shanghai jazz scene .com

A few shows have happened over the last couple of days, so I’m reviewing (or mentioning) them all in a single fell swoop of a post.

The Core at Glamour Bar

First of all, I made it down to the bund to listen to The Core on their final night in Shanghai a few nights ago. It was an enjoyable show, one of the few jazz groups that is perhaps a perfect fit for the Glamour Bar in terms of both style and the sound filling the space effectively. As I mentioned in the post before this, they were channeling John Coltrane’s second quartet sound, and hearing them live it was apparent that they draw quite a lot of inspiration from that particular group and its members in many ways. But thankfully they do so while maintaining their own individuality, creating their own unique group sound as well. But the influence of the members of Coltrane’s most famous quartet is unmistakable in most of these players, with a strong dose of McCoy Tyner apparent in the pianist’s sound, Elvin Jones’ characteristic fullness in the drummer’s playing, and of course late-era Coltrane in the saxophonist’s quick vibrato and powerful tone. So for me the general effect was that the melodies of songs were quite original and the arrangements interesting, and then the solo sections had the effect of Coltrane’s spirit entering the room. It was intense!

I think it fit the club because the Glamour Bar tends to have great attendance for things like this, whether edgy avant-garde or other jazz groups, yet oftentimes people who come might only listen for a short while and talk the rest of the time. Of course, the hard core jazz listeners usually turn up on time, while the socialites come a bit later, so the prime listening time for all these shows is the first set before too many people are talking. However, this group was a good fit for the social tendencies of its audience that day because they had the raw power to reach all corners of the room no matter how loud the conversation level was.

The music itself was lots of fun to listen to, with a nice amount of tunes in odd time signatures (they opened the show with the tune in 7 that I heard on their website) and a few with characteristically Scandinavian harmonies (lots of major triads changing in quick succession). The players all have mad skills and are well-rooted in the jazz tradition (especially the tradition of Coltrane’s second classic quartet–did I mention that already?) while also expressing something unique and interesting individually.  So I was glad I went.

Lawrence Ku trio at the Oriental

I’d be cheating if I said I went to hear Lawrence Ku’s trio at the Oriental Arts Center yesterday afternoon, so I won’t claim that I did. However, I heard from others that it was a good show, featuring Shanghai’s favorite Australian drummer Nicholas McBride and bassist Peter Scherr who is up from Hong Kong for a few shows. They played a program of mostly Thelonious Monk tunes. Did you happen to catch the show? Liked it? Hated it? Leave a comment!

ETH Big Band at JZ last night

A few different things have been happening at JZ in the absence of some of the regular bands who play Sundays and Mondays while the regular players are on tour in North America. Coco Zhao’s band is playing a few shows in Canada and the States, so his regular Sunday night slot has been filled this week by a student big band from an institute of technology from Switzerland (ETH). The regular Monday night band is usually run by EJ Parker, who plays in Coco’s band. Replacing that group has been a band run by trumpeter Theo Croker playing lots of great original music. Anyway, back to the topic at hand–the ETH big band.

What struck me first about this band was the strength of their lead trumpeter. Also their percussionist was pretty great. The arrangements the band played were mostly pretty modern-sounding and interesting, I didn’t recognize most of what they played. Generally speaking, this was a pretty solid band, but some of the members were not as solid as others, which made it clear that it was a student band. Still nice to listen to anyway.

I’ve just returned from a fantastic trip to Yunnan, and decided I really have to bring a band out there for a bit of a Southwest China tour. It’s too nice a place to be not to go more. However, the perennial problem when leaving town is, of course, keeping you up to date on what’s going on here on the jazz scene. Once again I’ve gotten slightly behind in that front, but hopefully you’ll catch this post in time to get down to Glamour tonight for Norwegian jazz band The Core. They played last night there already, and will do again tonight for their last show here in Shanghai.

I’ve listened to sound samples from their website, and the music is all impressive. Definite references to Coltrane (they’re definitely channeling the second quartet in the tune I’m listening to now) but not in a copycat way, but rather in an energetic way, which I have a feeling is going to make their live show amazing.

RMB 50
Wed May 7, 9pm
Glamour Bar: 5 on the Bund, 6F
(021) 6350 9988, 6329 3751

Since I didn’t make it to last night’s show at twocities, I made a special effort to go hear the Canadian piano-cello duo this afternoon at Glamour Bar, and enjoyed it.  The two players are both quite virtuosic on their respective axes, not to mention well versed in both the classical and jazz realms.  And though there were plenty of jazz and classical influences present in the music, most of it was generally unclassifiable, eclectic melanges of various world rhythms and tonalities.  Overall lots of fun…it made me think how (even more) exciting it would be to hear the two leading a larger ensemble playing the same music.

The two mainly performed pieces from their album twotet/deuxtet including Wash Away (inspired by a dream in which Chopin meets Ray Charles), Huevos Verdes Y Jamon (a springy tune with a Latin feel featuring percussive cello playing), Sniffinâ?? Around, and Spirit Dance.

One listener I interviewed felt that Matt Brubeck (who is actually American, but is now based in Toronto) had an uncanny resemblance to Samuel Beckett.  However it is unverifiable currently due to the lack of pictures online of Beckett in his youth.

Well, as we reported a while back, the word on the street was that the live music was going to stop completely at the Blues Room. Fortunately, that has proven untrue, with a new band playing three nights a week. The new group playing there, headed by Willow Neilson, features various musicians and vocalists on different nights. The core group, however, includes Erica Li on vocals, Steinar Nickelson or Sean Higgins on organ, and Nicholas McBride on drums. The trio’s name is “Three point strike”, possibly a reference to the burgeoning kung fu prowess of the band leader. They rock out with a mix of not only jazz but also funk, afro-beat, soul, and R&B flavors among other musical stylings.

Three point strike is playing three days every week: Thursday (from 10pm to 1am), Friday and Saturday (11pm to 2am), and I believe they have ditched the Southern soul food menu and are serving the same food as the City Diner upstairs.

The Blues Room. 146 Tongren Lu.

Live music now every Thursday, Friday and Saturday night.