Grander than you can imagine…

Excitement
seemed to build higher during the final six days of the Rochester International
Jazz Festival, with a full house for Tony Bennett at the Eastman Theatre on
Wednesday evening and a sold-out Water Street Music Hall for Ray Barretto,
despite the poor sound.

            Festival promoter John Nugent says
the 2003 festival made a modest profit and that he fully expects to go forward
with a festival in 2004. But, as in the past two years, this will depend on
community support.

            “It’s become clear to me that
Rochester has an opportunity to embrace this event in a way never before seen
by the community,” Nugent says. “With an appropriate level of funding to expand
on the high level of music I demand in my festivals, this event could become
the number-one jazz festival in the northeast, if not the entire nation. I know
that’s a bold statement, but I believe 100 percent in my ability to produce and
deliver on what I say I am going to do. I hope I’ve demonstrated this.”

            Among the major acts at this year’s
festival, an overriding theme emerged: the Eastman School of Music as an
influential jazz powerhouse.

            Maria Schneider is the most direct
product of this, having been a graduate student at the school, studying
arranging with Bill Dobbins and Rayburn Wright.

            In introducing her recent work,
“Three Romances,” last Tuesday evening, Schneider explained that the second
section, “Pas de Deux,” was based on the breathtaking motions of her favorite
dancer. She joked that the audience should try to imagine this, despite the
fact that the two soloists were not-so-graceful guys. This proved not to be
difficult as Schneider herself danced her way through conducting the piece.

            Although Schneider would be the
first to downplay the fact that she is a woman, there is something undeniably
significant about a woman composing and arranging a magnificent work like this
and conducting it in front of an all-male band in a branch of jazz that is
overwhelmingly male-dominated.

            The concert also included
saxophonist Rich Perry as featured soloist on Schneider’s beautiful arrangement
of the love theme from Spartacus. The
student ensemble, rehearsed by Dave Rivello, was excellent; percussionist Ted
Poor was particularly outstanding.

            The next evening it was Dave
Brubeck’s turn to credit the Eastman School and Rayburn Wright for opening an
important chapter in his career. His composition, “Elementals,” was first
played in the Eastman Theatre and recorded with Wright and the Eastman Orchestra
in 1963. Brubeck went on to perform it all over the world.

            At 82, Brubeck played with the
dexterity and dynamic range of a 20-year-old, but also with the intelligence
and assurance that can only come with age and experience. His involvement in
the music has not diminished. On tunes like “On the Sunny Side of the Street,”
he leaned deeper into the piano keys as each chorus of his solo grew more
intense than the last.

            Brubeck’s band was marvelous
throughout, but near the end of the concert, on “Take Five,” saxophonist and
flutist Bobby Militello, bassist Michael Moore, and drummer Randy Jones outdid
themselves on absolutely glorious solos. While his band took the spotlight,
Brubeck watched with genuine interest, like a proud father. This is appropriate
because, in the world of jazz, Brubeck has more offspring than he’ll ever know.

            Tony Bennett paid tribute to the
grandeur of the Eastman Theatre. “They don’t build them like this anymore,” he
said. “I’ll show you what I mean.” Bennett then told the technicians to turn
off the microphone and he sang “Fly Me to the Moon” with no trouble reaching
the upper balconies.

            But Bennett also talked about how,
in a way, he owes his career to three Eastman graduates — Goddard Lieberson,
Mitch Miller, and Alec Wilder — who signed him to Columbia Records to record
the first of his over 100 albums.

            If anyone had any doubts about the
strength of Bennett’s jazz roots, he dispelled them with tunes by Gershwin and
Ellington and a band to rival any at the festival. Guitarist Gray Sargent was
simply phenomenal. Perhaps Bennett’s most stirring performance came early, when
he sang Charlie Chaplin’s “Smile.”

            Among those who went to meet Bennett
after the show was vocalist Claudia Acuna. Her two performances at Max’s were
standing-room-only, which is no surprise considering her rising star. With
full-bodied renditions of “My Romance,” “Ay Mariposa,” “Nature Boy,” and other
tunes that she has made her own, Acuna did not disappoint.

            On Thursday evening, Rochester’s own
Mambo Kings brought down the house at Kibourn Hall with compositions by a range
of composers, from Michel Camilo to Horace Silver.

This article appears in Jun 18-24, 2003.