Double Bass Virtuoso Marc Johnson Plays it Solo on his brilliant : "Overpass"

Marc Johnson: Overpass ECM Records

There is something very special, very visceral when a listener is given the opportunity to share a solo musical performance. It can be one of the most personal and intimate experiences that a musician can offer to his audience. Marc Johnson was said to have found inspiration to do his latest solo bass album Overpass after listening to fellow bass virtuoso Dave Holland's solo bass album Emerald Tears from 1977. Johnson's beautiful offering Overpass on ECM records, like Holland's, will clearly become another must-have inspiration to any musician who wants to tackle the formidable challenge of making a viable solo offering on such a beautiful but unforgiving instrument. 

Marc Johnson photo credit Jos Knapean

The album is bare, naked, and yet resplendent in its musical sensitivity and personal declarations. The bassist relies only on his skills, his instrument, and an internal compass that leads him to choose and interpret his musical selections so deftly. The album is a little over forty-three minutes and includes eight compositions that range from Eddie Harris’ stirring “Freedom Jazz Dance” to Miles Davis’ “Nardis” and Alex North’s moving “Love Theme from Spartacus,” the latter two made famous as standards in the Bill Evans’ repertoire. Johnson includes five of his own compositions that are both beautiful and deeply personal, “Samurai Fly,” “Life of Pai, ”And Strike Each Tuneful String,” “Yin and Yang,” and “Whorled, Whirled World.”

Bassist Marc Johnson was born in the heartland of America, Omaha, Nebraska, and grew up in Texas. He attended the then North Texas State University and was part of the school’s acclaimed One O’clock Lab Band with fellow alumni keyboardist Lyle Mays and drummer Steve Houghton. Mays and Houghton were enlisted into Woody Herman’s Thundering Herd, and later it was Mays who recommended Johnson to join Herman’s band. Mays stayed eight months with Herman before leaving to join with guitarist Pat Metheny and forming the Pat Metheny Group. Johnson’s stay with Herman brought him to NYC where an opportunity to sit in with the pianist Bill Evans resulted in his joining Evans trio in 1978. Johnson and drummer Joe LaBarbera would be the pianist’s last trio until his death in 1980.

By his own admission, Johnson was young and had limited experience when he joined Evans’ trio, but he had a fluidity, velocity, and melodic sensitivity that captured Evans’ attention. After Evans’ death, Johnson had to find a way to expand his growth and continue in the musical direction that he had only begun to explore in his brief time with the pianist. Instead of continuing in a piano-based configuration, Johnson looked toward forming a group that could change his musical pallet,  expanding on the group's musical possibilities. In 1996 he formed the influential Bass Desires with dual guitarists John Scofield and Bill Frisell and the drummer Peter Erskine. He also became part of guitarist John Abercrombie’s Trio, again with Peter Erskine in the mid-eighties and through 2007. One of my favorite albums of this group was November released in 1993. Johnson’s proclivity and skill for working with guitarists led him to be sought after by other notable guitarists including Pat Metheny, Ben Monder, Pat Martino, Ralph Towner, and Wolfgang Muthspiel.

Johnson’s proficiency on his instrument led him to work with a rainbow of musical artists including pianist Enrico Pieranunzi and saxophonists Stan Getz, Lee Konitz, Joe Lovano, Charles Llyod, Michael Brecker, John Surman, and drummers Jack DeJohnette, Paul Motion, Joey Baron and Armenian percussionist Arto Tuncboyaciyan to name a few.

It was in 1988 when Johnson first worked with his present wife, Brazilian pianist Eliane Elias. It was an Erskine project titled Motion Poet. A few years later he was asked to join Elias’ group and their musical and personal compatibility led to marriage in 1999. It has been a lasting relationship for over thirty years. His musical priorities since joining Elias once again changed back to working with a pianist. Johnson said in a Jazz Times interview from 2020 “My Musical choices ... have been dictated by prioritizing my work with Eliane…It’s wonderful that we can be together and play music together."" For me, it’s been the best of both worlds.”  

Johnson’s focus on his work with Elias has come with a greater appreciation for the important influence of Brazilian music. He has won two Grammys for co-producing Elias’ Made in Brazil (2016) and Dance of Time (2017.)

With all his achievements, Johnson’s work on Overpass is a welcome addition to his personal body of work. The album opens with the pulsing Eddie Harris composition “Freedom Jazz Dance,” an often-overlooked gem of free spirit. He does an incredible job of maintaining pace with throbbing pedal point and dances out the melody with liquid precision and enviable precise speed. It is no surprise that even alone, the bass in the right hands can really swing.

“Nardis” is a Miles Davis composition. The title was created by Davis reversing the last name of his friend Ben Sidran and was written for a 1958 Cannonball Adderley session Portrait of Cannonball. The tune was well explored by Bill Evans’ last trio. Here the bassist, perhaps under the spell of Evans’ preoccupation with the song’s many intriguing iterations, explores the composition on his own terms. Johnson uses his sonorous bass to create a drone. He juxtaposes a musical path through the sparse melody with his rich pizzicato facility and his inventive interpretation. His tone is deep, warm, and resonates with a sustain that hangs in the air like a warm gust from a sirocco.  The bassist creates an impressive meditative chant that will not be forgotten.

Johnson’s beautifully playful “Samurai Fly” is a reimagining of what he originally released as “Samurai Hew-Haw” on his Bass Desires album from 1986.  Here, without the distinctive dual voices of guitarists John Scofield and Bill Frisell, the bassist re-creates this East meets West song. He gently overdubs himself playing a dynamic lead on a slightly dissonant, almost buzzing arco. It at times reminds me of an Americana-style fiddle-like approach and he accompanies himself with an anchoring rhythmic pizzicato. The song conjures up fanciful visions of a militant Samurai fly that is buzzing defiantly to this east meets west war song. Priceless.

“Love Theme from Spartacus” was a theme from the Stanley Kubrick film Spartacus starring Kirk Douglas back in 1960 and was written by composer Alex North. Yuseff Lateef was apparently the first jazz musician to see the potential of this song in the genre, recording it on his oboe in 1961 on his album Eastern Sounds.  Bill Evans had purportedly gone to see the film several times and was taken by the beauty of the music. There is no doubt he made the song an important part of his repertoire, most famously being memorialized from his solo album Conversations with Myself from 1963. 

Marc Johnson finds this moving piece of music the perfect vehicle for his own singularly personal interpretation of this love ballad. It’s hard to imagine such a seminal love theme could be so well expressed by the single voice of a virtuosic double bassist, but Johnson makes it his own. He starts with several multiple-string plucks that set the stage. The sparse ringing of his decaying notes on the repeating theme resonates with sincerity and his playing barely waivers from the truth of the music’s original iconic essence.   

Johnson's composition “Life of Pai” is a dirge-like song that he has dedicated to the passing of both his father and his father-in-law. Sadly both transitioned within months of each other. “Pai” is Portuguese for father and thus " Life of Father." The music utilizes a somber descending feel, sometimes using multiple strings in tandem, and Johnson creates a solemnity that might be considered a sacred requiem.

“And Strike Each Tuneful String” is based on a folk song, “Wonderous Love,” that Johnson's mother used to sing in a church choir. Using these personal recollections- tiebacks to his life experiences and his upbringing- makes his music a living, breathing, DNA-like part of his creative process. You hear the bassist building on ideas, motifs that inspire him, and he expands on them like a meditation that he follows religiously to see what develops. During the process, other ideas emerge, other patterns are introduced, further extrapolations are developed and the music expands organically. Johnson creates a rapidly repeated pattern on his bass that hums, whirls, and vibrates like a turbine in action. There is a visceral connection to the turbulence he creates on his bass patterns that can draw you in, hypnotize you.

“Yin and Yang” is a song developed by Johnson when he was working on experimenting with the sonic aspects of his custom-made double bass made by the Brazilian luthier Paulo Gomes. In his interview with Bass Magazine, which was so valuable to understanding the bassist's thoughts about this album,  Johnson said “I got into this strumming thing one day and I said ‘Wow, listen to that.’  I put my ear down in front of the instrument and hit all the strings-when you hear all the harmonics bouncing off each other, it’s really cool.” 

Johnson strumming created this drone-like, harmonically rich background that has drum-like qualities. He overdubbed his Eastern-influenced arco to create this contemplative composition. Take a seat in a comfortable recliner, grab a set of good headphones and just lose yourself into this one. Guaranteed to lower your stress and blood pressure and leave you at peace for a little over four precious minutes.

The closing composition “Whorled, Whirled World” has a minimalist form that Johnson created in admiration of such composers like Philip Glass and Steve Reich. The bassist opens with a repeating, cyclical pattern that creates a whirl-like rush. He changes between time signatures without ever losing the flow. He minimally accentuates the whirlwind with improvisational accents that he creates in the moment. There is a feeling that more than one person is creating this gyroscopic-like storm, but it is only Johnson and his marvelous instrument. He modulates his velocity at times and eventually allows the music to fade out at the coda. He creates the impression that this energy-charged musical pattern has a perpetual life all its own.

You can sample some of the music of this great album by going to the ECM: https://www.ecmrecords.com/shop/1619621465/overpass-marc-johnson

You can also sample some of the music of this great album by going to the ECM: https://www.ecmrecords.com/shop/1619621465/overpass-marc-johnson

 

Emory Jazz Fest 2018: Peter Erskine, Darek Oles, Warren Wolf and Gary Motley perform at the Schwartz Center

Gary Motley, Darek Oles, Warren Wolf and Peter Erskine at Emory's Schwartz Center

On Friday February 9^th the 2018 Emory Jazz Fest presented a sophisticated quartet at the beautiful Schwartz Center featuring the world class drummer Peter Erskine, the vibraphonist Warren Wolf, the bassist Darek Oles and Emory’s own director of Jazz Studies Gary Motley on piano. The concert on Friday was the highlight of a series of master classes that professor Motley arranged with the drummer/educator Peter Erskine to conduct on Thursday for the jazz studies students. Bringing in musicians of Mr. Erskine’s caliber, to share their in-depth insight, makes the musical educational experience at Emory appreciably more vibrant and Professor Motley should be applauded for his continuing efforts in this direction. Past performers at the Emory Jazz Fest have featured an impressive array of artists including the trumpeter Nicholas Payton, the saxophonist Theodross Avery, the drummer Carl Allen, the bassist Rodney Whitaker, the clarinetist Anat Cohen, multi-reed artist Victor Goines, the violinist Regina Carter and drummer Terreon Gulley.  The Emory Jazz Alliance should also be commended for their dedication to supporting the jazz studies program at Emory by raising awareness of this admirable art form.

The concert on Friday night was a highlight open to the public. A drum clinic on Saturday morning was opened to the public and was packed with drummers who wanted to get some of the inside scoop on techniques from the jubilant Mr. Erskine. Erskine, a roundish almost jovial presence, peppered his Saturday morning clinic and demonstration with some pithy anecdotes about his career and the various characters that he has worked with over the years, from Walter Becker and Donald Fagen of Steely Dan to Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter from his Weather Report Days. 

Erskine’s work can be heard on over seven hundred recordings starting with the Stan Kenton Big Band,  the seminal fusion group Weather Report and the cutting edge group Steps Ahead and including his work with artists from Joni Mitchell, Diane Krall and Jaco Pastorious to Bob Mintzer and Pat Metheny. He is a drummer’s drummer.

I attended both the Friday night concert and the Saturday morning drum clinic with Mr. Erskine. I was unable to attend the Saturday performance where Mr. Erskine and Mr. Oles performed with Mr. Motley and the Emory jazz orchestra and the Emory Symphony Strings.

The Friday night concert was nearly sold out, with the audience anxious to see this talented group perform. The group started with Erskine’s own composition “Twelve” which is a swinger loosely based on Cole Porter’s “Easy to Love.” Warren Wolf, whose vibraphone was center stage, took the lead solo; a smoothly executed cascade of high register notes. Mr. Motley seated at the piano stage left, took the second solo, a brief one featuring some interesting block chording ala George Shearing. The bassist Oles (whose full name is Darek Oleszkiewicz) offered a facile, deep-toned solo of his own before Erskine ended the piece with his own rousing barrage.

“Solstice” was the next selection, a pretty melody written by Mr. Motley and featured on his fine album No Reservations Required, released in 2017, but played here at a slower more sensitive pace. Kenny Barron’s “The Traveler” became the vehicle for some nice synchronous playing between Wolf’s vibraphone and Motley’s piano. Watching Erskine was like a lesson in technique. While the drummer for the most part played very laid back, he utilized sticks, brushes, the back of his brush, mallets and every other technique to get the sound he wanted.

Mr. Wolf led the proceeding for the most part when he was on stage. His composition “Sweetbread,” an upbeat swinger, was the next selection and his work on the vibes was light and liquid. He drew upon that tubular sound of his instrument to great effect letting the ring of those metal tubes linger in the air when appropriate. Erskine started to push the proceedings along a bit and Mr. Motley seemed to respond to the prodding with his own invigorated piano work.

Mr. Wolf’s beautiful ballad “Annoyance” from his album Wolfgang was said to be inspired by an annoyingly repeated note in one of Mozart’s compositions. Mr. Wolf, who credits the vibraphonist Dave Samuels as his mentor, can be quite moving on his instrument. The talented Wolf can also play drums, marimba and piano.

Mr. Wolf then left the stage and the quartet turned into Mr. Motley’s trio. The group did a Cole Porter tune “Everything I Love.” The song started out with a call and response between Oles and Erskine. You could see the intuitive nature of these two communicating on the stand as they have worked numerous times together over the years. Being the odd man out, Motley at times during the evening seemed a bit tentative, but on this one his solo work was a fountainhead of creativity and nuance. It became obvious that it became his trio and the three musicians responded to his commanding direction.

Wolf returned, and the quartet did a Stevie Wonder composition “Knocks Me Off My Feet” from his Songs in the Key of Life for the final song. The funky arrangement featured a nice solo by Wolf.  The group took a bow and the audience stood applauding until they came back for a final encore.

The group did an encore of “You and the Night and the Music,” which featured one of Motley’s most adventurous solos of the night. Wolf was as smooth as silk. Oles kept a rock-solid tempo throughout the evening and Erskine made his nuanced drum work look like it was effortless. The drummer ended the set with a rolling tom solo that scintillated the crowd.

The group never got too out of the box but presented a very polished performance that was reminiscent of the sophisticated work of John Lewis and Milt Jackson with their seminal group the Modern Jazz Quartet. 

Alan Broadbent's "Developing Story" : A Tour de Force of Jazz meets Strings

Alan Broadbent's Developing Story 

The New Zealand born pianist Alan Broadbent has a long and storied career as a jazz man having played with the likes of Woody Herman, Chet Baker and Charlie Haden. But it is his orchestral accompaniment work with singers Natalie Cole and then with Shirley Horn and Haden that garnered him two Grammy awards. 

He is currently singer Dianna Krall’s musical director and has arranged and conducted strings for the Eagles Glenn Frey After Hours album and for Paul McCartney’s Kisses from the Bottom with the London Symphony Orchestra. The man is no stranger to using the magic a fully engaged orchestra can bring to a recording.

Broadbent, now seventy, has been intrigued by a song he has had in his head since the early 1970s and the theme to that song emerges in three movements on his latest album Developing Story, released at the end of June of this year. 

Alan Broadbent’s love of some jazz standards is also on display as he deftly arranges Tadd Dameron’s “If You Could See Me Now”, Bill Evans’ “Blue in Green”, Miles Davis’ “Milestones” and John Coltrane’s “Naima” as well as his own “Lady in the Lake” and “Children of Lima” on this gorgeous album. 

Wanting the music to be true to its roots, he approached the music from a jazz trio point of view hoping that he could arrange a symphony orchestra around that core musical feeling. Jazz and Classical have been strange bedfellows over the years with some attempts to combine the two falling far short of their intended goal. Broadbent may be the perfect scribe to join the two in harmonious marriage.The trio is a superb one that includes Broadbent on piano, Harvie S on bass and Peter Erskine on drums and the orchestra he envelopes the music with is the London Metropolitan Orchestra under his masterful direction.

All three movements of Broadbent’s “The Developing Song” are cinematic masterpieces with gorgeous piano lines by Broadbent and swelling string orchestrations that carry you away in this haunting melody. MVT II is a slow waltz based on the same theme with the trio more in prominence and the orchestra brass and woodwinds providing some magical moments of suspense and grandeur. MVT III initially launches the song into more of a swing-like feel, Erksine’s feathery brushes leading the way, before a shimmering drum solo leads to some towering brass that soar majestically like Roman horns announcing the entrance of a conquering hero. The music just sweeps you away.

Broadbent’s take on the jazz standards is equally as royal in its scope; his piano leads the way embellishing the melodies with lush orchestrations that are like miniature masterpieces of their own construction. To describe the nuances of his arrangements would do them a disservice, they are meant to be lavishly enjoyed; played on headphones with a glass of fine red wine or a dram of aged bourbon by your side. This is the good life in all its musical splendor.

His arrangement of “Naima” is particularly luscious, a filigreed take on Coltrane’s ode to his first wife. Woodwinds dance to Broadbent’s call like wood sprites in a magical forest. He summons a gush of wind created by his marvelously arranged strings and boisterous brass. Like a master weaver he spins another world within the song structure.   

“Blue in Green” is another treat to hear as Broadbent envisions it in all its stringed and French-horned glory. The pianist in him loves the sparse beauty of this Evan’s melody, while the arranger in him hears layers upon layers of possibilities in this melancholic song.

Broadbent’s unique arrangement of “Milestones” is like Gil Evans on steroids. The remaining songs are all gorgeous arranged and magnificently played. It may have taken the maestro nearly fifty years to get to realize his Developing Story but we are all the richer for him having finally completed this tour de force.

Alan Broadbent - Developing Story (extended version) from Ralf Kemper on Vimeo.