Day five at the 2003 Ottawa Bluesfest.
Julian convinced me to go see jazz/blues pianist Michael Kaeshammer, and am I ever glad I did. He played an hour and a half of adventurous, knife-quick songs, ranging from toetapping boogie-woogie to lighter-touched, more lyrical stuff. He and his bandmates (on upright bass and drums) injected everything with flashes of contemporary wit and experimentalism, with unexpected flickers of high-notes, sudden splashes of cymbal. I don't find myself putting much jazz on at home, these days (except for Kind of Blue), but tonight's show reconfirmed my prior realization that live jazz kicks ass three ways to friday. Whereas in lots of other genres (rock, folk, hip hop), I seem to vastly prefer the album-listening experience, with jazz, a live setting is many times more exciting. Not only does the improv feel improvised, you're there to feel the temperature of the air, see the glances between musicians, behold the little things that make the music what it is, and drive it down its spontaneous little paths. You follow the artists' train-of-thought (at least to a higher degree), which lets them surprise you all the more with the harmonic flourishes, the false-endings, the sudden (glorious) resurrections of the melody. Though there were a few places where things were too straight-ahead blues for me (especially when Kaeshammer was singing along), and he sometimes held the same note patterns for too long, it was overall quite terrific.
Then we sauntered over to the mainstage, where 23,000 people were trying to make out Sheryl Crow on the giant screen (seeing her on the stage was a lost cause). The sound wasn't so good (it was quiet, first of all, way in the back), and the 6 or 8 songs we stayed for didn't make any impression. (I went nuts, though, trying to figure out who she was covering on "The First Cut is the Deepest." My exchange with Julian went like this:
[Sheryl is singing "The First Cut is the Deepest."]
Sean: Do you recognize this song?
Julian: No.
S: It's a cover, but I can't remember what.
J: Oh.
S: It's driving me crazy!
J: [shrugs]
[I spend five minutes making groaning sounds, rolling my eyes, singing the song to myself, making comments like "I think the original was sung by a black guy." ... "Maybe not." ... "It's either from a long time ago or really recent. Maybe." Julian is simply doing a lot of shrugging.]
S: Argh, what was it!?
J: How did it go, again?
S: Uh... "The first cut is the deepest, uh, baby I know... the first cut is the deepest. Um. Na na na."
J: Oh. That's Cat Stevens.
S: Yes! [slaps forehead] But you didn't recognize it when she was actually performing?
J: [shrugs]
All I know is that there will certainly be a lot (ie, several hundred) of disappointed people, tomorrow, who paid $35 to get into the grounds, only to witness a performance that they experienced in lesser quality than they would have at home on TV. And the beer was more money.
Posted by Sean at July 9, 2003 12:44 AM