Having just published a feature on the Bad Plus, I wanted to add a word about pianist Ethan Iverson’s wonderful trio gig at Smalls, with Ben Street on bass and the great Albert “Tootie” Heath on drums (Philly in the house). It was great to hear Ethan play straight bebop — “Hot House,” “Now’s the Time,” “A Night In Tunisia” — but of course in his own way. He repeated the first phrase of the bridge to “Anthropology” on every succeeding phrase as well, obliterating the “correct” melody in a way that made no technical sense but bloody well worked. Tootie put a subtle rock hi-hat beat under the Mexican classic “Perfidia,” until Ethan moved into slow swing and voiced the melody in flawless Red Garland block-chord style. Tootie’s energy was electric. Ethan saw him sipping something between tunes and remarked, “Oh, you got a beer?” Tootie, without a second’s pause: “Yes, one of many.”
I don’t often have time to comment after the fact on shows I
preview for
Time Out, but David Sanchez’s first set at the Vanguard on Friday was one of those musical experiences that just leaves you speechless and practically shook up. Sanchez was on fire on tenor, Orlando Le Fleming solid as stone on bass, Henry Cole absolutely killing on drums, but what got me the most was the unflappable cool, and limitless harmonic resources, of guitarist
Lage Lund. He’s now playing a Sadowsky
Jim Hall model, which allows him extraordinary fluidity and evenness of tone as he fills the ample space in Sanchez’s surging music. He opened huge aural expanses with voicings of just two or three notes, and burned down the house with one impossibly deft solo after another. I’ve heard Lage plenty of times, live and on record, in the last few years, but I’ve never heard him sound like this. And I’ll repeat what I texted to a friend right afterwards: I’m not sure I have
ever seen anyone play the instrument that well.
