Brian Slattery Photos
Morris.
Sitting on the stage of the recently opened State House on State Street, guitar improv maestro Joe Morris revealed that he grew up in New Haven and remembered the space from his childhood. He reminisced about the Horowitz Brothers store, which had been just around the corner. He looked around at a building that was, for him, steeped in history.
“It’s really nice to be able to play here,” he said. “I love New Haven. Beautiful things happen here.”
Morris and his trio were the headliner for a Thursday night show at the State House that was part of Jazz Haven‘s ongoing Jazz Week, featuring jazz in its many diverse forms from Aug. 17 to Aug. 26. Thursday night, gearing up for a nine-event weekend across Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, featured three events of its own. The Ric Cunningham duo performed earlier in the evening at Harvest, and at Stella Blues it was jazz fusion night. The State House, meanwhile, was showcasing jazz’s more avant-garde side.
The New Haven Improvisers Collective fielded the Light Upon Blight Ensemble — Jeff Cedrone and Bob Gorry on guitars, Pete Brunelli on bass, Richard Brown on sax, and Peter Riccio and Tom Hogan on drums — to warm up the audience who stood or sat on the floor on the State House to hear them. Hogan clicked off four quick beats on drumsticks and the band exploded. Hogan, Riccio, and Brunelli worked together to produce big lurching grooves, while Cedrone, Gorry, and Brown sometimes took turns, sometimes paired off, and sometimes all played at once to create an interlocking, propulsive cacophony.
Riccio and Hogan.
As the band members moved through their set, they played a few songs from their new album, Streamline Moderne, and dedicated an expletively titled song to the current sitting head of state; they settled on a buzzing drone like a swarm of angry hornets while Brown threw out peals of notes and the drums and bass pulsed on. Light Upon Blight finished with a number based on a searching motif redolent of North Africa that ended with Brown and Gorry stepping aside for a moment so Cedrone could sweep the audience with sliding tones from his guitar. The drummers then took it out, playing off each other just long enough to bring it back to that motif and take it out. A gracious Gorry made it clear that the members of Light Upon Blight were just as excited to see Morris and his group as the assembled crowd was.
After showing his hometown pride, Morris and his trio — himself on guitar, Brad Barrett on bass, and Eric Stilwell on trombone — showed why Morris has had an international career playing improvised music since the 1970s. Morris began the set with a few spacious notes. Barrett fell in on bass. Stilwell offered a counterpoint. The trio then began passing around ideas faster and faster. Things got a little frantic, then subsided. Morris and Barrett shared a moment of lyricism that gave way to a buzzing tone from Stilwell, who opened the door to more frenzy. Morris began to pull sounds from his guitar that didn’t sound like a guitar. He made his instrument sound like a far away, struggling string section, creating an atmosphere that let Barrett and Stilwell roam free. Barrett took the chance for a solo that Morris, in time, joined him on. Stilwell built it up further, until the three of them were making something symphonic, full of melodies and harmonies, an expanding palette of textures and sounds. For a moment things got quiet again, and it sounded like it might be the end. Then it seemed Morris found yet another approach, another direction to go in, and Barrett and Stilwell followed. In time, they ended, but only because it felt right. Their playing made it clear that the ideas would never really end.
Jazz Haven’s Jazz Week continues throughout the weekend through Sunday, Aug. 26 at various venues around town. Check Jazz Haven’s calendar here for full listings.