Translated material
Miles' Magic
Marcus Miller summoned the spirit of his great teacher
The City Jazz festival is getting better and bigger every year. Both in terms of timing and coolness of names. This year's headliner is Marcus Miller, a virtuoso bass guitarist, film composer, author of a dozen excellent albums, where different styles of predominantly “black” music are mixed in a whimsical but tasteful way. Plus a killer bass guitar: powerful riffs and fast solos are adored by fans of jazz, fusion and even rock.In the mid-90s, all “left-handed” Miller discs were sold at the old Gorbushka; when pirates stopped peddling non-commercial repertoire, people began to buy “original” CDs. For jazz salesmen, bassists who play melodic eclecticism are a goldmine. Alas, there are only one or two of them. And even those cannot please everyone. Victor Bailey is too confused. Christian McBride is too correct. Brian Bromberg spreads himself too thin. Victor Wooten is too funky. Stanley Clarke releases albums too rarely. In general, they are good, but they all lack something. But Miller is perfection.
Despite a successful long-term career, Miller decided to return to his start. He began by collaborating with Miles Davis. The peak of their work is Tutu (1986), an epoch-making album, considered the forerunner of acid jazz. Acid jazz, however, has died, but the idea of Tutu (a combination of jazz improvisation with electronic instruments) is still alive.
Miller and his team performed in the second part of the evening, and the program was opened by SymFusion Orchestra, winner of the festival competition “Usadba. Jazz". They said that the guys were young, not professional, that they were connected only by personal friendship. I don’t know what has changed since the summer, but at the House of Music the orchestra showed a strong program. The audience enthusiastically accepted the hypnotic music, something at the intersection of jazz with minimalist soundtracks. In a better world, SymFusion Orchestra would pack the halls and record soundtracks for trendy art house. It’s hard to say what will happen to him here; Let's wish you the best.
Next, guitarist David Fyuzhinski (leader of the American band Screaming Headless Torsos) and the group of saxophonist Nikolai Moiseenko performed. The Berkeley graduate project turned out to be completely incomprehensible. That is, they played well, but it was unclear what - the compositions were chaotic, chatty, without any internal connection. The musical themes and improvisations are quite simple. As they said in the Soviet school, “what did the author want to say?” Fierzynski plays a stunning instrument: a guitar with two necks, one with 12 strings and no frets. A bunch of gadgets that allow you to produce the sound of either a cello or a pseudo-oriental instrument. Rich texture, but what is it for? Fiuzinski, an ardent supporter of microtonal tuning, plays the usual guitar stuff: heavy riffs, howling slides... The crowd seems to take it well (especially the dirty Hendrix-esque riffs). When the music died down, a shout was heard: “The drummer is super!” Drummer Alexey Kravtsov is truly a “super”, modern musician who plays broken rhythms with ease and ease, with accelerations, decelerations and unexpected turns. And only he was noted, and not the main character of the performance, the only one who knew why the audience was in the hall, and why the musicians were on stage.
During the intermission, many moved to the half-empty stalls. As soon as you sighed, lowered your eyes to the floor, muttered: “I have a ticket for the balcony...”, they led you by the hand to the third row. The world is not without good people!
The move paid off - a magic session was taking place on stage. It was expected that they would play something from Tutu, but the title hit, used even for TV screensavers, would be left as an appetizer. We started with the plays Tomaas and Backyard Ritual. During the very first pieces, trumpeter Christian Scott and saxophonist (soprano, alto) Alex Khan showed class and frantic energy.
Then Miller threw the bass guitar behind his back, hung the bass clarinet around his neck and began playing the familiar theme. Most jazz fans know it from the album You're Under Arrest (1985) by Miles Davis, and most normal people know it as one of the early hits of Michael, God forgive me, Jackson, Human Nature. The time has come, Scott and Khan left the stage, and Miller released the solo song Panther from the third, absolutely masterpiece, album The Sun Don't Lie (1993), a hit without which not a single one of his concerts is complete.
Before performing the long-awaited Tutu, Marcus said that “everything (the creation of the album. - A.B. ) began with this piece” and that it was “dedicated to Desmond Tutu, who fought against apartheid.” Also, in the Yoruba language, tutu is said to mean “cool.” That is, the English cool. That is what Miles started with: cool jazz. Maybe this is not true (neither Davis nor Miller showed deep knowledge of the languages of their historical homeland), but it is beautiful.
I won’t say that the concert “resurrected” anything. Of course not. Christian Scott plays in some ways just like Miles, in others - not at all. And other passages are simply better than Miles. But he's not that great trumpet player. This is not a "suckers' attraction" - this is a good Marcus Miller concert. No more, but no less. And it slightly exceeds expectations.