Belltown Bent

Buddy's view

It was Buddy Catlett day in Seattle two weeks ago - February 21st, 2008. I was at City Hall to recognize Buddy, along with my friend Robert Wade, and to celebrate all he means to the city's jazz history and ecosystem. I listened, I watched, I shook his hand, and I photographed him. But I didn't write about it. I didn't share it on the Bent. Like so many people, and things, since last August, it didn't make it to the Bent.

There have been plenty of pictures, and plenty of thoughts. Even occasional hit-and-miss attempts at writing. And for six months, nothing has made it the Bent. They'd slip a day or two, or a week, until they didn't seem like news. And so it went. Or not.

But I kept thinking about Buddy. Out there week after week. Playing gigs with Clarence Acox's Legend Quartet at the New Orleans in Pioneer Square, or with Brian Nova at the Pampas Room in Belltown. He's played with Louis Armstrong, and Quincy Jones, and Cal Tjader and on and on. He just keeps playing. A long time ago. Tomorrow.

I remembered this blog is not about news. It's about the view from here. It doesn't matter if it's a day, a week, or a year old. It's just the view. Thanks Buddy.

More pictures of Buddy and Friends from Buddy Catlett Day in Seattle.

Lionel Loueke: long trip, short stay

I'm always fascinated by the paths which lead musicians to my neighborhood jazz club. Born in Benin, West Africa, Gilles Lionel Loueke moved to Côte d'Ivoire to attend the National Institute of Art and study music for four years.

He aspired to play the music of American jazz guitarists like Pass, Montgomery and Benson, so he applied and was accepted to the American School of Modern Music in Paris - four more years of study.

Then came a scholarship to Boston's Berklee College of Music for a degree in Jazz Performance. Next he was awarded a full scholarship to USC's Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance where he started to play and record with musicians like Terence Blanchard (seen here in 2005 at Jazz Alley) and Herbie Hancock. Now NY, NY is his base and he has signed with Blue Note Records, after releasing a few albums on small indie labels.

This (17 years of formal training, touring, and recording), apparently, is what it takes to be nominated by the Jazz Journalist Association as "Up & Coming Musician of the Year"*. It's also what it takes to begin playing clubs like Jazz Alley as a leader, which brings us to his short stay (two nights) here in Seattle before his band heads to L.A. and he joins Herbie Hancock for an east coast tour.

His current working band of fellow Berklee and Monk alumni is the namesake trio from his Obliqsound release GILFEMA, Gilles Lionel Loueke, Hungarian percussionist Ferenc Nemeth, and Sweden-born Italian bassist Massimo Biolcati, recently in town with Ravi Coltrane's quartet. In the words of Phil DiPietro at All About Jazz, you can expect, "World music, maybe — world-class, definitely!"

* Anat Cohen, born in Tel Aviv, and another world traveler who passed through Berklee, was the winner.

Silas makes his point

I'm still thinking about John Szarkowski, and his gifts to the world of photography. Especially his notion that photographers are pointers. They want to show you what they saw, asynchronously. First, capture the moment. Then, find the memory in the image. Finally, share it, and make one three-hundredth of a second seem timeless.

This is Silas, stealing the sidewalk show. And making a point. He stopped me in my tracks, and stopped time in the process. As the ad hoc leader of Red Brown and the Tune Stranglers (Red didn't make the date), Silas stepped up big time, and drew the crowd in for the rest of the band, delivering some of the finer moments at 2007's NWFL Festival.

While there was no doubt he was working it, was he actually playing the violin? Can't say, really. Did he have the best moves on the entire Fisher Pavilion promenade? Absolutely. Was he flat out fronting the band. For sure. Sometimes it just doesn't matter. There's more here than meets the ear, much less the eye. And that's Silas' point.

Women of the world

The world of music is an extraordinarily large place. It is populated by talented individuals who, as musicians, come from faraway places - like Ouidah, Benin, or Hamamatsu, Japan. They develop their musical voices in many more places, like Paris and NYC, or Tokyo and Boston, absorbing influences and integrating cultures along the way. Through their travels, growth, and performances, they become citizens of the world, and they bring their music with them.

But much can also be said for letting the world come to you. Certainly the world of music. Two women of the world bring their signature musical perspectives to Seattle in the coming weeks, as Angelique Kidjo (May 4-6) and Hiromi (May 8-9) each make return visits to Jazz Alley.

Hiromi first landed in the Bent in March of 2006 (read what Ahmad Jamal and Oscar Peterson had to say about her) and has been a frequent visitor to my headphones ever since. The best way to describe her music, is to let her. "Other people can put a name on what I do. It's just the union of what I've been listening to and what I've been learning. It has some elements of classical music, it has some rock, it has some jazz, but I don't want to give it a name." I'm with her. Other people can try. Not me.

But I highly recommend, given the opportunity, you sit in the same room with her and listen and watch. The experience will prepare you for her recordings, including the latest, Time Control, which features a Slovakian drummer, a British bassist, and was recorded in Nashville. Via Hamamatsu, Tokyo, Boston and the world.

Kidjo, who was born in Benin, began performing when she was six years old and has been evolving her West African-based celebratory dance music for the last 4 decades. While political upheaval lead her to Paris, she never left her traditional roots behind. Her influences are global and span decades, she has collaborated with too many names to drop, and serves as a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF.

Djin Djin, her just-released CD features Alicia Keys, Peter Gabriel, Josh Groban, Carlos Santana, Joss Stone, and Branford Marsalis. Such artists certainly help extend the considerable reach of her music, but she won't need their help to reach you at the Alley. That's a good thing, because she'll need the room on stage for you. The world, after all, is a small place.

Black-tie optional

Floyd Standifer, a founding father of Seattle's jazz community, died on Monday night, at the age of 78. As Jessica Davis so wonderfully told the story back in 2002, it was over 60 years earlier, at the corner of 21st and Madison in Seattle, when he first heard the sound of bebop. He had come to Seattle to study physics a UW, but as he told Jessica, "Once I heard bebop, that was it. The importance of physics went out the window and in went Charlie Parker."

In the decades that followed, the relationship between Standifer and Seattle grew immeasurably. Musicians came to regard him as a teacher, a mentor, a musical father, a pillar of the jazz community, an icon. The city twice proclaimed Floyd Standifer days in 1996 and 2000, and he was honored by two Mayors for his stature as a jazz man, and his contributions to the city's scene.

And Standifer held Seattle in equally high regard. As jazz writer Paul DeBarros recalls, he "had a great affection for the natural beauty and laid-back lifestyle of Seattle." And in Floyd's own words, "... the first thing you were was a human being. And it's the last thing you're ever going to be. This town allows you to do that. All that other stuff in between is just stuff that you learn to do. You're looking for someplace where life can mean something, you come here."

I'm a relative newcomer to Seattle, but the natural beauty which surrounds us, and the thriving, multi-generational jazz scene which pulsates from within are two of the city's powerful draws. From the time I arrived in 1998, references to Floyd came from every direction. From my long-time friend (and jazz mentor) Robert Wade, in conversations with new jazz friends, in music columns in both dailies and weeklies, and from the musicians I eventually met.

While I never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Standifer, I do want to share a personal aside in his memory. I photograph, on a volunteer basis, the Seattle Repertory Jazz Orchestra, a fabulous cultural treasure of which he was a valued member. I donate images for a variety of purposes, including limited edition prints for donors and supporters. I never got to see, or photograph, Floyd playing with SRJO, in all their swinging, black-tie glory. But his picture was the one most requested by people who love their music. At last fall's Bumbershoot, not long before he had to put his horns down, I joined the crowd who packed in to see him at the Seattle Jazz Showcase. Clearly, Floyd Standifer didn't need a tux to personify class. Swing in peace.

What others had to say: Paul deBarros | Gene Stout | Doug Ramsey

Update: Jazz After Hours host Jim Wilke will devote his Jazz Northwest program (KPLU 98.5 FM) to music and memories of Floyd Standifer on Sunday, Januar 28th at 1PM PST. It will be available as a podcast after the broadcast at kplu.org.

Celebrating youth at 86

Clark Terry was carefully pushed through the crowd to the edge of the Jazz Alley stage in a wheelchair. From there he was helped, step by cautious step, to his stool at center stage. The audience cheered him as he climbed up, and settled in. He looked up, the crowd went quiet, and with a grin he said, "old age sucks."

We all laughed, relieved of our concern, charmed by the indomitable spirit of the man who has been climbing onto bandstands for more than 60 years, sharing them with the likes of Count Basie, Duke Ellington, and Oscar Peterson, and influencing great players like Miles Davis and Quincy Jones, and so many more along the way.

He's been knighted in Germany, named to the French Order of Arts and Letters, recognized with a National Endowment of the Arts Jazz Master fellowship, received fifteen honorary doctorates, and was the first black musician at NBC leading to 10 years as a spot light musician in Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. The story goes on and on, just like Terry (I mean that in the most respectful way.)

He possesses an invaluable historic perspective on jazz, its culture, and its characters, and he shares it freely, like when he reminisced last December about Thelonious Monk at a Jazz Museum in Harlem speaker series. When NPR's Jacki Lynden asked how he kept going, he responded, "It's young people, they keep you honest, they're gonna ask you questions. You better have some answers." After the interview, he took the stage with young lion Roy Hargrove, a half-century his junior.

Today is Mr. Terry's 86th birthday, and thanks to him I'm quite convinced that old age can swing. Happy Birthday man! We'll see you at Jazz Alley in January.

More: Clark Terry | St. Louis Walk of Fame | 07 April 05 pictures - Jazz Alley

Birthday greetings, bottle of wine

Hard to say if he would've been out 'til quarter to three, but there's no doubt that I'd still love him if Jimi Hendrix had made sixty-four. Born November 27, 1942, today would have been that day.

Back in 1969, long before I'd heard of Belltown, or become quite so Bent, I was already very familiar with Seattle's favorite son. I took this picture of Jimi at the third of three shows he did at the Waikiki Shell in Honolulu, on June 1st of that year.

I went to the first show on Friday. He stopped playing after about 30 minutes or so because of a bad hum in his amp - some sort of electrical problem. I don't remember much about Saturday's show, but I'm pretty sure I was there. The third show, a make-good for Friday's buzz-out, was one of those nights. A big moon coming up over the Diamond Head crater, gates open to all comers, Jimi in all his glory, and I had my very first SLR and a cheap telephoto lens.

I thought today would be a good day to break out this old image and remember an extraordinary man who left us too soon. And, as Paul McCartney (the other left-handed cultural icon born in '42 - he turned 64 last June) suggested in his song*, we'll open a bottle of wine and remember Jimi on his birthday. Luckily, like Paul, we got older too.

*While this song, like most Beatles songs, is credited to Lennon and McCartney, When I'm Sixty-Four  was one of the first songs McCartney wrote, while he and John were still the Quarrymen.

Heaven Down Here

If you've followed The Bent for a year or more, or scanned through Musicians in Performance, you know how I feel about Tuck & Patti. A year ago I wrote about Tuck, the guitarist, but it was Patti who provided the context. In Tuck's words,

"When we are playing together, I play almost exclusively for Patti. It is as if nothing else exists. I have come to the conclusion that by doing so, I am properly playing for God and for the audience."

The result, for the audience, is transcendent. We are no longer in a night club, no longer watching a performance. We are with this man and woman, seeing into their hearts, feeling our own, basking in the glow of the love they share with each other, with God, and with us. They bring it to us.

"Heaven Down Here"

This morning my friend Hank, The County Clerk, wrote a warm remembrance for his friend Wendell Burgess. Wendell was a gardener. Or as he preferred to be called, a "yardener." Hank is also a man of the dirt. He hopes, for his friend's sake, folks "yarden" in heaven. Certainly, Wendell's seeds, humor, advice, and wisdom have already been cultivated in Hank's garden, and they will continue to bloom in Hank's heart, and garden, wherever he may plant them. Wendell may be "yardening" in heaven, but, like Tuck & Patti, he's already brought some heaven down here.

Tuck & Patti return to Seattle November 14-16 - a little bit of heaven at the end of an alley. Share their love.

The good, the bad, and the nefarious

Their music tests the boundaries and cross-overs between multiple genre. It is dramatic, virtuosic, inventive, and edgy. It is, in a word, good.

The Bad Plus throw out convention and breathe fire into next week's Jazz Alley calendar, with startling original material mixed amongst their acclaimed reconstructed covers of classic and contemporary rock. Definitely hot.

Also hot, these days, is the topic of Digital Rights Management (DRM). There are a number of blogs discussing the pros and cons of the technology. The most nefarious scheme I've heard of was created by Sony BMG. They embedded a DRM application in some CD's, including (ironically) TBP's Suspicious Activity? that used malware techniques to install and cloak itself in PC system software, sometimes resulting in system crashes and data loss. Mark Russinovich of SystemInternals helped break the story and expose Sony last year. The Bad Plus, to their credit, are good guys and had no prior knowledge of Sony's foul play. Sony later settled with their violated customers. You've got until December 31st to claim your pittance compensation if you  got smacked by one of those bad CDs.

More images: The Bad Plus live at Bumbershoot 2004

The fabric of music and life

Dobet Ghanoré sings to the politicians of Côte d'Ivoire. Songs heard on the world's stage sometimes command more attention than the voices of the governed. She sings, with a social conscience, about family and roots, and prays for an end to war, a cure for the AIDS pandemic, and for the orphans both leave in the street.

Her music is woven, like fabric, from the languages and styles of her pan-African culture -  lyrics in Bété, Fon, Baoulé, Lingala, Malinké and French - and the music of Manding melodies, Congolese rumba, Ivorian Ziglibiti, Cameroon Bikutsi, Ghanaian High-Life and Zulu choirs.

"Atho"

Dobet made her North American debut at Seattle's Jazz Alley, along with Mali's Habib Koite, as they launched the U.S. leg of Putumayo's Acoustic Africa Tour. The tour will visit 40 cities, joined by Vusi Mahlasela of South Africa. All three artists are social activists successfully drawing attention to Africa's challenging social issues with their music.

The tour is also introducing audiences to Oxfam America, an organization committed to creating lasting solutions to global poverty, hunger, and social injustice. One immediate opportunity to contribute to their effort is to support the passage of H.R. 6142, currently in the House Ways and Means Committee. The bill will amend the African Growth and Opportunity Act and extend a provision allowing sub-Saharan African countries  to export clothing to the U.S. made from third-country fabric. Their emerging clothing industry provides nearly 300,000 workers, mainly women, with jobs that put food on the table, send children to school, and pay for health care.

Sometimes our politicians listen to us, even if we don't lift our voices in song. Contact your Representatives and ask them to support H.R. 6142. Seattle's 7th District Representative, Jim McDermott, is on the Ways and Means Committee, and can be contacted here.

Images: Dobet at Jazz Alley - Oct 2006 | Habib at Jazz Alley - Jan 2004 |
More: Dobet's debut CD Ano Neko | Dobet and husband Colin Laroche de Feline performing Mindile (Quicktime) - Paris, Oct 2004 | Dobet's Bio @ Contre Jour Records