NusMusWes24 Festival, Wesleyan 5/11/24

 What if we had a festival and nobody came? And nobody manned the exhibits, some exhibits fail to materialize, had no written descriptions of said exhibits, and had a stunning lack of administerial oversight? Well that was the Saturday morning leg of this festival which was designed to celebrate the modern composition luminaries that have graced its uber-liberal hallowed halls. John Cage, Alvin Lucier, and Anthony Braxton are top tier musical theorists that have left an indelible mark on what we know as “music”. The CFA website listed three musical installations set up on campus that were open from 8am-midnight. The first was a video project  “Saturn to Jupiter” by Brent Wetters, the next “For Alvin Lucier ( automated pipe organ) by Brian Parks, and the third was “Deer Tick: Solar Sounders on the Lawn” by Daniel Fishkin. I go in the Ring Family Auditorium at 11am to view S to J, only to find the theater empty. The computer on the front console beckoned judging from the “start” screen on the big screen. As the only human in this subterranean sharp edged concrete igloo of a structure, I press start. The screen goes blue, then asks for my username and password. Cage couldn’t have drawn it up better! As I go to leave, the morning handler stops in and says he will reboot. While he reconfigures, I trek to Memorial Chapel to view the pipe organ. Tiptoeing through the Gaza protest encampment then passed a lacrosse match to enter the beautiful, but once again human-less, venue, I am greeted, personally, by a self propelled pipe organ emitting a low level hum. On the altar, this antiquated musical keyboard had a variety of labeled knobs and dials. With no human or written descriptors, one was left to wonder Luciers attachment to the piece. On the way back to the auditorium to see if my one music nerd acquaintance had righted the ship, I pass by the quad where the solar sounders should be. Again, no human, but I do see several speakers and a couple of expensive looking microphones lurking furtively in the perfectly manicured shrubbery. Was I supposed to pinch the mics and sell them on eBay? Again, not sure because of the now annoying lack of people. The video was restored and the Saturn to Jupiter piece was a series of short films and stills taken on a frozen path from Winnipeg to the North Pole. Eerie frozen landscapes and nature shots were punctuated by same of wind battered seemingly abandoned industrial outposts. The sound was a mixture of of boots crunching on very cold snow, wind, and some distant, largely unintelligible conversation snippets. Imagine, there was more human contact in the video of the tundra than from the festival itself. The contradictions on my walk were striking, lacrosse match vs. the Gaza encampment; the skull and bones buildings vs. the submerged cubist igloo and let’s not forget modern music festival vs. me. As I was leaving the auditorium, I shared a laugh with a Spanish couple, the only other patrons of this part of the fest. I tell them that somewhere in heaven, John Cage is smiling at my attempt to find sound…..or not.

The Decemberists w/ Ratboys 5/4/24 College Street Music Hall

Caught the last few tunes from Chicago based rockers Ratboys. While not entirely male, lead Ratboy  and singer was decidedly female. Standard quartet with bass, drums and lead guitar joined the lead Ratgirl. Jammy rockers, Ratboys did a good job of warming the near capacity crowd for a Saturday.

The Decemberists have been positively reviewed in this blog before. Archaeological wordsmiths from Portland OR, this band has been making quality music for years. The brainchild of lead singer Colin Meloy, they straddle the lines between indie-pop-quirky Americana. The lyrics are often dark with tales of murder and intrigue from bygone eras. I mean who uses petticoat, or “birthed me down a dry ravine” in a song lyric? Like the career arc of Mofro (reviewed a few weeks back), the Decemberists discography is a steady barrage of timely quality releases with gems to be polished on each record. Assisting Meloy are a crew of multi-instrumentalists that shape the sound. Bassist Nate Query moved from electric to acoustic standup with ease. Accordionist Jenny Conlee also played keys on certain tunes. Chris Funk played a variety of brass instruments, starting out on a French horn flugel combo. Lead guitar moved to occasional banjo, and there was a young female singer that helped the guy-girl nature of some tunes. The setlist was culled from most releases :All I Want is You, Shankill Butchers, The Bachelor and the Bride, Don’t Carry it All, (new tune) Burial Ground,  The Crane Wife, Traveling On, The WantingComes In Waves ( from the fabulous Hazards of Love record), Long White Veil, Make You Better, Severed, 16 Military Wives. Closed with the apt I Was Meant For The Stage and encored with the new Joan In The Garden. Go to Spotify and preview this tune, it ends  with a 14 minute drone scrawl of feedback that gets the listener wondering what is happening. Erudite pranksters, one can only think that the tune is a message from Meloy to someone. Always enjoyable to see what these smarty pants are up to.

Bill Fontana 4/19/24 CCAM Studio Yale

 First time at the CCAM (Center for Collaborative Arts and Media) clubhouse in a brutalist enclave behind the Yale Rep Theater. The CCAM nerds have done it again bringing octogenarian soundscape sculptor Fontana in for an installation and Q and A. He spoke of his vast experiences recording the natural and human world. Commissioned by a wealthy patron to accessorize his Frisco area estate, Fontana buried 10 speaker systems around the property that pulsed various frequency loops of water bodies that he recorded around the world. Niagara Falls, the Nile et al had a subliminal audio effect to those strolling the grounds. Multiple microphone placements on buildings in the city of Cologne gave rise to a long form drone from the city piece. Synthesized fog horn bellows from SF bay. Magnified tree noises from a Sequoia forest. My favorite, positioning himself in an Australian rain forest in the 70s to witness a total eclipse away from people but in line with the eclipse path. He said that the bird call pattern went from the normal, seemingly call and response mode, to simultaneous squawks as the eclipse approached, to silence during the event, and then reversed order back to normal. The piece today was Silent Echoes: Notre Dame. To commemorate the fifth anniversary ( to the day) of the Notre Dame fires, Fontana’s piece had multiple large scale video loops of the views from the 10 refurbished bell towers of the historic cathedral. He recorded and amplified the activity of the bells as they responded to the din of the city. He said the bells acted like big sonic ears, the result was a bell drone loop that changed when one walked through the darkened studio room at CCAM viewing the vertigo inducing video. I chatted with Fontana and wife, asking him how he got permission to be in all of these places, “perseverance “ his wife chimed, seemed that she dealt with the administrative part of his work. Another fascinating endeavor sponsored by well connected undergraduate art theory kids.

Joe Morris w/ William Parker 4/14/24 Real Art Ways Hartford

 Sunday afternoon show as part of Joe’s “Improv Now” series. These two master improvisers collide for four string based workouts. First tune has them on their home base instruments, that is Parker on acoustic bass and Morris on electric guitar. They said that they met in the 80s, and this long relationship manifests with a telepathic quality to their music.  Morris, with eyes closed, squiggled while Parker plucked and bowed, spending time in and around strings. Next offering had Parker on ngoni and Morris starting on ngoni-tar and then moved to the floor to bang on some percussion. The ngoni is a west African instrument with a dried gourd of a base, stretched animal skin (usually goat), a neck with several strings to be plucked. Parker said that he was reading poetry in a park in Brooklyn and was approached by the mystical Don Cherry, who befriended him and turned him on to the instrument. In a similar fashion, Morris received a package from Parker with a small jeli ngoni which he then fashioned into a ngoni guitar or ngoni-tar. The third tune had Parker on guimbri and Morris on a banjo and then switched to a banjuke ( for those keeping score, a banjo ukulele). Parker mumbled some wordless vocals to shade this one. Parker is a downtown kook, he had a pink knit cap with green dots that made him look like an avant garde strawberry. Morris had long straggly gray hair that looked like he stuck a fork in a light socket while prepping to teach his course on differential sonic equations. Joe has taught music theory at the New England Conservatory for years and has the look of a crazed intellectual. Parker announces that he is going to throw an ice cream party and that we are all invited, which seemed random, but coming from this renaissance man, anything is probable. The final offering had Morris on acoustic bass and Parker on shakuhachi ( Japanese longitudinal end blown flute) and some sort of metallic mini vuvuzela. Parker also sang a little “ death has died today, god is in tears, and the devil has a big old grin”. It was a treat to see these two old friends spending an afternoon, laughing at conventions. They are not constrained by musical norms,  normal musical instruments, or even the mode of delivery. Check Parker’s prolific Spotify presence and you are just as likely to hear an electronic piece as hearing him sing an indigenous ditty.

Nat Adderly Jr. 4/13/24 AFAM Cultural Center, Yale

 First time at the African-American Cultural Center at Yale, a hallowed hall sandwiched between the Yale Cabaret and the hippie enclave The Group W Bench. April brings May showers but also the Yale Undergraduate Jazz Collective’s annual weekend festival. The collective is a revolving cast of well-connected jazz nerds that put on several shows with top tier talent. Nat is an alum (‘77) and has a five star jazz pedigree. His father Senior and uncle Julian “Cannonball” are pillars of 60s and 70s Jazz. I’ve come to realize that cornet playing senior wrote the standard “Work Song”, one of the most copied songs in the jazz canon. Junior plays organ and assembled a quartet of bass, sax/flute, and drums.  As a connected jazz man and a degree from Yale, Nat has spent most of his time as musical director for Luther Vandross. Soul and R&B hits need to be arranged and scored, and Nat has the chops to serve up hits for his boss. The set was wide ranging, started with the Wayne Shorter composition Yes And No, then on to a rolling workout of Oliver Nelson’s Stolen Moments. Vandross tasked Nat to arrange Superstar by the Carpenters, which apparently was a huge hit despite having “no business being played on the radio at 10 minutes”.They played an uptempo version of the tune with flute standing in for the vocals. Next up is the Philly soul fave People Make The World Go Round with an excellent galloping bass backdrop. Final tune was You and I by Stevie Wonder. The world is full of musical siblings and often the level of success differs, I mean who can forget Thelonius’ lesser known brother Chip. Nat jr. has forged a career as a well connected musician, it was nice to see him cut loose in a familiar surrounding.

Marco Benevento w/ Ghost Funk Orchestra 4/10/24 Spaceland

 Happily caught the last few tunes from NYC-based opener GFO. A sprawling 9 piece, two guitars, bass drums, sax, trumpet, trombone, and two female vocalists had trouble fitting on stage. They reminded me of the heady nadir of local funkateers Deep Banana Blackout. Blistering trombone solo and sassy vocals could turn any gathering into a party. Seems like I review Marco on an annual basis, I’ve likened him to a keyboard playing Cheshire Cat, a benevolent drug thief, the list goes on. On this viewing, he seems like the kid who mastered 3 tier chess playing while you were struggling with beginners play. He plays multiple keys simultaneously, Korg, Moog, sometimes even banging on a Playskool model. He has dispensed with the tophat, the glow-rimmed spectacles, and other outfits in favor of his true self. Lightly bearded, long hair, he looked like Leon Russell up there. He is joined by the amazing Karina Rykman on bass and vocals and Chris Corsico on drums. Karina looks like Jan Brady as a whirling dervish on frenetic bass and vocals. Their recent release BarnBurner was recorded at Levon Helms barn in Woodstock and shows the live layout. Original compositions Greenpoint, Solid Gold, Let it Slide, At the Show, were sprinkled in with some stellar covers. In reverence to Levon, they played This Wheel’s On Fire, Pink Floyd’s Fearless with a bluesy Bennie and The Jets section. Marco spends most of his time in the preeminent Grateful Dead vehicle Joe Russo’s Almost Dead (JRAD) and Karina has her solo gigs opening for any and all jamband. I even spied Karina’s long blond hair flailing on the set of  Late Night with Seth Myers. Closed with a first run of Rock and Roll by the Velvet Underground with Karina doing her best Peppermint Patty vocals. Ended the night with Nilsson’s Jump Into The Fire. I was a pretty avid viewer of The Brady Bunch back in the day, I must have missed the episode where Leon Russell comes to the door and tells Mike and Carol that he is taking the middle lovely lady on the road.

Mofro 4/4/24 College Street Music Hall

 Self-proclaimed “swamp cracka”, JJ Grey is the singer and front man for the Jacksonville FL outfit Mofro. With no “hits”, Mofro follows the Wilco acumen of relentless touring and sticking to the script. In this case, the script is southern fried rock with a side of Memphis soul and lyrics steeped in environmental stewardship. I first jumped on the bandwagon in the early 2000s after viewing a memorable belting of Galactic-backed, rainstorm fueled Sympathy For The Devil. On this evening, Grey said his visits to New Haven started in the late 80s with stops at Toads and the ill-fated Moon ( on Whalley Ave). They’ve come a long way baby as evidenced by two new monster beautifully painted tourbuses. Decent crowd for a Thursday to get a couple hours of Mofro. The current band is Grey on harmonica, guitar, organ and vocals with bass, drums, percussion, lead guitar, organ, trumpet, sax/flute, and two female backing singers to round out the 10 piece. An affable front man with a confident stage presence, Grey inhabits soulful ballads and choogling rockers and seems genuinely glad to call and response with the ladies. Mofro has released a steady stream of music that has produced multiple singalongable chestnuts over the years. New songs from the recent Olustee record were peppered in. Solid renditions of Orange Blossoms, Lochloosa, On Fire, A Woman were right at home with new songs Top of The World , The Sea, and the cover tune Seminole Wind. Mofro was embraced by the jam crowd for his laid back approach and pro environment tunes and has forged a successful career spinning tales of cherishing the natural world.