Festival Review: Burlington Discover Jazz Festival 2003

I just got back from a weekend at the 20th Annual Discover Jazz Festival in Burlington, Vermont. For readers who are unfamiliar with this little gem of a festival, I highly recommend it. I’ve been going on and off for about ten years now and, in that time, I’ve seen and heard Joe Henderson, John Scofield, Gerry Hemingway, Dianne Reeves, Lester Bowie, Dave Douglas, Chucho Valdes, Elvin Jones and many more, in a place that’s short on big city hassles and long on talent, both regional and otherwise. The venues are all within walking distance of the center of town, as is the food and parking.

Arriving too late and too tired on Friday night to attend the Sonny Rollins show at the Flynn Theatre, I opted instead to do a reconnaissance mission in the form of a relaxing walk about town. There are a sizeable number of Burlington restaurants and bars that routinely host music, but during the jazz festival additional venues open up. The Blue Plate Ceramic Café on College Street was hosting a trio led by bassist Anthony Santor. When I came by, the band was on break, but I got talking to the leader about our mutual acquaintances in music throughout Vermont and when they started up, I went in. The music was first rate, the owners Arnold Carbone and Rusty Baker were welcoming, so I ended up closing the place, even sitting in for a couple of tunes. So much for "too tired".

On Saturday the festival kicked off at noon with the traditional parade down Church Street, led by Sambatucada, Vermont’s very own samba troupe. The parade wound up in City Hall Park where the rest of the day’s free events were to take place. Saturday’s lineup included an Ethiopian pop flavored aggregation called the New Nile Ensemble, an organ, bass and drums funk unit called The Vorcza Trio that includes Gabe (son of Keith) Jarrett on drums, and wound up with Jamie Masefield’s Jazz Mandolin Project playing a revved up set that stretched the mandolin’s sonic pallette to the near-breaking point.

During the JMP’s set I ran into Michael Daves and the other members of Western Massachusetts Inner Orchestra whose work I have reviewed in these pages. The IO were getting ready to do their own marching thing, with the destination a performance at the Phoenix Gallery also on College Street, where Burlington’s ever present neo-hippies would dance with abandon.

Prior to the Dave Holland Big Band performance at the Flynn, I attended a Meet the Artist panel discussion facilitated by the noted Boston jazz writer Bob Blumenthal. Holland and band members Robin Eubanks, Alex Sipiagin, Antonio Hart, and Gary Smulyan discussed the origins of the band and its concept, and, to a man, expressed their gratitude for being part of something so musically and spiritually rewarding. Holland himself marveled at the opportunity to head a working big band in a time when smaller groups are struggling to say afloat.

The big band, which is an expansion of Holland’s stellar quintet of the last six years, features along with Holland’s bass and Billy Kilson’s drums, the shimmering vibes of Steve Nelson. Holland discussed this departure from the usual piano or guitar-centered rhythm section as a choice he made solely on the basis of Steve Nelson’s musicianship rather than on the instrument itself. That choice, along with the trombone and saxophone combination of Eubanks and Chris Potter, has resulted in an ensemble sound that is one of a kind.

Holland, in the tradition of his early mentor Miles Davis, gives free rein to the players in his band, and that openness on his part has encouraged them to write for both bands. Sipigian, Smulyan and Hart, who also play at various times with the Village Vanguard, Carnegie Hall, and Mingus Big Bands all said that there is something very special about working with Dave Holland in this band, and after hearing them on Saturday night I have to agree.

I heard the big band’s debut at the Montreal Jazz Festival in 2000, and had the same feeling about it, but it is truly a polished and seasoned unit three years later. There is an airy, buoyant quality to the ensemble sound, helped by the vibraphone coloring, the virtuosity of the players, and by the ever changing landscape of the through-composed body of work that has become the band’s repertoire. Band members expressed that this is not easy music to play, and I believe it, but on Saturday night, they made it sound like there was nothing to it on. I find it heartening that Dave Holland has scored with two winning ensembles at the same time.

                                                                                         - Richard Mayer  June 8, 2003

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