Celebration was truly in the air for Charles Lloyd’s presentation of two of his three recent trio recordings, for as soon as the jazz legend stepped on stage, the audience spontaneously sang “ Happy Birthday” to him. The rest of the 2 hour event was a collection of musical party favors.
The first half of the concert consisted of Lloyd with “Ocean” Trio team of guitarist Anthony Wilson (who’s dad Gerald was at one time Lloyd’s bandleader back in the day) and longtime pianist Gerald Clayton. Once the proponent of mixing rock, world and jazz sounds with a dark and pungent sound, Lloyd over the years has returned to his sonic roots, blowing breathy smoke rings of evocative sighs like Lester Young (and even at times holding the sax like him) with blue sighs on pieces like “Defiant” and “Black Butterfly”. Clayton’s full fingered stride created lovely crystalline ripples, with hints of tunes like “What’s New” while Wilson intently looked to the leader’s musical voices like an attentive conversationalist as he gently strummed and passionately solo’d on “Evanstide>
Switching to the flute, Lloyd gave a whimsical bouncy to the bopping blues of “Third Floor Richard” as Clayton mixed deep pulses with free form extrapolations, making his interdigital muscles stretch to the max on his solo on the hip, happy and fun “Kuan Yin”.
For the second set, tonal guitar master Bill Frisell and modern thinking bassist Larry Grenadier created a completely new set of colors of which Lloyd could use for his musical palate. Lloyd tapped into his inner Johnny Hodges for a swooning “Blood Count’ while Frisell added folksy tunings. The threesome here seemed more conversant than the theme-solo-theme of the first trio, as Frisell and Grenadier gave a rich foundation to the fragrant foam of Lloyd’s tenor on “Ay Amor” while the strings formed haunting cobwebs for “Nu Blues”. Lloyd sighed through his flute on the melancholic and Iberian “Beyond Darkness” , before the evening closed with all members on stage for a gitano’d rendition of “La Llorona”, a mix of Latin quarter serenades, toreador callings and reflective passions.
Having a career that has spanned through musical trends including swing, bebop, hard bop, free, rhythm and blues, rock and psychedelia, Lloyd is the last and leading voice to a generation of ears that still need to be reminded that real soul music is not determined by the beat of the drum, but by the beat of the heart.
Upcoming shows at The Soraya include The Clayton-Hamilton Orchestra with Samara Joy 03/26 and WAR 04/15
photos Luis Luque