Roy Parnell (1943-2006) - Earshot Jazz

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Le Mystère, from page 7 were among the country’s outsiders. The Communist dictator Todor Zhikov and his henchmen brutally excluded and suppressed Rom artistic expression, and persecuted its practitioners – even now, after the end of Communist rule, the country has a poor record of treatment of the minority Roma, who number about 500,000 – just under seven percent of the country’s population. And yet – isn’t it so often this way? – both official sponsorship and official persecution produced phenomenal musical and other artistic results. Rom wedding bands such as the phenomenal ensemble of Ivo Papasov flourished in the underground, and in a true folk sense – at village festivities, chiefly weddings, 8 • Earshot Jazz • March 2006 promoted by word of mouth. Their “folk” was a merger of Rom styles with those of the countries and regions through which they roamed. It was often electrified – but folk. Koutev based his compositions on song and tunes from various regions of Bulgaria, and formalized them in a way that gained approval from thugs and surely risked producing shockingly debilitated expression. And yet he triumphed. His groups came to represent the pinnacle of what could be achieved under the wet blanket of state “sponsorship” of the arts. Early on, as now, the members of Le Mystère are singers from the various rural regions of Bulgaria. Using arrangements by Koutev, or by the current conductor, �� Dora Hristova, the earmarks of the group continue to be sophisticated harmonies, thrilling rhythms, and a dazzling, six-part vocal style. The repertoire includes works not only by Koutev, but also by other composers who followed in his path, including Krasimir Kyurkchiyski, Nikolai Kaufman, and Petar Lyondev. So, in the final count, what should we make of the group’s connection to “folk” music? It seems that it is the category, “folk music,” that is perhaps the problem. So often invoked, yet so infrequently inspected, it seems often to serve an exclusionary role, just as the Bulgarian authorities wished it to. It doesn’t include jazz, or the blues, although in many ways those forms both meet its stipulation of demotic performance handed down in practice and performance, borne along in a tradition of evolution. But that’s another topic, and I’m not here to provoke dissonance, not when we’re about to be treated to music of such transporting, world-wise otherworldliness. – Peter Monaghan Presented by Earshot Jazz and KBCS 91.3FM. Tickets available through Earshot Jazz (206) 547-6763 and Ticketmaster (206) 628-0888 and Ticketmaster online. Town Hall Seattle: 1119 8th Avenue, Seattle (8th & Seneca); pay parking on site. The Tiptons, from page 7 Marc Seales and Michael Brockman at the University of Washington, but had been a musician since childhood, and a saxophonist since her teens. A teacher of saxophone, clarinet, and flute, she has continued the Tiptons’ tradition of locating and bringing on board the finest of woman sax players in the region. And here, timed to Jessica Lurie’s visit from out in New York, is an extra treat. She and her bloke, the phenomenal artist, Danijel Zezelj, will present their performance, live painting, projection, song, and live band performance piece, “Shop of Wild Dreams,” at Consolidated Works (500 Boren Ave N, 381-3218) on March 1 through March 3. This is an event not to be missed, because Zezelj’s art must be seen to be believed (see www. dzezelj.com).
New Dutch Swing into Seattle ICP Orchestra Saturday, March 25 Seattle Asian Art Museum, 8pm $16 ($2 discount for Earshot members, seniors and students) The Instant Composers Pool (ICP) Orchestra, long one of the world’s most startling and earstretching jazz ensembles — and also one of the most amusing and diverting — makes a return visit to these shores, with a lineup of 10 stellar musicians. Any U.S. tour by the superb ensemble is a not-to-miss event. At the helm is one of the true originals of the art form, pianist Misha Mengelberg. He and drummer Han Bennink formed the group in Amsterdam in 1967 in the full throes of the free-jazz movement. It was then, and remains now, a refuge for playing in the spirit of those times but, in its performances and recordings, the band opts not for fully free improvisation, but for near-anarchy contained within recognizable musical forms, from swing rave-ups to twisted tangos. For the successful implementation of its approach, it depends on an evolving cast of always-topflight musicians. The �� “instant composition” that drives the band is spontaneity and idiosyncrasy. “I welcome all kinds of personal things, which depend on the resoluteness of the musicians,” Mengelberg told the Boston Globe. That is to say, he seeks to surround Han Bennink and Misha Mengelberg. Photo by Francesca Patella. himself with singular jazz musicians, and he has plenty of those in the current ICP — beginning with the tireless Bennink, with whom Mengelberg says he has a love-hate relationship that should not be discontinued. At the time of the group’s formation, Mengelberg and Bennink were still in the glow of their memorable collaboration with Eric Dolphy in 1964, just before his �� death. That would kick-start their foundational role in what jazz writer Kevin Whitehead calls, in his history of modern Dutch jazz, New Dutch Swing. That is a hybrid that set itself apart from American models with such components as a European chamber-music sensibility and, notably, a heap of pizzazz. The latter is an inevitable element of any performance that includes the irrepressible, hyper-percussive Bennink. For the group’s edginess, however, Mengelberg is just as important, and more subtly so. As Sam Prestianni put it in the San Francisco Weekly: “The pianist’s strong, stark dissonance, especially in the lower register, offers a superb foil to the drummer’s often nutty, octopi rhythms.” Mengelberg is a master of oblique, unpredictable, and often just plain playful composing for this creative orchestra. Wry humor is one element of his generally eccentric musical personality, which manifests itself in surprising tempos and phrasing. That may bring to mind the zaniness of the Willem Breuker Kollektief; saxophonist Willem Breuker was there at the ICP’s founding, and spent plenty of time in the band before branching out to form his own ensemble. But, more than the �� March 2006 • Earshot Jazz • 9
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Roy Parnell (1943-2006) - Earshot Jazz

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