Ass. gigs

I've decided to put up a few selected images from Banff with each posting. Here is a shot from a performance at The Club, with part of a wind octet doing a piece by Gunhild Seim from Norway. She was another one of the composers in our residency and she wrote some lovely pieces, particularly this octet. Pictured from l to r are yours truly, Ken Hoffman and Audrey Ochoa both of Edmonton, tenor phenom Mike Ruby from Toronto and the pride of Pitt Meadows, talented composer and trumpeter Carl Anderson.

I've played a number of assorted gigs since I returned to Vancouver in May that held some significance for me.

The first was with the Wanda Nowicki group at Rime, the first time we played there. I had some trepidation as to whether or not this was a suitable venue for the group. We we sufficiently ironically hip? Worldbeat melange? Whatever, in the end, we were a good fit for the room. We had a good crowd and many stayed to listen for the whole evening. It's always a bit hit and miss when I've played there - you never know what sort of audience you may get. I've also got a theory that when the people in the back of the room see a drum kit onstage, that is permission for them to talk loudly all night.

It was my first AD (after discovery?) gig with the group and they all heard something different in my playing. That was really good for me, but what I really dug about the gig was a couple of times when we all internalized the time as a group. That's something that we hadn't done before and something that I've been on them about, since the time is not always super-solid with these guys. It's something that I admire in groups like Kate Hammett-Vaughan's or Mike Allen's. Anyways we had a taste of it that night and I want more. Part of it may have been the setup of the stage at Rime which makes it much more like a performance than backround wallpaper at other restaurants we play. With Cem's departure from the management team there, I hope we can get back there soon. Emir certainly liked this group and ion Zoo as well.

Speaking of ion Zoo, the following Monday was a set at the Cellar with an expanded version of that group. With the addition of Marianne Trudel and Seattle cellist Paul Rucker, we go by the name of Fuzzy Logic. This group only gets to play once or twice a year and we had an instant chemistry from the first time we got together for a gig in Seattle. Paul arrived in town the day of the gig and we rehearsed at Clyde's place. Sure enough, the magic was there from the first notes we played. This is the only group where I expect brilliance all the time, and the rehearsal only bore out this belief.

We were the second half of the double bill at the Cellar that night. There was quite a long changeover between the two groups and Raymon Torchinsky was pulling out all the stops to get the recording gear set up as quickly as possible, but there were inevitable glitches to work out. We eventually sort of slid from an extended soundcheck into our set. Much to our dismay, for the first time, that spark wasn't there right off the get-go. We all tried ways of pushing it along to reach our customary zone, but it took a long time to gel. It got progressively better and in my opinion, the last piece was breathtaking, with all five of us twisting and turning together through an improvised song. Afterwards, musicians in the audience asked if the piece was written. It wasn't. The concept of spontaneous group composition is very exciting for me and when it happens for me as a performer or a listener, I think it is one of greatest aspects of improvised music.

Listening to the recording later on, the whole set sounded relatively good, getting better as it went along. But each of us had the same immediate reaction after the gig was done, that for the first time ever we had failed to achieve our group potential. In other words, we weren't brilliant right off the mark.

This all led to some very interesting and productive discussions amongst us and with other improvising musicians. That group mindset, the "zone", whatever you may call it is a very elusive thing to capture. We were very fortunate to have had that chemistry from the start, but it turned out we were quite unprepared as a group as far as having ways to deal with the music if things weren't there from the start. Some of us over-played, some under-played, but we didn't seem to have the trust in ourselves just to ease up and let it happen. As I say, you can't push a chain.

In the end, after listening to the recording, yes it was a good gig. But the real value in it was the learning we gleaned from figuring out why we didn't gel immediately and how we can recover onstage if things aren't really working. I am just honoured to be part of a group where we can improvise at such a high level and have such high expectations.

Throughout this whole time, there was bit of a dark cloud hanging over my head. The SongRoom was fast approaching and I had not finished my composition or worked out all of the logistics to pull the performance off. It was time to get it together.