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| Pic by Nick |
In my recent review of Byron Wallen’s excellent album Meeting Ground here, I concluded with the observation: Imagine my happy anticipation of seeing Wallen play at Exeter next week.
That gig last night fully lived up to the expectation,
wonderfully so as I will explain shortly. As ever, The Blue Vanguard Trio
excelled in their support and individual solos, these accompanying the warm
personality and hot playing of Wallen. A set of standards began the evening,
opening with Nat Adderley’s Sack O’ Woe, which included a glorious elongated trill on the horn; a John Coltrane
number, and others I have [as usual] failed to remember by name.
I had to leave at the interval, but the song played just
before this is what made the evening for me, truncated as it was. Wallen
introduced his self-penned song as ‘something outside the box’ and it was to be
Freedom Struggle from his album Meeting Ground. He explained a little
about his travels to North Africa and meeting and playing with musicians there,
expanding to also briefly talk about Morrocan Gnawa music and all these links
to the song which was in many respects about personal survival and surrender.
The playing was sublime, the start a soaring flight over Milverton’s piano
layers, with horn-squeals at its peak, to eventually break into the rhythmic percussion
of Al Swainger on bass and Coach York on drums, this sustained palpably to its
end [especially in the sense that one couldn’t sit still to its playing and instead had
to move with it - for me anyway], Coach, in particular, keeping the fire alive.
I was reliably informed this morning that the post-interval
set was also superb, but I was so pleased to have heard my final
number. It was memorable.
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