Summerhall, Edinburgh
Wednesday August 1st 2012
As statements of intent go, Summerhall's opening shebang featuring this
rare appearance by the 80-something saxophonist and contemporary of
John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman was pretty much the way to go. It was
Shepp, after all, whose 1965 Fire Music album captured its era's
artistic, spiritual and political ferment, even as it sired a new
shorthand for a fresh, angry breed of jazz iconoclasm. Summerhall may
be en route to recapturing a similarly-minded sensibility, but Shepp
himself has mellowed, as this low-key but life-affirming set to
accompany visual artist Jean Pierre Muller's 7x7 installation, which
Shepp contributes to, made charmingly clear.
Arriving on stage with pianist Tom McLung, with whom he's made two
albums with, including one featuring Public Enemy's Chuck D, Shepp's
hat, suit and purple shirt and tie combination suggested a natty mix of
old school elder statesmanship with a dapperly understated hint of
flash. Perching himself on a stool, Shepp opened with the pleasant
enough Hope Time, written for pianist Elmo Hope before getting to his
feet for a charming of possibly ironic take on Duke Ellington's Don't
Get Around Much Anymore, crooning the words like a matinee idol.
Things took a darker turn as Shepp swapped tenor for soprano sax on
Revolution, a brooding, incantatory piece pulsed along by McLung's
low-end piano, and interspersed with a poem written for Shepp's
grand-mother. There's an understandable intensity to the piece, just as
there is later when he dedicates a number to his fifteen year old
cousin, who died in a gang-fight. The set moves through the light and
shade of Shepp's oeuvre throughout in this way, as he largely coasts
effortlessly through a jaunty blues here, some gospel-inclined scat
vocal there.
Just before the second set, a mobile phone trills on the front row.
“I'll wait,” smiles Shepp, beatifically. Robert Wyatt, another
contributor to 7x7, is in the audience, and Shepp acknowledges this
with a tender version of Memories, a Hugh Hopper song recorded by Wyatt
for the B-side of I'm A Believer, and which Shepp accompanied a young
Whitney Houston on for a version with Material, Bill Laswell's early
1980s increasingly jazz-funkish crew. On one level, such eclecticism
may not be as radical as Fire Music or Revolution. As the lights dimmed
on the venue's old dissecting room turned roughshod concert hall,
however, it was a joyful opportunity to watch a genuine master run the
full gamut of his experience.
Arts Journal Online, August 2nd 2012
ends
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