2013 Tanglewood reviews

Terrence Blanchard Quintet performance Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood

June 28, 2013 performance, by Dave Read.

The Terrence Blanchard Quintet filled Tanglewood’s Ozawa Hall with two sets of dense jazz before a sparse audience on June 28, 2013. It was a lovely evening in the Berkshires, but rain had been forecast, so maybe that had something to do with the nearly empty lawn and four-fifths empty hall. Has the Berkshire county reached the tipping point, where there’s so much stuff going on, that so many tickets for such an accomplished artist as Blanchard could remain unsold?

By “dense” we mean that the music made by Blanchard and his band occupied all the space available; the spacious Ozawa Hall with its renowned acoutistics sometimes seems to be accompanist, rather than mere facilitator, for a musical performance. Besides his brillance as a trumeter, Mr. Blanchard is a charming m.c., engaged with the audience, and generous to his band, which is terrific. He told a funny story about the Tuscon Jazz Society by way of introducing tenor sax player Brice Winston, a wonderful player who is heavily involved in jazz education.

Terrence Blanchard features new release Magnetic in Tanglewood performance

The rhythm section was good enough to be booking their own gigs! Pianist Fabian Almazan, from Cuba, shone especially brightly on his composition, Pet Steps Sitteres Theme Song. The tune is on Blanchard’s current Blue Note release, Magnetic, which also includes Time to Spare, a groovy up tempo composition by Winston, which got the evening underway in good order. Robert Hurst lll was on bass; his 2nd set solo was mesmerizing. Blanchard told us drummer Justin Brown “has great time” and a great career ahead. Blanchard himself demonstrated total artistic mastery of the trumpet, including loud high passages where it felt like notes bolted off the stage and became hecklers in the empty balcony.

Jerry Garcia Symphonic Celebration Warren Haynes Boston Pops

June 22, 2013 performance; by Dave Read.

A Jerry Garcia Symphonic Celebration with Warren Haynes and the Boston Pops, Keith Lockhart conducting attracted a large audience to Tanglewood on June 22. Scheduled between concerts by Melissa Etheridge and Joan Baez with Indigo Girls, the tribute to the Gratfeful Dead founder and cultural icon was ample reason for a broad swath of baby boomers to spend the whole weekend in the Berkshires. It was an opportunity for the BSO to claim some measure of Haight-Ashbury street cred, with Maestro Lockhart sporting the boldest, brightest, and brand-newest tiedye and there was a groovy light show projected on the Shed facade, which got one-upped by the way more psychedelic burnt orange Strawberry “super moon” rising late in the first set. You can view and listen to plenty of clips from this show on Youtube, where we grabbed a screenshot from one video, here: http://youtu.be/VuaDyBMqo9o.

Photos from Jerry Garcia Symphonic Celebration at Tanglewood

Tanglewood goes mainstream?

Fans who lament the absence of James Taylor from Tanglewood’s 2013 summer schedule may be placated by the BSO’s wading deeper into the mainstream of popular music by booking several acts that are on the summer circuit. Even with the eleven “popular artist” shows booked so far this summer (one for Labor Day weekend TBA), Tanglewood is bound to remain sui generis among music venues, especially since the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra occupy all but a few slots on the summer calendar. However, at least for this opening weekend, MASS MoCA was the more relevant musical venue in the Berkshires because of the wildly successful Solid Sound Festival hosted there by preeminent rockers (and Tanglewood veterans) Wilco. With the demise two years ago of the Tanglewood Jazz Festival, which had been held for about ten years on Labor Day weekend, the far end of the summer calendar presents an opportunity for clever programming by the BSO, maybe something sui generis.

Yo-Yo Ma’s Brazil at Tanglewood

August 3, 2003 Tanglewood concert review by Dave Read

The esteem for Yo Yo Ma is widespread, extending even to the climate gods, who transformed Tanglewood into a rain forest August 3 to accommodate the five Brazilian, one Cuban, and one British musician who collaborated with him in the Koussevitsky Music Shed for a concert billed as Yo Yo Ma’s Brazil: An Evening of Latin American Music.

The concert opened with Ma and his long-time pianist and fellow-musical traveler Kathryn Stott playing three songs: first by the contemporary Peruvian composer Antonio Mariano and then Brazilians Heitor Villa Lobos and Carmargo Mozart Guarnieri, each of whom came to Boston in the 1940s to conduct the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Sérgio and Odair Assad guitar duets

Ma doubled on mic as MC to introduce the first tunes and then the guitar duo Sérgio and Odair Assad who played an assortment of songs including compositions by Mariano, Villa Lobos, Bandolim, Jobim, Piazzolla, and one composed by Sérgio called Menino.

As Ma noted, the Assads are in the vanguard of the re-emergence of the popularity of the guitar duo, and their performance tonight showed why. The brothers play matching Millenium guitars (by Thomas Humphrey; Sérgio plays a cedar-top, Odair plays a spruce-top). Their harmonies are intricate and engaging, and they play such clear tones that at points it sounded like one was hearing a piano.

Sérgio introduced Menino by calling it “an innocent piece about a child,” and it evoked an image of a child’s day as it unfolded: busy and restful, with daydreams and excitements. Ma’s cello part served to create the frame within which the Assads painted their charming portrait of childhood. On their next piece, Bandolim’s Noites carlocas, Ma listened along with the rest of the audience as the brothers cut loose for some very impressive, very jazzy playing.

Yo Yo Ma introduces Nilson Matta, Rosa Passos

Next to come on stage, with Ma’s introductions, were: Nilson Matta, “to join me in playing a lower bass instrument,” Cyro Baptista, with 75 percussion instruments, lots of flair and humor, and Rosa Passos, “with a miraculous voice.” In various combinations, they closed out the first set with three pieces by Antonio Carlos Jobim (1925-1994), the man whose song The Girl From Ipanema brought global popularity to Bossa Nova in the early 1960s.

The whole ensemble but Odair played Jobim’s O Amor em Paz, which was a highlight of the evening, showcasing both the translucence and seductive wistfulness of Passos’ singing and Ma’s virtuosity which he demonstrated by following her first verse with a cello solo – in Portugese! – which echoed her phrasing note-for-note.

The set’s last song was introduced by Baptista, who is from Brazil’s rain forest: to some applause he said the song is called The Rains of March, – but wait, I forgot something – tonight it is called The Rains of August!. The highlight of his contribution on that piece was the delicious percussion he produced by rubbing his palms and wrists up and down against each other, looking something like a pizza tosser with limbs as pliable as dough.

virtuosity and charm of Paquito D’Rivera on display

The second set opened with Ma’s introduction of “the legendary Paquito D’Rivera,” who ambled onto the stage and displayed his Victor Borge-like playfulness before he displayed his virtuosic clarinet playing. The first five songs of the set had Paquito D’Rivera playing along with a variety of ensembles; the first and fifth were compositions of his, Preludio Y Merengue and Afro. The latter tune was something of a showcase for Baptista, who played a berimbau, an Afro-Brazilian instrument with which he produced haunting, ethereal sounds.

Before closing with two rousing full-ensemble pieces, Ma played a duet with his pianist Stott, Gismonti’s Bodas de Prata/Quatro Cantos, which was elegant and showed their affection for each other; and then Piazzolla’s Tango Suite with the Assads, which was dazzling and included all three musicians at times tapping out the rhythm on their instruments.

The encores turned out to look like a courting ritual between Rosa Passos and Paquito D’Rivera, as amid the spirited playing around them and with the audience dancing up to the foot of the stage, they couldn’t take their eyes off one another, and D’Rivera even suggested a way to a tryst when he segued into Take the A Train! That’s about when Passos, who had expressed her love for Mr. Ma several times already, declared, I love Paquito D’Rivera.

And off to the muddy parking lots of Tanglewood slogged a few thousand, not a few carrying crushes for Ms. Passos, and all full of gratitude to Yo Yo Ma for his brilliance as a musician, excellence as a talent scout, and overall generosity of spirit.