Hugh Masekela and Pancho Sanchez at Tanglewood
Weekend Long Tanglewood Jazz Festival Sizzles on a Cool Night
By: Charles Giuliano - Sep 01, 2007
The double header of South African trumpeter, Hugh Masekela, and his Capetown combo, in tandem with the sizzling salsa of conga player, Pancho Sanchez, and his eight piece Latin band proved to have more pop and home runs than the recent flopperino of the swooning Red Sox getting pummeled head to head by the Yankees. The Sox took another dive last night but we tuned them out to imbibe in the hot music on a cool night with the launch of the Labor Day weekend long Tanglewood Jazz Festival.
A mostly stiff set of seniors jammed sold out Ozawa Hall but there was a more youthful party and picnic for as far as the eye could see out on the lawn. Nothing more eloquently spoke to the dilemma and challenge of jazz today than the fading, conservative, somewhat square oldies but goodies springing for the $57 seats inside and the kids jammin and groovin in the cheap seats (bring your own blankets, picnic and booze) for seventeen bucks al fresco. The acoustically perfect and oriental flavored Ozawa hall, with its magnificently crafted teak interior, opens up on one end with a sloping hill providing the equivalent of bleacher seats. The weather couldn't have been more cooperative with the first hints of cool fall air.
It may be back to school and work for most folks come Tuesday morning, but, for now it is time to shake your bootie. Lord knows Masekela tried hard enough. He finally got the audience to stand and shimmie through a tribute to Nelson Mandela, "Bring Him Back Home.". This drove the prim and proper ushers nuts one of whom even had the noive to shove her hand in front of my camera lens and order me back to my seat. Hey babe, this is Jazz. Get over it. Sanchez turned on the heat with a hot and hypnotic salsa but only a handful of ladies popped up from their seats and grooved to the beat. When Sanchez introduced the band, each with his own brief vamp, some lady out on the lawn, back, way back, gone, outah here, screamed, over and over for Javier Vergara the tenor player. One of the band members quipped "That's his sister." What a difference the night would have been if more of the kids were sprinkled in with the seniors. Often the band members seemed to be straining to reach back to the lawn for some response to their considerable effort and energy.
The mood will be more sedate this afternoon at 3 when British born jazz pianist, Marian McPartland, tapes yet another segment of her National Public Radio broadcast "Piano Jazz" which started in 1978. Her featured guest artist is the young sensation Renee Rosnes. One of the features of this Festival is a mix of established and emerging artists with a Jazz Café set up in a tent to present newer, younger artists in free concerts for those with passes to the Ozawa Hall events. We caught an interesting set by harp player and vocalist Maeve Gilchrist who provided Celtic skat for a media only event. The rising star is a native of Scotland who recently graduated from Berklee College of Music. The programming is so dense, starting today at 1 pm in the Café with the French vocalist Mina Agossi who serves up a rich gumbo of different flavors from Fast Waller's "Aint Misbehavin" to "Voodoo Chile" by Jimi Hendrix, that the heck with a blanket, we may just pitch a tent and sleep in the woods or party round the clock. Just like Woodstock, man. Get down baby.
At the VIP Press party which kicked off the weekend we caught up with the entrepreneur Freddy Taylor. He didn't look a day older than when he ran the legendary tandem of clubs, The Jazz Workshop and Paul's Mall, on Boylston Street in Boston back in the 70s when I was the beat jazz reporter for the former Herald Traveler. It has been too long since I last saw him but Freddy hasn't missed a beat. Approaching him I said "Hey Freddy for a minute there I thought you were Mel Brooks." This launched him into a "Thousand Year Old Man" schtick. Taylor could have had another life and career in standup comedy. He used to book the Reverend Irwin Corey just to cop his gags. There may have been just a dozen folks in the house but Taylor was always doubled over cracking up.
"This is my sixth year here" Taylor said. "At first they just approached me to book an act or two at the end of the season. But I said to them, hey Tanglewood, with its level of prestige jazz deserves better than that. How about a Festival? And here we are doing great." The success of the annual Jazz Festival rekindles the summer long debate, launched with articles in the Berkshire Eagle, about the need for more diverse programming at Tanglewood which is gradually losing its audience for a steady diet of "serious" music. But, so far, attempts at diversity have been skittish at best. An early season presentation of the "Reunited Cars" (minus founder and lead singer Ric Ocasek) turned into road kill. Middle of the road acts like Keith Lockhart and the Pops or Garrison Kellier's "A Prairie Home Companion" have been great hits. And how many times can you trot out, James Taylor. In that context the solid and popular programming of Fred Taylor's super successful Jazz Festival seems like a promising alternative for the "shoulder" season before and after the summer long residence of the BSO. And heck, why not throw in a little Jazz at Ozawa Hall during the height of the season just to give a jolt to the staid and stodgy programming. Do we need yet another string quartet when we could get down and dirty with Jazz on a Summer's Eve now and then just to mix it up?
It had been some time since I last caught Masekela and had forgotten how preachy and strident he can be. Now somewhat thickened with age and moving with greater effort when he breaks into African dance steps he started by berating the audience to get up and groove and not just sit there because "We are Africans." It started as a joke but became less so when he launched into a screed about global repression of poor people many of who are victims of violence and genocide. The litany of atrocities and oppression ground on through a politically flavored set. The audience mostly sat mute and rather unmoved by the political agenda. Here and there were middle aged black folks who nodded in assent and muttered right on brother. It was a message surely that needs to be heard but many wondered if this were the right time and place. They had, after all, paid top dollar to party through the last days of summer.
But for the most part Masekela pulled it off even though he made few converts to his radical views of Third World politics. He is a consummate showman but we would have preferred that he spent more time on his superb playing of a very mild and mellow flugelhorn. Too much of the set he spent rapping and riffing or clanging on a cow bell. Play the damn horn man, He is a competent and compelling player with a rich and rhythmic mix of jazz and traditional African music but hardly an artist of the first rank. What is most interesting is the diversity of traditions he brings to the stage but he proves to be a master of none other than being a charming and engaging entertainer when he chooses to be. In a moment of self reflection he interjected that "I am not running for office. You don't have to vote for me."
That said much of his set was intriguing and great fun. One of the best pieces "Stimela" involved simulating the sounds of the train and its shrill whistle which transported laborers from all over Africa to Johannesburg to work the mines which he described as "deep, deep, down in the ground." He was also quite graphic in describing the sorrow and misery of these workers in bug and filth infested shacks consuming meager meals of slop dished out on tin plates. The shrill, haunting sound effects and accompanying dance moves got your spine twitching and titubating. This was followed by a tribute to the people of "Darfur." Then he got us all on our feet with a near riot of frenzy through the rousing anthem of "Mandela." But he also emphasized that blacks are now working with their former white oppressors to build a new and free South Africa. "We forgive but will never forget and no one group will ever again dominate another." As if to make his point he later introduced his superb accompanist the horn player, Morris Goldberg, who he acknowledged as "My best friend for the past 51 years."
After a break the Pancho Sanchez band had a hard time following Masekela. Seated in the middle of the stage with his set of three conga drums Sanchez seemed to work hard to get into a groove and establish a rapport with the audience which had come to a Jazz festival but largely did not know how to respond to his Latin beat and salsa music. Wisely the band offered a mixed set and the audience nodded approval when they played the Frank Foster/ Count Basie standard "Shiny Stockings." There was another stunning moment when the superb trombone player, Francisco Torres, performed a slow and melancholy version of the Hoagy Carmichael standard "The Nearness of You." The band also performed a number of original pieces such as the 6/8 beat of "Gestation" written by and featuring the trumpet of Ron Blake. The set ended with the title track of the new CD "Raise Your Hands" while Sanchez urged the audience to get up out of their seats and clap to the beat. Once again that lady usher went bezerk trying to keep the aisle clear and prevent folks from storming the stage. Hey, lady, this is like Salsa not Beethoven.
Tonight singer Kurt Elling will appear at 8 pm along with Randy Crawford singing with pianist Joe Sample. There is still time to pack a picnic basket, grab a blanket and head for the lawn. On Sunday afternoon at 1:30 Kevin Mahogany's Kansas City Revue will perform a tribute to the blues giant Big Joe Turner. The afternoon program will also feature Bossa Brazil and the Maria Schneider. The program concludes on Sunday at 8 PM with Hank Jones accompanying award winning vocalist Roberta Gambarini and the legendary pianist Ahmad Jamal paired with Jimmy Heath. So come on down the joint is rockin.