Last year I penned a defense of the controversial jazz trio The Bad Plus for TNR Online. I’d like to take a moment to repeat and amplify that defense.
Unexpectedly, I wound up at Carnegie Hall last night for a multi-artist tribute to Lorraine Gordon, owner and proprietor of the Village Vanguard. (This was under the auspices of the JVC Jazz Festival.) Five groups with longstanding ties to the Vanguard took the stage in succession: Dr. Michael White’s Original Liberty Jazz Band; Paul Motian’s group with tenor saxist Chris Potter, bassist Larry Grenadier and guest vocalist Rebecca Martin; Roy Hargrove’s quintet with special guest Bobby Hutcherson (vibes); The Bad Plus; and the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra (formerly the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra), which began working at the Vanguard in the mid-’60s and continues to this day.
All were good, but none held a candle to The Bad Plus — pianist Ethan Iverson, bassist Reid Anderson and drummer David King. Opening the second half of the show, the BP started with Iverson’s “Mint.” (“The song is in perfect condition,” Iverson quipped.) They continued with King’s “Thrift Store Jewelry” and a hypnotic rock instrumental (“Giant”) by Anderson. To close they played a cover of Burt Bacharach’s “This Guy’s In Love with You,” rededicated to Lorraine Gordon as “This Band’s In Love with You.”
The conventional wisdom among the BP’s detractors is that it’s all a gag — the Nirvana and ABBA covers, the loopy banter, etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. Most of the trio’s repertoire is original and unassailably rigorous, full of compositional intricacy and rhythmic elasticity. The Bacharach cover was only partly comical; the arrangement was finely detailed and rippling with melodic insight.
When the group first emerged on Columbia Records it was proclaimed a sort of “great white hope” in jazz. This ruffled a lot of feathers, and understandably so. But Iverson, Anderson and King — world-class musicians all — never claimed to be the saviors of the art form. They’re just three people with an uncommon bond, making uncommon music. And continuing to evolve. They received the night’s only standing ovation, which doesn’t prove much these days, but not every band can establish this level of audience connection in a mere 20 minutes.
I’ve been told that The Bad Plus’s stint at Columbia is over, which is probably for the best. Their music deserves to be judged on its merits. In that regard, mainstream success seems to have been a hindrance.
[Update: “Mainstream success” is an imprecise phrase—perhaps I should have said something like “blockbuster” success. There’s no reason to think that leaving Columbia spells the end of success for The Bad Plus. I think it simply points toward a different model of success.]
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