a T-shirt that read, “I AM a jazz musician.”
- ah, now
there's a merch idea!
The Globe Review
Krall returns to her jazz roots
J.D. CONSIDINE
29 June 2005
The Globe and Mail
Context, as they say, is everything.
The last time Diana Krall performed at Toronto's Hummingbird Centre, it was on the heels of her chart-topping 2004 release The Girl in the Other Room. Thanks to the inclusion of a half-dozen originals, composed in collaboration with husband Elvis Costello, The Girl was seen as more of a pop effort than a jazz album, and Krall's performance seemed split between the two worlds.
This time, Krall returned as part of the Toronto Jazz Festival, and there was no mistaking where her focus lay. Gone were the overt pop references and tunes by Joni Mitchell, Tom Waits and Chris Smithers; in their place were bop licks and songs by Harold Arlen, Cole Porter, Mose Allison and Bob Dorough.
And while she certainly spent time at the microphone, Krall generally seemed more interested in showing her stuff as a pianist and bandleader — so much so that you'd almost forget she ever made platinum-selling albums.
Of course, that's what listeners expect at a jazz festival, and if any of Krall's fans were disappointed by the shift in emphasis, it wasn't audible in their response. Indeed, not only were the members of the capacity crowd expectedly enthusiastic, they occasionally accorded Krall's playmates more applause than their boss.
Fair enough, because her quartet performed with enough fire and improvisational vigour to have been mistaken for an instrumental group with vocals, rather than a singer's backup band. Although the lineup was largely the same as last year, with new drummer Karriem Riggins joining veterans Anthony Wilson on guitar and Robert Hurst on upright bass, the playing was much more ambitious.
Wilson set the pace early on with a lean, angular solo in the set-opening I Love Being Here with You that evoked the harmonic adventurism of Pat Martino, which Hurst matched with a jaw-dropping flurry of notes. Clearly these guys came to play, and Krall wasn't about to be outdone, delivering a solo whose escalating cascade of notes ended in a two-fisted cluster of chords, pushing against the pulse with Brubeckian daring.
She may have been decked out in her signature little black dress, but Krall's playing was most likely wearing a T-shirt that read, “I AM a jazz musician.”
Not that she entirely turned her back on her pop side. Her version of her husband's Almost Blue was offered without solos (apart from some arco obbligati by Hurst), and the show-closing rendition of Departure Bay was presented singer/songwriter-style, with Krall alone at the piano, locked deep within her memories and emotions.
But The Girl in the Other Room was given a treatment no different than 'Deed I Do, with Wilson taking an oblique, almost dissonant approach to the lush chord structure and Riggins focusing more on witty accents than basic backbeat. Even more impressive was Little Girl Blue, a Janis Joplin oldie Krall announced as having been “inspired by Louis Armstrong,” and which the group rendered as though composed by Allison. No pop pandering there.
Best of all, there was a fearlessness to the performance suggesting that Krall and crew were more than happy to stretch out and take chances. Arlen's My Shining Hour, for instance, was allowed to accelerate into a brisk bop workout that, at times, seemed almost too fast for Wilson to handle. But rather than fuss over articulation, the guitarist simply charged ahead, pushing the harmonic envelope and egging the rhythm section on. It was as if the group were playing a round of “top this,” and damned if each soloist didn't.
In all, it was the sort of showing likely to leave jazz snobs wondering why Krall doesn't play like this all the time. Which is perhaps a bit unfair; after all, if those millions of fans wanted aggressive hard bop, they'd be pushing Abbey Lincoln up the charts. Besides, the fact that Krall can make a pop-friendly album and play uncompromising mainstream jazz is itself worthy of applause.
Even if it only happens at jazz festivals.
Posted: 29 Jun 2005, 00:19