Musical Flavors

Last year’s Savannah Music Festival was all about colors for me. This year I searched for musical flavors! What a delight it was to hear Tatiana Eva-Marie and her Avalon Jazz Band serve up a taste of French jazz a la Django Reinhardt and then, three days later, discover the haute cuisine of Ana-Maria Vera playing Debussy’s L’isle Joyeuse.

Growing up in the Texas Panhandle I realized that my parents’ musical tastes diverged sharply. Mom would have appreciated Ana-Maria Vera’s piano playing. Mom and I loved playing duets together, especially Brahms’ Hungarian Dances. That was like drinking creamy-rich hot chocolate!

My Dad however, preferred listening to Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys. At the bluegrass concert by Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder I could almost taste my Dad’s delicious chili, But my tongue needed refinement. Texas Swing and Kentucky Thunder share many harmonies and rhythms, but they differ, too. Like beefy chili, the dance music of Bob Wills could include any number of ingredients: electronic synthesizers, keyboards, and drums. Like ham, corn and Bourbon, the staples of a Bluegrass kitchen, Bluegrass music is inspired by Appalachian folk songs, but limited to stringed instruments:  guitar, banjo, mandolin, upright bass, and fiddle.

We had heard Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder play in Savannah ten years ago, but I hadn’t listened to them since. This year I paid close attention. I loved how Skaggs introduced his six fellow players and let them demonstrate their virtuosity on vocals, banjo, guitar, fiddle, or bass. Skaggs congratulated Dennis Parker on eight years of sobriety after some rough times that had taken him away from Kentucky Thunder. Maxann declared his rendition of “Jesus Loves Me” to be superb. I agreed. I’ll be listening to Bluegrass more often, now that I appreciate its special characteristics. Maybe I’ll develop a taste for Bourbon, too!

And I’ll be listening to more jazz. I studied jazz piano for a couple of years in the 1980s, but never before had I appreciated the vibraphone until I heard Warren Wolf and his Wolfpack on April 3, our first night at the Festival. Here’s how an expert plays the “vibes.”

Wolf grew up in Baltimore and attended Peabody Preparatory for eight years. After high school he went to Berklee College of Music in Boston. He has played with Wynton Marsalis and Cyrus Chestnut, among other jazz greats. Above you see the colors and actions. Here’s how the Wolf Pack sounded in Savannah. Their music made me think of champagne, a fruit smoothie, or a delicious soufflé.

Next we heard the Isaiah J. Thompson Quartet. Thompson, a jazz pianist with both Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Music from Juilliard, earned my respect by playing masterfully and expressing the warm feelings I was having for the cousins and friends with whom we later shared dinner.  This promo for his new album gives me fresh incentives to listen to more of Thompson’s great jazz piano and the tenor saxophone artistry of his bandmate, Julian Lee.

Concerts on April 4 took us to France; we listened to jazz by two French artists performing in the style of Django Reinhardt’s native Sinti culture (a Western Europe Roma group). Tatiana Eva-Marie, the jazz vocalist mentioned above, sang only in French and almost put me to sleep. Stephane Wrembel‘s guitar playing woke me up. After returning home, I discovered a recording of Tatiana singing “La Mer” (Beyond the Sea), which our Quail Ridge Chorus sang in English at our concert last month.

While Steve, Jay and Jim played golf the next morning; Maxann, Allene and I read, took a walk, and had lunch at our favorite Low Country restaurant, The Foolish Frog. I especially enjoyed the taste of their Frogwater! The weather was chilly in early April; I look forward to more time on the porch when we return May 1 to meet visitors from England arriving for a special golf tournament.

 

After a quick dinner at Repeal 33, a sister restaurant to Prohibition (which was repealed in 1933), we hurried to Ships of the Sea Garden for Dumpstaphunk. But this band was to the Escher String Quartet (which happened to be performing at the same time several blocks away) as beef jerky is to filet mignon! It was so over-amplified that we soon left and drove an hour back to the Cooley’s home in Beaufort SC to watch Iowa defeat Purdue in the NCAA Women’s Basketball championship semi-finals. Sports can be nourishing, too.

On Saturday afternoon, the Savoy Family presented a delicious gumbo of Cajun music: Marc Savoy on an accordion he had made himself; his wife Ann, guitar & vocals; Joel, fiddle & vocals; and Wilson on piano, fiddle & vocals. When not touring, they live in Eunice, Louisiana. Their songs showed the spectrum of Cajun life from sorrow and lost love to the joy of dance.

I loved seeing Ann accompanying her sons’ violins on her triangle and seeing dancers of all ages take to the dance floor. Click on this link to see two of us getting it on.

Sunday afternoon, the Cooleys and the Smiths attended a stellar afternoon performance by Michael Collins, Ana-Maria Vera, and Philip Dukes. To me, this was the most delicious hour of the Festival:

Max Bruch (1838 – 1920): Four pieces for Viola, Clarinet and Piano, Opus 83

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937: Sonatine, Ana-Maria Vera, Piano

Claude Debussy (1862-1918) Prelude No. 8 La fille aux cheveux de lin (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair), and L’isle Joyeuse, Ana-Maria Vera, piano

Francis Poulenc (1899-1963): Clarinet Sonata, Michael Collins, clarinet, Ana-Maria Vera, piano.

When I play the Mozart Clarinet Concerto with my friend Martin, I think of Salzburg Nockerl, a dessert that Mozart surely enjoyed. Now we have some French clarinet music to explore! What a pleasure it was to visit this veritable smorgasbord of music in Savannah!