Missing Barcelona

Chucho Valdés and The Afro-Cuban Messengers, at the Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona (photo: Lorenzo di Nozzi)

By Larry Blumenfeld (Arts Journal)

I've been back from Barcelona for more than a week, but it seems like yesterday.

If Barcelona is one of the world's most alluring cities--and it is--its Voll-Damm International Jazz Festival must be counted as one of the world's most distinctive and complete jazz events.

The audacious architectural achievements of Gaudí, the searching experimentalism of early works at the Picasso Museum, and the unexpected culinary inventions (what, for instance, Catalan chef Isma Prados can do with tomatoes, strawberries, and sardines) all figure into a novel context for great and adventurous music, and for concert-going in general. The "tenderness sutras," as he calls them, offered by saxophonist Charles Lloyd and his terrific quartet seemed especially radiant there, and both the intimacy and the ostentation of Cuban pianist Chucho Valdés's music were perfectly matched by his setting, the Palau de Música. Not to mention the graciousness of artistic director Joan Anton Cararach, a former music critic himself, his exceedingly lovely wife, Doan Manfugas, whose deeply felt ideas about music owe to her early training in Havana's finest conservatories, and the suave General Director Tito Ramoneda, whose dream of a cultural event linking his city with both New York and Rio de Janeiro seems just crazy enough to work.

(To read more, click here)

Chano Domíngueza 'The New York Times'

Chano, en l'estrena a Barcelona d'El duende de 'Kind of Blue' (foto: Ricard Cugat).

L'arribada de Chano Domínguez i del festival de jazz de Barcelona a Nova York no ha passat inadvertida per dos dels millors crítics de jazz de Nova York, tots dos en actiu (i ben en actiu) a The New York Times. En la seva prèvia setmanal en la qual recomana un concert (que tant pot ser de rock com de pop o de jazz), Ben Ratliff tria la visita de Chano al Jazz Standard amb uns arguments d'una fina solidesa.

Heus aquí la seva prèvia:

Ben Ratliff
Formally, jazz and flamenco aren’t particularly related beyond deep affinities held by musicians for one style or the other. But improvisers learned long ago that they can push music anywhere they like. CHANO DOMÍNGUEZ, the Spanish jazz pianist born in 1960 in Cadiz — flamenco’s birthplace — has done a beautiful job of moving jazz and Spanish music together. His sets typically encompass songs by Thelonious Monk and Bill Evans, the Catalan folk art of Frederic Mompou and Cuban boleros. This week he’s performing his own takes on the music from Miles Davis’s album “Kind of Blue.” His excellent band includes the flamenco singer Blas Córdoba, the bassist Mario Rossy, the percussionist Israel (Piraña) Suárez and the dancer and palmero Tomás Moreno Romero, known as Tomasito. Why does a small band in a jazz club need a dancer? Because some kinds of motion qualify as music. Go see him: you’ll understand.

Dos dies després, en la seva influent llista setmanal, és Nate Chinen qui recomana (les estrelles es donen als concerts més destacats segons l'autor) com una de les grans propostes de la setmana la clausura del 41è Voll-Damm Festival Internacional de Jazz de Barcelona a Nova York.

El seu comentari és aquest: 

 

Nate Chinen
★ CHANO DOMÍNGUEZ FLAMENCO QUINTET (Thursday) “Flamenco Sketches,” a ballad on the epochal 1959 Miles Davis album, “Kind of Blue,” provides a fortunate premise for the Spanish pianist Chano Domínguez, in his second Jazz Standard engagement this year. Leading an explosive ensemble — with several percussionists, including the dancer and palmero (hand clapper) known as Tomasito — Mr. Domínguez presents “The Flamenco Side of ‘Kind of Blue.’ ” His appearance is part of a trans-Atlantic exchange program with the Barcelona International Jazz Festival, now concluding its 41st year.

Quatre dies, 10 sets (tres divendres i tres dissabte). La reserva d'entrades de l'Standard ja indica que no solament s'igualarà sens dubte el 90% de percentatge d'entrades venudes del festival a Barcelona, sinó que es probable que se superi i que les quatre nits a l'Standard es converteixin en un èxit esclatant. De moment, dimarts, l'endemà de la seva arribada a Nova York, Chano serà entrevistat per Josh Jackson pel seu influent programa de ràdio, The Checkout, que serà emès aquella mateixa nit (tota la informació aquí) i pel crític Larry Blumenfeld, que escriurà per The Wall Street Journal un reportatge sobre Chano i el singular desembarcament del festival de Barcelona a la capital mundial del jazz.

Aquest 'Catalan tinge'…

La setmana de jazz catalanobalear a Nova York organitzada aquest maig al Jazz Standard de Nova York dins del festival 'Catalan Days' promogut per l'Institut Ramon Llull continua generant crítiques molt positives. L'última ve firmada per un altre nom de prestigi, Larry Blumenfeld, que –com a bon especialista en la música de Nova Orleans– titula amb grapa el seu article "That Catalan tinge" (referència, és clar, al cèlebre "Spanish tinge" cabdal en l'origen del jazz i que Jerry Roll Morton va fer cèlebre).

L'article, publicat al número de tardor de Jazziz, repassa tant les bondats de la música com les de la cuina d'Isma Prados, convidat especial de la setmana i també una de les estrelles incontestables d'uns dies que van deixar petjada a Nova York. Blumenfeld analitza amb precisió l'actuació de Chano Domínguez i el seu quartet, i també parla amb Alexis Cuadrado, el nostre home a Brooklyn, i amb Joan Anton Cararach, director artístic del festival de jazz de Barcelona. El festival, com ja hem escrit en anteriors ocasions, va assessorar l'Institut Ramon Llull en aquesta setmana jazzística.

A més a més, l'article també esmenta particularment el cicle Variacions sobre Kind of Blue del festival d'aquest any, protagonitzat per Jimmy Cobb, Chano Domínguez i Omar Sosa. "Els promotors de festivals dels Estats Units haurien de prendre nota d'iniciatives tan creatives com aquesta", conclou Blumenfeld.