Hancock leads a summer night of splendid jazz

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Certainly Herbie Hancock was smiling as he took the stage in the Cahuenga Pass on Wednesday night. "I'm home," he exclaimed, having just returned from two months in Europe. He and his quartet quickly began to slink through a number titled "Sonrisa," which was decked out with more pastels than an episode of the old "Miami Vice."

They came, among other sources, from the guitar of Lionel Loueke, a gent from Benin who provided his own version of digital, powered by the 20 fingers he seemed to possess on each hand.

After joining the rest in this opening display of shifting spectral panels, he had his own solo number, accompanied by his own one-man band: bass player on the low strings, chords on the top, melody in there somehow and little scratchy hardshell beetles keeping time -- or maybe it was just his fingernails on the guitar body.

He sang sadly, bravely and wistfully in some unknown language, then bellowed like some mythical beast. It was awesome.

Another treat brought along by Hancock, the man who broke Wynton Marsalis, was a passionate young violinist named Lili Haydn, late of the George Clinton P-Funk tour. A tosser of tresses with a lot of body English, she played her tribute to her late mother, "Unfolding Grace," singing sweetly along with the high notes. She doesn't pretend to be a jazz player, but Hancock sees something there, and she certainly is coming along.

Hancock seemed to have plenty of steam left after his one-nighters all over Europe, and he came through with the solo of the night on his classic "Cantaloupe Island," a richly resourceful passage that was past magnificent.

It was packed to the brim with creativity, but then, that was the way things were going from the moment Joshua Redman opened the show with "Surrey With the Fringe on Top," climaxing it with an intertwining double strand of arpeggios that foretold the illuminating intricacies of the rest of his set. Redman's was such a rich mixture that you didn't realize until halfway through the set that there was no piano, just Redman and his sax, fertile bassist Reuben Rogers and warmly witty drummer Eric Hartland.

Christian McBride brought along another stalwart young star, saxophonist Ron Blake, for his little band. Blake outputted a fiery stream from the banks of which the other two members of the quartet, drummer Terreon Gulley and keyboardist Geoffrey Keezer, contributed sarcastic or supportive remarks. Keezer yowled and howled at the soloists, who responded with licks that were juicy with savvy.

McBride is the new creative jazz chair for the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He had assembled a small but high-powered array of top jazz artists for this show, all of whom responded by playing at their peak, all night long.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter

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