
****
If you'RE looking for fireworks, look elsewhere. Here Robbie Robertson
TVOTR at Radio City
reflects on the best part of half a century in rock'n'roll, around half of
Get tickets now to see
that as the main creative force behind me Band, original exponents and TV On The Radio &
most successful proponents of North American roots music, albeit hailing Light Asylum, April 13th!
from Canada. Robbie is one of the great guitarists of his era, and a
tctetmastg.toniAvontn.aniio
songwriter whose words are worth a listen. This is rock played in a
gentleman's groove. It swings but it won't knock you down in the street.
Sterling accompaniment is provided by Robbie's old mate Eric Clapton,
who co-wrote a few songs, sings on them, and proves once again that slow hands are the best.
Check out He Don't Live "Here, on which Robbie's acoustics and Eric's electricity will arouse your
short hairs.
PETE CLARK
METRONOMY
The British Riviera
(Because Music)
****
Like Hot Chip, Metronomy have always operated in dance music's more melodic reaches. But
even by their standards, this album is a revelation: a slick, stylish pop record more reminiscent
of Steely Dan than Fatboy Slim. Recorded in a fully functioning studio - rather than in frontman
Joseph Mounts bedroom, as per its two predecessors - the album boasts a more poised and
polished sound. Synths make way for saxophones on Everything Goes My Way, while the
presence of real drums gives its 11 tracks a fabulous, full-band feel. If there's a dip in quality
towards the end, it's a minor one: Metronomy have found their sound - and the summer just
found its soundtrack.
RICK PEARSON
t
MONTY ALEXANDER
Uplift
fJazz Legacy)
****
In an age of anarchic and pretentious music, it's a relief to turn to Monty Alexander, a masterly
pianist who delights audiences everywhere. Recorded "at various concert halls around the globe
between 2007-10" as his latest label blithely puts it, he's as inventive and unfailingly swinging
here on his 62nd trio album as when he left Jamaica and caught Frank Sinatra's ear in Miami
long ago. The revelation that he plays by ear recalls the great Erroll Garner, whose rhythmic
power, harmonic ingenuity and orchestral approach to piano improvisation were similarly
distinctive. Whenever asked if he could read music, Garner would reply: "Not enough to hurt my
playing."
JACK MASSARIK
Seun Kuti & Egypt 80
From Africa with Fury: Rise
(Knitting Factory Records)
Nigeria's Fela Kuti, the creator of Afrobeat, has two sons continuing his musical legacy and both
are currently in fine form. Femi Kuti has preferred to forge his own path, but Seun has largely
continued in his father's mould with political lyrics and a powerful band of pumping horns and
percussive polyrhythms. Although the music doesn't sound as radical now, it is actually more
finely-honed and stronger. Songs like African Soldier, Mr Big Thief, and Slave Masters would
make Fela proud. This is a powerful punchy album, co-produced by Brian Eno but, as with Fela,
the live shows are even better. He plays the RFH on April 13.
SIMON BROUGHTON
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VWIvOom
CULTURE CITY
AUGUST 31,2010
Looking Back, Falling Ahead
By PIA CATION
Like the moment when day turns to cocktail hour, the summer arts season is teetering at transition. It's the last
day of August Labor Day looms. The outdoor festivals are all but over, and a new season of arts is on the horizon.
Much like conversations held at dusk with drinks, it's time for looking back—and forward.
What were the highlights of the summer? Here's a broad look at my five favorite arts encounters of the season—
and the five I'm most looking forward to this fall.
1. Monty Alexander: Harlem-Kingston Express
Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola
Monty Alexander's blend of jazz and reggae made for an outrageously good time. When Mr. Alexander—the
Jamaican-born pianist with a cheerful, chatty style—surrounded himself with a Caribbean quartet to the right and
a jazz trio to the left, the result was fresh, lilting interpretations of Bob Marley's greatest hits, as well as Mr.
Alexander's original compositions, like the unmatchable "Love Notes."
2. Mostly Mozart Festival
Lincoln Center
Richard Termine
Louis Langree conducted the Mostly Mozart Festival
Orchestra on Aug. 17.
From start to finish, the evening of Aug. 17 was one of uplift. It
began with Joshua Bell and Jeremy Denk performing Mozart's
Violin Sonata in B-flat major. The pair plays frequently together,
and it shows; they are passionate, animated and musically in
sync. The best part about these Mostly Mozart pre-concert
programs is that the audience has (most likely) made an extra
effort to be there. In between movements, there was barely a
cough, nary a sniffle—as opposed to when the full audience
shows up and sounds like a tuberculosis ward.
When the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra took the stage, it
soared through three pieces under the baton of Louis Langree. Somewhere during Schumann's Symphony No. 4.,
I began to wonder: Why does Mr. Langree join us only for the summer—and only for a few weeks at that?
3. Alexi Ratmansky: 'Namouna, A Grand Divertissement'
New York City Ballet
It was refreshing—comforting even— to see a new work of ballet that incorporated a sense of fun. But "Namouna"
is both humorous and serious: Though a comedic romp, the dancers were given gorgeous steps to perform. If you
http://online.wsi.com/article/SB10001424052748703618504575459841509043962.htrnl?...
3/21/2011
REUTERS
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Island Records stars pay tribute at Montreux Jazz Festival
SatJul11,200911:54amEDT
By Jason Rhodes
MONTREUX (Reuters) - Baaba Maai and Angelique Kidjo were among the headliners in a
tribute to Island Records founder Chris Blackweli that rocked into the early hours at the
Montreux Festival on Saturday.
'Without Mr Chris Blackweli you wouldn't have me before you tonight. That's all I have to
say," Angelique Kidjo, the Grammy Award-winning Beninese singer-songwriter discovered by
Blackweli in 1991, said.
Kidjo, Maal and the other gathered musicians, who all recorded for Blackwell's boundarycrossing label during their careers, knocked dead the packed Stravinski Auditorium on the
shores of Lake Geneva with a mold-breaking evening of musical acrobatics marking the
label's 50th anniversary.
Blackweli, who started Island Records in 1959 with 1,000 pounds ($1,600), worked with local
ska and reggae singers in Jamaica, where he grew up, before moving to London.
There he scored his first big transatlantic hit with Millie Small's cover of "My Boy Lollipop" set
to a romping ska beat.
Island broke down musical, geographical and race barriers, helping turn reggae into a global
musical form by bringing legendary Jamaican singer Bob Marley to an international audience,
and unearthing talents like Kidjo and Irish band U2.
Congolese pianist and songwriter Ray Lema kicked off with a blend of Congolese rumbas,
township jive and reggae.
"I know you are a man of passion. In other people this passion dies away," Lema told a
visibly moved Blackweli, sitting in the audience. "So I just want to thank you for your passion,
Chris Blackweli."
Jamaican pianist and band leader Monty Alexander followed, flitting through a genre-busting
set of seamless complexity that left heads shaking in amazement.
The highlight was Alexander's cover of Marley's "The Heathen" that shifted effortlessly
between driving grooves, rock and jazz forms before his double bassist provided what must
be the cleverest Michael Jackson tribute to date.
In a short improvisation he moved smoothly from Queen's "Another One Bites the Dust" into
the King of Pop's "Billy Jean" and 'Thriller" before Alexander's piano launched back into a
full-out reggae finish to the Marley track.
Kidjo, who recorded four albums for Island before Blackwell stepped back from the label in
1997, joined a beaming Alexander onstage, bowling over the crowd with a voice as powerful
and clear as any church bell in rollicking renditions of "Tumba" and "Afrika."
The last was dedicated to legendary South African singer Miriam Makeba, who was a key
influence on Kidjo's muscular singing style and sassy stage persona.
Senegalese superstar Baaba Maal, an outspoken campaigner on poverty and AIDS in Africa,
started his set with the acoustic 'Tindo Quando" before rousing the crowd with the hypnotic
electro-beat of "Television" and the rapid-fire West African rhythms of "International" pounded
out by percussionists.
On Saturday, the festival pays tribute to jazz singer Nina Simone with performances by Kidjo
and Wyclef Jean before further celebrations of Blackwell and Island Records including Sly
and Robbie on Sunday and Marianne Faithful on Monday.
(Reporting by Jason Rhodes; editing by Michael Roddy)
Pianist Monty Alexander takes jazz to a special place - TwinCities.com
Page 1 of2
TwinCitiestcom
Pianist Monty Alexander
takes jazz to a special
place
Alexander introduced the melodic pattern of one
original piece by reaching into the top of the grand
piano and plucking a three-note phrase on the
strings, then using his other hand to echo it on the
keyboard.
He also showed his affinity for the blues with a slow
but uplifting instrumental that sounded like Ray
Charles at his best and included a quote from an
Irish jig.
By Dan Emerson
Special to the Pioneer Press
Updated: 06/13/2009 11:27:34 PM CDT
The ornate State Theatre in Minneapolis is one of
Minnesota's classic, restored buildings. But it
functioned as a cozy, at times raucous, jazz dub
Friday night for a dynamic performance by Jamaican
jazz pianist Monty Alexander and his trio.
Along with the fleet-fingered technical ability that
has invited comparisons to the late piano deity Art
Tatum, the 65-year-old Alexander is one of the most
eclectic pianists you'll ever hear. He has an
irrepressible knack for snatching Caribbean and
Latin, European classical, bebop and blues elements
and weaving them seamlessly into a tune.
Quoting melodic lines from various tunes in the
middle of a solo is a standard jazz technique, but
the wildly inventive Alexander takes it to a new level.
His version of Duke Ellington's "Caravan" must have
included playful melodic snippets of a dozen other
songs, a high-velocity medley ranging from 'Take
the A Train" and the samba "Brazil," to the 1930s pop
hit "Jeepers Creepers" and even a little "Chopsticks."
Because Alexander takes so many spur-of-themoment detours, his backing musicians really have
to be on their toes. His sidemen Friday night —
bassist Hassan Shakur and New Orleans drumwizard Heriin Riley — proved up to the task.
Alexander would sometimes cue them verbally in
midsong, a task made easier by a cozy stage setup.
Alexander, who worked as a teenage studio
musician in his native Jamaica before coming to the
U.S., also played instrumental reworkings of songs
by the island nation's most honored musical son,
the late Bob Marley. They included Marley's
"Running Away," "No Woman No Cry" and "Heathen."
The latter piece ended dramatically with some ultralow phrases Shakur bowed on his acoustic bass.
Richard Evans' "Montevideo" began with some fauxdassical arpeggios before breaking into a driving
samba beat.
Alexander's ruminative, minor key original "Hope"
showed his classical influences with some ornate
arpeggios. Another original, the gracefully swinging
"You Can See," had an optimistic, uplifting vibe that
embodied the Jamaican spirit.
During the second set, Alexander took the energetic
jazz-dub effect up a few notches, inciting some
dandng from the audience. For his encore, he
picked up his second instrument, the melodica, to
cover Harry Belafonte's 1950s hit, "The Banana Boat
Song."
The show was the third and final concert of the
Hennepin Theatre Trust's Generations of Jazz series,
which earlier featured Russian-born pianist Eldar
Djangirov and pianist Ahmad Jamal.
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TIMESONLINE
From The Times
August 31,2009
Monty Alexander Trio at Ronnie Scott's, Wi
Monty Alexander—Jamaica's classiest export after Bob Marley—wins gold for the first jazz
tribute to Usain Boh
Clive Davis
****&
The reggae singers and dancehall idols have already been busy producing homages to Usain Bolt, but it's
probably safe to say that Monty Alexander — Jamaica's classiest export after Bob Marley — wins the gold medal
for the first jazz tribute. The pianist's breezy sprint instrumental, flipping between sleek funk riffs and exuberant
swing, captured something of the sprint champion's insouciant charm.
It is a quality that is never in short supply in Alexander's residencies. While he may never attract the kind of
hysteria that follows Keith Jarrett and Brad Mehldau around, Alexander — silver-haired but still more than
sprightly in his mid-sixties — is the compleat pianist, an extrovert whose technique spans myriad traditions, from
bebop to stride, swing to R&B, Beatles pop to boogie-woogie and dub reggae. Yet at the same time his signature
remains instantly recognisable. Little wonder that the "house full" sign was outside the entrance for his opening
night.
His current band, with Hassan Shakur (alias J. J. Wiggins) on bass and the former Wynton Marsalis sideman
Merlin Riley on drums, is a wonderfully percussive unit that seems to defy gravity. With Alexander sometimes
restricting himself to the lightest of touches, it was almost possible to spend an entire number savouring Shakur
and Riley's flawless interplay. This was close to a masterclass in rhythm.
Alexander's latest release, Calypso Blues, is a genial collection of songs associated with Nat "King" Cole, one of
his earliest influences. His opening set, however, roamed far and wide, teasing the audience with a steady flow of
fleeting quotations from Monk, Ellington and Co.
True, Alexander sometimes flirts with sentimentality. His composition The River evoked Abdullah Ibrahim's hymnlike meditations, but nevertheless contained too much sugar for its own good. I have to admit that I could also live
without hearing any more cover versions of that lachrymose Charlie Chaplin ballad, Smile. To Alexander's credit,
though, the rhapsodic arrangement generated more than enough momentum to mask the taste of vanilla. In
another number, which scampered through a lush island landscape, Alexander produced a melodica and gave an
affectionate nod in the direction of Harry Belafonte. In the wrong hands, it could have been slightly embarrassing;
Alexander carried it off triumphantly.
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SA1/9flfiQ
Review: Jazz pianist thrills
http://cjonline.com/print/53481
cjoniine.com
* • HHtTOttKAGUirAl|OUHVAl
Published on CJOnline.com (http://cjonline.com)
Home > News > Locai > Review: Jazz pianist thrilte
Review: Jazz pianist thrills
By Chuck Berg
Created Sep 13 2009 - 8:31pm
Monty Alexander - one of the lions of keyboard jazz whose resume includes gigs with Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and
Sonny Rollins - packs a wallop.
On one hand, he's a pianist's pianist whose impeccable technique, stylistic breadth and spontaneous, sound-of-surprise
inventiveness is the envy of his peers. On the other hand, he's a crowd pleaser, a prestidigitator who might slyly drop a
reference to a novelty tune like "Music, Music, Music" into a solo.
On Sunday afternoon at the Regency Ballroom of the Ramada Hotel and Convention Center, Alexander thrilled a full
house of Topeka Jazz Workshop patrons with an ebullient performance that dazzled and delighted.
One keynote was sounded at the onset with the calypso-flavored "Fungi Mama." In tandem with bassist Hassan Shakur
and drummer George Fludas, Alexander let loose a solo whose mild tropic breezes gave way to stormy bursts of bluesy
thunder and bolts of boppish lightning.
In Nat Adderley's "Work Song," an edgy jazz-funk stroll with gospel overtones, the diminutive Alexander, perched atop a
couple of phone books, leaned into the keys with a gusto that had the house rockin'. Floating like a butterfly, then stinging
like a bee, Alexander gave us wow after wow after wow.
Although now eligible for Social Security, Alexander is a man still clearly enraptured by his muse. His sense of joy,
beaming smile, and attentive appreciation of his colleagues' solos were natural and palpable. That Louis Armstrong and
Nat "King" Cole are profound influences is not surprising.
We might also recall that jazz cognoscenti place Alexander, deservedly, in the piano pantheon that includes icons Fats
Waller, Art Tatum and Oscar Peterson. Recalling the latter, Alexander's indelible limning of "Smile," penned by Charlie
Chaplin for his "Modern Times" (1936), was a heart-on-sleeve rhapsody that brought down the house.
Alexander's Jamaican roots were given full play in an exuberant reframing of Bob Marley's "Runnin1 Away," whose loping
undertow built to a churning climax. Then, without a word, Alexander paid tribute to old pal Frank Sinatra with a smart,
swinging romp through "Come Fly with Me."
At afternoon's end, Alexander and the superb Shakur and Fludas received another standing ovation, which they
acknowledged with a happy encore, including "Wagon Wheels" and a jolly jaunt through our state song, "Home on the
Range"!
Chuck Berg is a professor at The University of Kansas. He can be reached at [email protected].
Source URL: http://cjonline.com/news/local/2009-09-13/reviewJazz_pianlst thrills
lofl
4/11/2011 8:04 PM
Deseret News | Jazz trio gives Sheraton crowd epic show
Page 1 of 1
Deseret News.
Jazz trio gives Sheraton crowd epic show
By Larry D. Curtis
Deseret News
Published: Tuesday, April 7, 2009 5:22 p.m. MDT
MONTY ALEXANDER, JOHN CLAYTON and JEFF HAMILTON, Sheraton City Centre, April 6
There is no doubt that in a year of remarkable jazz performers, there hasn't been a show greeted as
enthusiastically as Monday night's trio. Each of the performers would be a worthy headliner and John
Clayton and Jeff Hamilton have both visited Salt Lake this season with their own groups, but the reunion
of those two with pianist Monty Alexander was an event of musical magnificence.
Alexander directs the traffic, but the trio, who first met, played and recorded in the early 1970s, have an
obvious rapport on stage. They perform cohesively, they communicate well with a glance or a nod, and
they sure can play.
The ballroom was an absolutely sold-out affair, including extra chairs on the sides of the raised platformstage, with a few standing in the back. And from the moment the three men walked on stage, the
audience was in a rapture. They zipped through the first 45-minute set without a break and without saying
anything into a microphone. Dressed in formal suits and ties in the roasting-hot ballroom, and as
physically as Alexander and especially Hamilton attack their music, they wouldn't have looked out of place
in track suits.
Despite playing together only on rare occasions, the trio has a palpable trust that reminds the listener of
free-spirited trapeze artists performing without a net. Alexander would even rise from his piano bench
after giving a cue for Clayton or Hamilton to solo and all but dance as he watched them improvise for a
few measures before getting his lightning-quick fingers back to work. They took the familiar if mundane
"Candy Man," (featured in "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," performed by Sammy Davis Jr.) and
turned it into an exercise in brilliance.
The applause for the duration of the show was beyond enthusiastic, with fans not clapping but beating
their hands together and raising their voices with hoots and whistles. They ended the first set with the
universally familiar "Sweet Georgia Brown," but with a take that belongs distinctly to the trio.
They returned in the second set with more of the familiar but hit a high point with John Clayton's
composition, "3000 Miles Ago." Clayton pulled out his bow and broke off distinctly from the feel of the rest
of the night with a melancholy introduction and ending and a blues-based bass middle. Alexander did the
song writer proud, pulling out the finest touches on his keyboard, wringing the emotion from the changeof-pace song.
Much of the rest of the night Clayton stood calmly with his bass and smiles like a favorite uncle might
enjoy a cold drink on a hot day and in the meantime his hands walk the fret while he plays like a man
possessed.
The trio ended their set with an epic rendition of "Battle Hymn of the Republic." It was a musical
performance that any musician or group will be hard pressed to equal in this or any jazz series.
© 2009 Deseret News Publishing Company | All rights reserved
httD://www.deseretnews.com/article/Drint/705295729/Jazz-trio-eives-Sheraton-crowd-et)ic...
5/27/2009
Alexander Plays His Songs of Freedom
Jazz
By WILL FRIEDWALD
March 10, 2008
Harry Belafonte typically gets the credit for introducing Americans to calypso, the
West Indian style of music that swept the continent in the late 19503 and later
morphed into reggae. But the first North American to champion the irresistible
rhythms of Jamaica and Trinidad was the rhythm and blues star Louis Jordan in
such numbers as "Run Joe" and "Stone Cold Dead in the Market." Jordan took
the sound a step further in his 1949 "Push-Ka-Pee She Pie (The Saga of Saga
Boy)," in which he proclaimed to the world that he had invented a music he called
"the new calypso bebop." Not to be outdone, the Trinidadian star Lord Kitchener,
then living in England, quickly recorded an homage to Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie
Parker called "Kitch's Bebop Calypso."
If anyone is equipped to perfect the New Calypso Bebop, it is the pianist Monty
Alexander, who immigrated to America from his native Kingston as a ly-year-old
veteran of the Jamaican music scene in 1960. He was already equally versed in
island music and North American jazz, and during the next few decades he
became one of the most sought-after pianists on the contemporary jazz scene,
working as the keyboardist of choice for such bop pioneers as Milt Jackson and
Ray Brown. He was also a protege of sorts of Frank Sinatra: He served as the
house pianist at July's, the Chairman's favorite hangout.
But Mr. Alexander, now 63, has always remained true to his West Indian roots. In
the last decade or so, nearly all of his albums have focused on combining various
elements of jazz with West Indian music, most impressively on two entire albums
interpreting the Bob Marley songbook.
This weekend at the Allen Room, Mr. Alexander played four sets of his ambitious
program "Lords of the West Indies," employing a wide cast of Jamaican,
Trinidadian, and North American musicians. During a very tight 9O-minute set,
Mr. Alexander spanned the islands and the different approaches he's used to
experiment with West Indian jazz fusions throughout his career, from a bop
piano trio (with Hassan Shakur on bass and Herlin Riley on drums) with nods to
Caribbean rhythms, to full-scale calypsos mixed with jazz harmony and
improvisation.
With a minimum of patter, Mr. Alexander presented a program equally
enlightening and entertaining. He showed us, rather than merely told us, how
mento (the original Jamaican folk music form), calypso, ska, and reggae are as
different from one another as bossa nova, salsa, and tango are in other parts of
the Pan-American world. He used different ensembles to illustrate the various
forms. The calypso segment presented the contemporary vocalist Designer
evoking Lord Kitchener and the Mighty Sparrow on "Calypso of Bebop" and
"Love in the Cemetery," while bassist Happy Williams sang a topical calypso that
was seemingly inspired by the 2008 primaries and the Iraq war.
Mr. Alexander then brought out three veteran mento instrumentalist-singers —
Albert Morgan (rhumba box), Carlton "Blackie" James (banjo), and "Powda"
Bennett (shakers). The ensemble's big number was "Nobody's Business," the
mento incarnation of a folk tune that is all over the map of early jazz and blues,
showing up, fascinatingly, in different interpretations by Mississippi John Hurt
and Bessie Smith, not to mention Jordan and Ella Fitzgerald.
Particularly impressive were two Jamaican saxophonists, Dean Fraser (alto) and
Cedric "Im" Brooks (tenor), the latter of whom played with a big, compelling
sound drawn from the same wellspring of inspiration that launched Sonny
Rollins's ongoing calypso. The show hit its peak with a surprisingly intimate
moment, when Mr. Alexander and the saxophones played a reverential, prayerlike treatment of two canonical Bob Marley ballads, "Redemption Song" and "No
Woman, No Cry." Even at a slow tempo, Mr. Alexander extracted the essential
kernel of island rhythm, showing that this music has its own equivalent of the
Cuban clave. It was then time to close with a carnival climax, and the leader
included such familiar tunes as "Sly Mongoose" (a calypso favored by Charlie
Parker) and the Belafonte hit "Banana Boat Song." The crowd roared as "Powda"
Bennett spontaneously launched into an eccentric rubber-legged dance.
October 8-October 14, 2009 23
THE NEW YORK AMSTERDAM NEWS
Caribbean Lingo
Monty Alexander makes Lincoln Center stop
By MISANI
Special to theAmNews
The takeoff was sweet, man.
Real sweet. Looking dapper in
black slacks, a white shirt, a
vest with distinctive black and
white geometric designs, and an
Monty Alexander playing
melodica at the late playwright
Trevor Rhone's Nine Ninth ceremony In Brooklyn
(Hakim Mutlaq photo)
ecru-colored jacket set off by a
red silk handkerchief, the distinguished looking, silverhaired pianist Monty Alexander
immediately took command of
the Allen Room at Lincoln Center's Frederick P. Rose Hall last
Friday evening. With a sound
akin to that of a train whistle
emanating from his melodica,
signaling "all aboard," Alexander's
"Harlem-Kingston
Express" smoothly took off on a
marvelously entertaining and
enlightening,
cross-cultural
musical excursion, focusing on
what he refers to as "Jamaica's
calypso, our folk music, which
we call Mento."
Skillfully soaring and transcending beyond the Allen
Room's signature wall of glass
and out into the neon-lit night
sky, Alexander's exhilarating
fusion of music transformed the
Manhattan skyline into a
dreamy landscape. Here, jazz
and reggae played, folklore and
traditions danced, and New
Orleans and Jamaica made love.
Soloing exquisitely on piano
at the top of the set, Alexander
was dazzling on a medley of
Jamaican and American classics that included "Jamaica
Farewell," "Island in the Sun,"
"Young at Heart" and "Sweet
Georgia Brown. The pianist, to
date, has recorded close to 70
albums during his illustrious
career, which began as a
teenager in Jamaica when he
formed his first band, Monty
and the Cyclones. Amongst his
earliest influences were Louis
Armstrong and Nat King Cole,
who the young musician first
saw when they visited
Jamaica, prior to immigrating
to the United States in 1961 at
the age of 17.
During the Friday evening
concert, Alexander took the audience back to Jamaica in many
ways. One was through his stimulating guest, the Jamaican storyteller and poet Ms. Mattie Lou,
who gave delightful renditions of
the traditional folk songs, "Long
Time Gal Me No See You," "Hill
and Gully Rider," "What a Saturday Night" and "Lanton Market."
Dressed in a long, traditional,
red and black calico skirt and
white bodice, with a matching
head tie (head wrap), Ms. Mattie
Lou enlightened the capacityfilled venue about the songs, as
well as some of the folklore and
traditions of her country. Accompanied by the first-rate banjo
player Carlton "Blackie" James,
who also sang along with Ms.
Lou, an excellent young djembe
drummer (apologies, as his name
was not listed) and Alexander
joining in on the melodica, this
segment gave a vivid and enriching depiction of Jamaica's timehonored folkloric expressions.
Switching between Jamaican
dialect (broken "French, English
and Portuguese") and "standard" English, Alexander closed
this segment by acknowledging
writer/poet/comedienne
The
Hon. Louise Simone BennettCoverley (Ms. Lou), the great
Jamaican cultural folklorist who
championed the use of Jamaican
dialect (patois) in everyday life,
making it acceptable in
Jamaica, the Caribbean and
throughout the Caribbean Diaspora.
A cultural diplomat in his
own right, in 2000, Alexander
was awarded the title of commander of distinction by the
government of Jamaica "for
outstanding service to his
country in his capacity as
worldwide music ambassador."
This was reflected throughout
the evening's performance
with the Monty Alexander
Trio, featuring the exceptional
Alexander on piano, the superb
Hassan J.J. Wiggins Shakur on
acoustic bass and New
Orleans' electrifying Herlin
Riley on drums.
After several fantastic numbers, the trio was joined by the
horn section, with the Juilliard-trained
Trinidadian
trumpet dynamo Etienne
Charles, the talented Harlemhorn Clifton Anderson (trombone) and the gifted Charles
Dougherty (tenor saxophone).
Adding to the mix were the
super talented, cool Jamaican
musicians Wayne Armond (guitar and vocals), Glen Browne
(bass) and the white-gloved
Karl Wright (drums). This
hybrid combination was out of
this world as the musicians
worked their magic.
In
between
numbers,
Alexander's spontaneous conversation further added to the
musical experience. Focusing
on Harlem, he recalled: "I
played at Minton's in 1957
when I first came to New York
City." Honoring that moment,
he swung into Duke Ellington's "Things Ain't What They
Used To Be." Another cherished memory induced him to
play "Take the 'A' Train."
On a new composition dedicated to the Jamaican track
phenom Usain Bolt, the upbeat
ska number featured Alexander
on piano and Wiggins Shakur
on bass boldly racing against
each other, following which
Riley, with his inimitable style,
rushes in and everything
explodes rhythmically as they
try to catch up to the world's
fastest human being. This number was totally solid, as was the
closing "One Love," from
Alexander's 2005 masterpiece
album, "Concrete Jungle," a
reinterpreted, jazz piano-oriented arrangement of Bob Marley tunes.
Trust me, like the standing
ovation bestowed upon the great
pianist last Friday evening,
somewhere in the heavens, the
Honorable Robert Nesta Marley
and Honorable Marcus Mosiah
Garvey were likewise smiling
down and applauding their fellow countryman, the highly
esteemed Mr. Monty Alexander.
Ms. Mattie Lou, folklorist/
poet
(Hakim Mutlaq photo)
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M
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Harlem Kingston Express
Artistic Statement
For a long time I've been playing live with (jazz] trios — that's the most economical way to do your
music. I've never encouraged horn players to join me, because I'm completely at home in the setting
where there's an acoustic bass and drums, and they're supplying the basic sound and textures.
I used to play songs that reflected my Jamaican heritage, with the other [jazz] musicians. But when I
would play with the Jamaican players, and we would play things in that direction, that's when it really
took on the authenticity that I'm going for every time.
It was a while before I said [to myself], if I want to do this music and pick from the whole palette —
which is everything from Duke Ellington, Nat Cole, Bob Marley, Burning Spear, and my own pieces,
etc., I'm going to do what I want to do and bring two rhythm sections together. That way, it all can
be available to me, whatever I feel, the whole time. Because I feel American [and] I feel Jamaican,
and the rhythms that come from the street and the country in America are just as meaningful to me
as the vibrations that come from Jamaica. It's like, [my] left hand and [my] right hand.
And according to my whims, as I start playing the music, and the spirit moves me, I say, 'I think I
want to go Uptown right now. We're going to go to 125th Street.' Bap!!, and I give it to the Trio.
Then I say, 'alright, we're going right down to Trenchtown,' and then at the right moment, I invite
everybody to share in this world experience.
It's just a wonderful coming together of hearts and minds and brotherhood between musicians. I'm
at the piano, and [the piano] become the meeting place. And when I play this music this way, it's
cathartic. These days I call it Harlem Kingston Express, so that name may stick. In any case, it's the
great players of Jazz and the great players of Jamaican music, and it has always been a positive
experience.
— Monty Alexander