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Umbria Jazz Festival – Perugia, Italy 2014

This is cool. Well it’s better than that. It’s Monday afternoon and the troops and I are on a bus riding from Perugia to Pescara. The drive’s about four hours and it’s raining good with the windshield wipers waving and I love it. It’s the Italian countryside today, but this rolling through of almost any countryside can set you free. I look forward to it, and if it’s a little drizzly rain, all the better for atmosphere.

Umbria Jazz is a 10-day annual Jazz Festival—now 30 years old—held in Perugia, Italy. Old Italy! 160,000 people live in the city in a valley with Roman ruins and roads that slowly and lazily ascend to the festival town and what must have been castles where centurions stood watch. This is right out of a renaissance fair. Everything here is about the Jazz festival and people have come from every corner of this region. It’s like the 4^th of July…almost hot dogs and cotton candy!

I slept real hard and so I’m up early because we have a long day and I find myself taking a good look around and diving into my gratitude list. Oh yeah, for my life, for my wife, for my son, my work is fun, and, oh yes, that little heart flutter that made me make some serious changes in my life. People do this work real good in a bar with an out-of-tune upright piano and spilled beer on the floor. I’m a lucky so-and-so.

And guess what, about me all the way over here. Take 6 was with me last night. Oh Yea! You should have seen the hugging and jumping up and down and outright rejoicing at seeing each other and just about to share the stage. It’s hard to describe. I love these guys since the middle 80s when they were students at 7^th Day Adventist denominational school in Huntsville, AL (Oakwood College) where they had made a demonstration tape under the name of Alliance. When I mentioned that last night, they shouted. They are the height and breadth of ensemble vocal singing using the most sophisticated and Avant-garde chord structures in the Count Bassi-ish sound and tradition. Now quickly add that they have several individual voices that have stretched their “traditional roots” to adding R&B gospel vocal runs that push Stevie and Aretha to the limit. This is an amazing extra. I wish I could do that. They claim me as an influence, but I can’t do that!

I feel conspicuous in this moment here because there is so much more important stuff to say about this amazing connection with “The Six”. Right now, let’s stay with this wonderful at the Umbria Jazz Festival.

I have to think that it was on purpose that the promoters made this a “voices” day. Mario Biondi is also on the bill. Sammy says we should call him “Italian Thunder”. He has this big Barry White kind of voice that rarely gets any attention in contemporary pop R&B music. He can bring it. So yes, this is a singer’s day and it’s probably just as well that they didn’t announce it that way. They simply listed us in succession on their calendar. But to be sure these people heard some sangin’.

Mario’s approach really touched me. Quite jazzy with a great band and good soloists. We hit it at 9:00pm and took it to ‘em…old familiar things and new ballads and Brazilian syncopations and some George Duke/Al Jarreau funky dance. And you should have seen their eyes when Mario strolled onto stage and sang “Teach Me Tonight” with me…of all things. Some 25-year-old youngsters scampered down front to move, groove, and dance and pressed against the metal fence of the stage. I think I shouted, “Finally!!” That was a great way to end the night. Lots of notions satisfied (including an almost “Caruso”).

Thank you to Carlo and Alberto for a wonderful night in central Italy. Can’t wait to come back again!

Love,

Al

PS: Still driving in the rain!

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Lisbon, Portugal 7/18/14

“Lisbon was way cool! I had so much fun! I can’t wait to come back!” Sometimes that really does just cover it.

Lisbon by the sea. I’m not kidding you guys. San Francisco could take some lessons from Lisbon about how to be a beautiful city on the ocean. It’s cozy and warm with parks and greenery and the building code that does not crowd the beautiful, old city’s main structures with steel and glass. The pink stucco warms the heart. We saw and felt some of this on the way to the radio station, chatting about their smooth formula with live DJ’s and grown-up’s music that included some important references the great George Duke and his amazing gift to this century.

There are three tiers of balconies in this performing arts center and its size rivaled many opera houses with huge backstage areas for scenery. It was so satisfying to ask for house lights and look out at this wonderfully big Portuguese audience that I don’t see very often. They were smiling and happy. And so were we. I could touch the front row and there were some men and women who had this night on their calendar for a long time and they had come to hang out with a household favorite. It’s great to get that sense of things from the stage.

They shouted titles in Portuguese and I sang right back to them in their native tongue. Some people were almost squirming and squealing. “Would you just look at this black guy singing like he grew up in Lisbon?” And guess what, all of this is part of my personal dream works…dreaming to do music all over the world. I’m so grateful for this.

Now Sammy (my new assistant) and I kind of enjoy the long walk back to the dressing room, breathing deeply, pausing, and smiling back at each other, nodding our heads up and down. We did ok.

It’s time to eat some dinner and chill.

Can’t wait for these next few shows in Italy.

Until next time…

Al

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Canary Island Jazz Festival 2014

Spain and Portugal form the Iberian Peninsula together. They share a border hardly distinguishable from one another…don’t say that I said that ☺ I’ll never be able to return. Just off of their western coast is a group of tiny islands called the Canary Islands. They tend to be wonderful tourist destinations so you know the scenery will be amazing. We did two nights of the festival down here. The first one was in Tenerife and the next was in Las Palmas. It’s always great to locations where the local press requests a press conference. And so we did it the day before in the hotel. The journalists asked some good questions and it gave us the chance to talk about a lot of things, including my marathon career and recent events, such as my ten records in the last 15 years—the newest being the George Duke Tribute album “My Old Friend”. The album was just released in Europe on July 5th and will be in America on August 5th.

The hands of a man or a woman and a string instrument like guitar go a long way back in human history and would surly include Africa and Asia with an increasingly important bond between such hands and instrument producing virtuoso performances. But nowhere in history has there been what we must call a modern day explosion of this guitar and human hands relationship like there has been in Spanish classical guitar/flamenco. This driving force brought us everybody from Paco DeLucia to John McLaughlin to George Benson. Those influences somehow found their way to Brazil music and changed my life. AND that life-changing explosion came when I left the Jazz trio rhythm section format back in 1968 and worked with only an acoustic guitar player—Julio Martinez.

Lots of wide-eyed interests here.

To the next question I answered a resounding, “No, absolutely, not! I’m ten years too late with this George Duke Tribute.” More wide eyes. We played in their classical venue, which looks very similar to the iconic Sydney Shell Opera House in Australia. We had a wonderful and enthusiastic welcome with bright faces and people who I haven’t seen in 12 years. I know that our new program, just as we had planned it, has lots of familiar ring to it. But we’ve really opened the door to some new ideas and approaches that certainly must be fresh for them as listeners because it is for us. And so by the time we had delivered almost an hour and a half of mixed media music and surely must be finished, we returned with Chick (Armando) Corea’s “Spain” and then “Roof Garden/Reach For It” Medley from the record. Oh yes, they were on their feet and doin’ the scootcha bootie. We left feeling happy and fulfilled, and looking forward to a short flight to Las Palmas for the second night of the festival.

And what a great night it was. I’m going to ditto that above description for Las Palmas. It almost works. This hall was another classical music venue, and the first row the audience was touchable from stage. What an amazing difference in communication, energy, and flow this inevitably makes. Yesterday we all looked at each other and remarked about how the new transitions really do seem to be working and providing a seamless continuousness to evening’s music. Especially Larry and Joe Turano and Mark Simmons have become joined at the hip, and we really felt it here in Las Palmas….

“I Will Be Here For You” (Nita-koo, etc) has never ever found such complete and full expression as we’ve come to these days simply because of a captivating guitar-bass rhythm vamp that Joe Turano came up with. You really could listen to it all day long played over and over. That’s where I invite them to sing in Swahili.

And ditto again is the wonderful free form stroll through a 2am moonlit park, quietly playing your horn. Then with a quick trilly flash, you drop into the pulsating introduction for “Teach Me Tonight”. A song has been reborn.

Spain will probably remain a bit formal and shy and hesitant (except for flamenco, bullfighting, and the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria ☺). And so we had to coax them out of their seats for a little hipbone action in “Roof Garden/Reach For It”. They looked around at each other and saw that it was ok to “express yourself” with a little funky dancin’ right there at your seat and a good time was had by everybody.

Our local promoter smiled a lot and the next morning talked about the Canary Islands as a dream location for International Jazz Day. “We got 23 years now a Jazz festival.” That certainly makes them an important outpost for the continuing saga of “sacred” music, including jazz.

Again, thank you, Grand Canaries, Amparo, Miguel, and Miguel’s wife and son! It was an amazing two days here in the Canaries!

Love,
Al

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Rotterdam – North Sea Jazz Festival 7/12/14

Sunday morning. It’s the day after the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam and we’re driving to the airport. I’m thinking that I ought to be on my way to church to give thanks. And so I am! In my heart! It’s a little bit grey and cloudy, certainly not summery as it often is up here by the cold North Sea. Very often the winter seems to linger into summer and that’s why the residents will also be on this plane to Spain like we are. But oh, my friend, it was hot in the main hall last night. Easily 15,000 people back-to-back and belly-to-belly. If you want to sit, you’ll be consigned to a bleacher section way out back. North Sea Jazz Festival is like a contemporary Woodstock Event. And all about Jazz. Amazing! It’s more than a half-mile square of booths and performance venues where on any one night of four at this festival you could catch Stevie Wonder, Quincy Jones, or George Benson. At night, the contemporary neon lighting on the sides of main venues with the festival rival with sections of Times Square. This is the largest Jazz Festival in the world and has been since the days of Den Haag. I’m like, “Go ahead! Go for it! Get garish for Jazz!” Some of the performers are youthful and strongly influenced by contemporary hip/hop and rock music but courageously mixing in their own fresh jazz concepts. This has always been one of the ten commandments of jazz. Be yourself in today’s world. Know your horn and improvise.

Back-to-back, belly-to-belly as far as you could see and all teenagers…or so it seemed to me. The average age of the people that I saw was under 25. And they got their “jump up and down” booming groove on. We went to the venue at least 2 and half hours before. Alain Clark hit their spark and you could hear them singing and screaming chorus that they knew. He’s one of the hot new kids on the block that will surely remember this day in his young life. A kick in the ass!

You take a deep breath and roll right through eleven songs in 60 minutes. Three of them were ballads, but power ballads so to speak. The audience stayed with us and sang on choruses and waved their hands back and forth. There was no sound check and I know all of us on stage struggled to hear one another, but this is where that combination of talent, devotion, experience, and being “tight” carries the day. It was on! We were on! Chris and Joe came with beautiful breaths of fresh air, John and Larry flashed like rockers, and Mark was a rock.

This will always be one of those “big event” type gigs, like I mentioned a couple of pages ago. The eyes and ears of the world are watching! And if it’s good, it’s great. Lots of smiles and hugs all around. But believe me, it came and went in a flash…details are blurry…missing time! But the audience was grinnin’!

I got to spend a few precious moments with Stevie before his set. He was remarkably relaxed, cool, and warm with well wishes and congrats across the board and across the years. I gave him a hug with my LOVE and hurried off to catch up with some Netherlands family folk, Monique, Monic, and Herbert. All in all, it was a wonderful night that I will always remember.
Until next time…

Love,
Al

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Timisoara 7/10/14

Timisoara, Romania. Pronounced “Timmy-shwarah”

It’s Friday morning. The night after our show and there’s a wonderful slowly falling warm summer rain. From my window, which looks out onto the city square and the performance stage, it seems to be out of a 19th century painting of a Paris street scene. Colored umbrellas, sidewalk cafes, rain slick streets, people looking in shop windows, and bareheaded lovers quickly scurrying across the stone streets. If it sounds warm and idealistic, let me assure you it was! Maybe it’s because I found a much needed 3 day break in the heated action. It’s been non-stop for me since late October when we decided the “My Old Friend” celebration of George Duke was a definite yes. A true delight, as I’ll continue to describe it going forward from here, but an immense undertaking of new learning, writing, and several live performances. So this little break in the action has been a very welcome moment. But we did analyze and make changes in the new summer set list.

All night from stage I talked about cozy, comfort, gentle, sweet and kind, and hurried, yes, romantic. A brand new festival just born two years ago is where we played. Terri Lynn Carrington Mosaic the night before. But the concept here obviously is to mix the traditional with new traditions where Jazz meets contemporary hip/hop influenced R&B structures. This has always been the first commandment and calling card of Jazz that is bebop with new direction forged by young jazz players who emerged from the big bands. Fusion jazz itself was the mixing of bebop virtuosity with rock n’ roll and R&B of that day. Jazz has always commanded the listener and the player to be alive and stay alive in his environment and musical setting. I saw this reach (for it) in this brand new festival. I congratulated the audience and festival organizers on this beautiful achievement. And guess what, boys and girls, I have a whole bunch of new ideas. Check out the ending of “Backyard Ritual”. It begins percolatin’ syncopatin’.

The band played with inspiration. We listened to each other with bigger ears and sensitivities playing off of this moment’s nuances. Mark, John, and Chris were a trio unto themselves and played with undeniable unity of expression. Then along came Joe Turano and kicked everybody’s ass when he started a mournful solo whaling on the alto leaving his keyboard and wandering across the front of the stage finally coming right up to Larry Williams, who played two or three sustained keyboard ethers. It made me sing “Teach Me Tonight” real new.

This new audience definitely did get it (if slowly) that a lot of this is toe tappin’, hip shakin’ music and it’s ok to be that way. When I noticed 5 or 6 people tentatively making their way down the middle isle from the back, I screamed, “Yea, alright! Come dance!”

In refreshed conclusion, it was just delightful to meet this new group of Jazz enthusiasts, from Andrea at the airport who organized some press with Altia and Mimo to young Norbert who I encouraged to keep going for it. He can become a new force for good, live music on into the future. I told them I’d come back tomorrow! Let’s do it at the Opera House and the museum, too. Maybe duo.

Off we go to the North Sea Jazz Festival. See you in Rotterdam!

Love,
Al

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Saarbrucken 7/6/14

Saarbrucken. Still cookin’. And good lookin’.

Be sure to scream that when you’re walking to go on stage next time. That kind of became our motto and mantra throughout the evening. It was hot, steamy, and electric all night long. I remembered it from 8 years ago…same thing. We were even celebrating the second occasion for the Kirsti Alho Quartet opening for us. This performance space/room/venue is a converted garage—a big one. You could say it was large club with a stage. Standing room only.

They came and leaned their chests and arms on the edge of the stage. Back to back and belly to belly bouncing up and down, waving their arms and shouting and singing, the audience passed the energy through body contact from the stage to the back wall.

I’ve come to love this sort of performance space more and more. Maybe it’s my favorite. A big part of the appeal is the urgency that comes from the whole audience being shoulder to shoulder, being wide awake and attentive, and looking and hoping to “PARTY”.

The highlight that no one will ever forget was 7-year-old Cordelia in the very front of the stage. The stage was the level of her nose and eyes and made for a delightful visual that could have come from the pen of Charles M. Schulz (Peanuts) making my heart laugh and chuckle. So of course I introduced her to everybody! And just as you might have guessed, the atmosphere in the room took off to another cosmos of its own. GAWD I love that stuff!

All of this inspired the guys on stage to play in a new cosmos like space, too. They connected and improvised with each other with all of the special electricity brought by the audience before we got there. The guys burned real hard and intensely and discovered some new doors in this new program.

And me. I went chasing the improv upstairs and downstairs, around the table and out the door and right past the moon dog. This was refreshing to have happen so early on the tour. We turned around almost immediately and went back for a double encore with Kirsti Alho to duet on “Summertime”. They liked this new wrinkle and made me and the band come back again.

What a night! Again, I call to be invited back. They agree with applause.

Saarbrucken. Still cookin’. And good lookin’.

Love,
Al

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