Blogs: Author Archive

I don’t envy the artistic director of the Detroit Jazz Festival Chris Collins one bit. Collins, a working jazz saxophonist and an educator, put together one of the most awe-inspiring Detroit jazz fests in recent memory. What the hell, I’ll go one better. Collins put on the best jazz fest ever. Few, if any,...
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Always polished and always swinging It wasn’t surprising jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis put on one of the top sets at the Detroit Jazz Festival Saturday afternoon. Marsalis is an elder statesman of jazz, and he seems musically incapable of doing anything sub-par. For Marsalis’ hit Saturday he used some key lions from the Jazz...
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This was the Detroit International Jazz Festival‘s most diverse year. People heard hard bop, avant garde, Latin jazz and smooth jazz. The festival had a few performances that were weak. Take 6 with the Mulgrew Miller Trio was flat. The a cappella sextet performed some compositions trumpeter Miles Davis put his stamp on. The sextet strayed too far away from its gospel roots....
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THE BEST SO FAR The consensus among writers covering the Detroit jazz festival who caught the Maria Schneider Orchestra is that it was the best festival performance so far. That is a major complement given that Kenny Barron and Mulgrew Miller, Trio M, the Defenders of the Groove featuring Ernie Andrews and so many others...
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THE FIRST LADY Tia Fuller, the first lady of Mack Avenue Records, is a bona fide jazz saxophonist. Her current album, Decisive Steps, is her best so far. Saturday afternoon at the Absopure Riverfront stage, her quartet gave an outstanding performance, playing selections from the new album. Fuller showed that she is a democratic...
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GOSPEL CUTTING CONTEST SUPER BAD During the Tower of Power set, the man seated to my immediate right tapped me on the shoulder. Then he whispered in my ear Tower of Power was not playing jazz but they were definitely super bad. That statement pretty much summarizes the funk ensemble’s performance, which almost had...
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The downside of attending the annual Detroit International Jazz Festival press conference is you have to listen to handful of uninspired speeches from City Council members, and corporate sponsors, babbling about why the jazz festival is relevant. The past two years, for example, a certain council member has recited the same speech, detailing how...
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During a video montage that was shown Friday night at the Detroit International Jazz Festival, trombonist Steve Turre commented that many festivals around the world call themselves “jazz festivals,” but the Detroit jazz fest is the real deal. The man should be lauded for not being apprehensive about speaking the truth. And this weekend,...
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Last year, I attended saxophonist Wayne Shorter‘s concert at Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor. It was a weird evening. Shorter, pianist Danilo Perez, drummer Brian Blade and bassist John Patitucci played for nearly two hours straight. Shorter never introduced the band or the music they performed during that show. And they walked off the...
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It can be stressful covering a music fest the size of the Detroit International Jazz Festival. There is so much wonderful music to experience and I find myself stressing over what acts to see and what performances to miss. I wish I had the technology to clone myself — or at least the salesmanship...
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