Anderson and King of the Bad Plus and Moran perform. | taken by flickr users jerroen and mpix46, respectively
By Giovanni Russonello
Genre-defining, mind-frying jazz is coming to the D.C. area this weekend, but in an unlikely spot: Rosslyn, Va.
In fact, the town has been hosting the Rosslyn Jazz Festival annually for the past 20 years. And tomorrow, Saturday, the 2010 edition welcomes some of the biggest names in the jazz world, including the Bad Plus and Jason Moran’s Bandwagon.
The Bad Plus, a piano trio, have grown world-famous for their singular but ineffable style. Through always-intense, possibly telepathic communication, the members build pulsating sonic puzzles that they seem to have already solved. Shying from standards, the Bad Plus are known for their challenging renditions of songs by the likes of Nirvana and Blondie, and some call the band’s often-thrashing style punk-jazz. Pianist Ethan Iverson also keeps a bountiful blog.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWk-n0ue-wg&fs=1&hl=en_US] The Bad Plus are Iverson, bassist Reid Anderson and drummer David King. Their new album, Never Stop (e1 Entertainment/Universal), hits stores Sep. 14 but can be heard right now thanks to NPR. (See the promotional video above for the band’s thoughts on recording Never Stop.) The record marks the group’s tenth anniversary (an almost unheard-of milestone for jazz combos) by featuring all originals, a Bad Plus first.Which means Saturday will be a celebration of tens, since pianist Jason Moran and his rhythm section earlier this summer released Ten (Blue Note), a meditation on their own 10-year anniversary. D.C. resident Tarus Mateen on bass and drummer Nasheet Waits fill out the group, which calls itself the Bandwagon.
Ten has received widespread and vociferous acclaim for its apparently endless well of reference points and conceptual syntheses (this is Herbie Hancock meeting Rachmaninov to mess around over Monk).
Mateen’s rough-and-tumble technique on the bass is as edgy as it is captivating. A listener can hear him pushing the Bandwagon into more confrontational, rhythmically uncharted territory.
Tierney Sutton, a two-time Grammy-nominated jazz vocalist with a high-class quartet behind her, will close out the festival with an evening performance. Earlier in the afternoon, the also-Grammy-nominated Afro Bop Alliance will kick off the festival with its Latin and Caribbean-influenced music.
20th Annual Rosslyn Jazz Festival Schedule
- Afro Bop Alliance: 1-2 p.m.
- Jason Moran and the Bandwagon: 2:30-3:40 p.m.
- The Bad Plus: 4:05-5:15 p.m.
- Tierney Sutton Band: 5:45-7 p.m.
[…] post a video from that festival shortly. Meantime, here’s a now-outdated preview from last week, featuring a revelatory video on the making of the Bad Plus’ new album. […]