A quick plug for Sydney’s Kristin Berardi at The Zoo tonight – sure to be the highlight of the Jazz on a Sunday Vibe show. Anyone been to any inspirational gigs recently?
Post gig update:
I’m going to have a bit of a bitch about the gig. For the first time evah, I think, on LP, I’m writing a negative gig review. But I don’t think it should be seen as something astonishing in that sense, because in many ways, Kristin was good value, just that I was quite disappointed by the build up for the gig, and also by the way that The Zoo chose to promote it. I really think that hitting people up for a twenty bucks cover charge is way over the top for a Sunday night gig, when the acts playing don’t have an established name – even to the degree that they’re well known to Brisvegas gig goers. If you’re going to ask people to pay that amount of money for what is basically a discretionary decision to go and check out and support some new music, you should be honest about it and advertise it as a ticketed gig. Of course, if that were the case, you’d get very few punters prepared to pay.
But, what did we get for our dosh?
I think here I want to be critical of young jazz singers who’ve been to the Con, and majored in jazz voice, and that’s been the springboard for their public performances, who deliver something absolutely other than what one might expect. There’s probably some space for Rickie Lee Jones type vocals, and original tunes written with that vocal style in mind, but it ain’t jazz, and, boring as the gig with all the standards might be in the anticipation, it’s all in the interpretation. I’ve heard some wonderful takes on “Fire”, for instance. And jazz stylings of trad folk tunes like “Motherless Child”…
I’m not sure that running away from the jazz vocals in which you’ve been trained to a fairly routine pop or (alt?) country style is the way to go. I hate to say it, but you have to crawl before you can walk, and I don’t feel that venturing out into a cold winter night to hear Kristin sing rewarded me in any way. By contrast, I’d walk through sleet, rain and even snow to go and hear Megan Washington sing. Even if I had gout. Megan can do it. Not everyone can.
And I think the tradition itself is worth celebration, and homage. That’s how living genres reproduce themselves – with new interpretations from each generation, and each individual artist. What’s really interesting, rather than a flick to vaudeville pop, is the affect and emotional valence that new interpretations of classic tunes can be invested with. That’s where, paradoxically, you can give your audience something that is genuinely quite “new”. Every re-iteration is an iteration, and often, that’s where the politics of voice, and of memory, can burst through a well known song to disturb, excite and engage an audience. To the degree that we stop being a passive “audience” and something greater, and more collectively meaningful, can be created…
And, again, the decision of the promoters to put chairs out for gig-goers to sit on, and to leave the entire dance floor vacant and empty between the audience and the artists, acts against any creation of a collective event, and renders the gig something to be consumed… passively… also against all the traditions of jazz. And, oddly, it’s not something I’ve ever seen at The Zoo – a brave if imperfect venue – for any other act. If there’d been a drummer, I dare say, there’d have been no seats.
Brisvegas, for all its faults, has a very vibrant jazz scene, and cognoscenti suggest, we’ve got, along with folks on their trumpets and trombones and saxes in Perth, the best improvisational jazz tradition re-interpreted for these late modern capitalist times in Australia. So I think we deserved better tonight, particularly as the standard at The Zoo’s Jazz on a Sunday Vibe nights is normally exemplary.
Props to James Sherlock and his jazz guitar though. Just sublime.
And, here’s a comment for Kimberella and Anna Winter, Kristin was wearing a pumpkin dress.
Well… the last inspirational gig I went to was Antony and the Johnsons… and you know how long ago that was. But unfortunately right now I have a pile of exams standing between me and life.
If I wasn’t also in Cliff’s position, I probably would have been trying to get into the Hopetoun last night to see the Bawdies. Apparently there were quite a few people trying to watch through the windows.
I’m with Cliff and dk – probably all procrastinating together. Enticing music emails turn up and I’m steadfastly ignoring them.
“Anyone been to any inspirational gigs recently?”
Yes, Mark. Tariq Ali starred in “Pirates of the Caribbean”, inspiring a full house at Noosa on Friday. He has terrific mike technique and despite performing the whole show seated, drew regular bursts of spontaneous applause.
I wish I could say seeing Gough Whitlam speak at the opening of Rudd’s new office was an inspiring gig… but seeing the guy practically being carried to the podium to talk to us about how we should adopt fixed four year terms was hardly inspiring. I’m afraid that the “well may we say” has all but abandoned him.
Though earlier in the year Lou Reed’s performance of Berlin at the Sydney Festival was something special. I don’t think anyone left with dry eyes.
Lisa Gerrard, also a few months ago now … an almost-once-in-a-lifetime experience (in Melbourne, anyway).
EC, Is Tariq in Australia? I heard him speak at the Powerhouse in Brissie in 2003. Very very good.
Cliff, I finished marking all my essays as a friend of mine texted me and invited me out for a drink at 5pm which provided an incentive!
Having said all that, very ordinary gig. So I am just about to update the post with the first negative gig review I’ve ever written at LP!
Post now updated with (sadly) negative gig review…
That’s a nice review, Mark, or more properly perhaps, a reflection on the culture of gigs and music today.
Anyone who’s got this far may be interested in jazz out of Bris. If you’re interested in what’s on in jazz in Canberra, see my site and esp the attached blog
http://canberrajazz.net
Mark, he’s a class act all right; erudite, laid-back and charismatic. Tariq(as unobtrusive M.C., Peter Thompson, suggested we address him) did three gigs at Noosa Lonweekend.
cf. “Forum”
http://www.noosalongweekend.com/program_art.htm
Thanks for the review Mark. I considered going to this gig, but decided to venture back home to Toowoomba because of the late Sunday night finish. James Sherlock’s playing has to be experienced though, and he’s particularly good backing female vocalists. Brisbane is blessed with some fine jazz guitarists including Jamie Clark, Bruce Woodward, Toby Wren and Ewan McKenzie to name a few. I was lucky enough to attend a Sunday night gig last year where Sherlock, Clark, Woodward and Wren all played. Thanks also for the Megan Washington recommendation. For those also interested, Mojo Webb is a fine electric bluesman.