“There’s nothing on television,” said Charles McPherson to a packed house at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music Thursday night. It was the first of two sets, and McPherson’s impish welcome was unnecessary. People were there to hear some great jazz. He might have said, “There’s nothing like this on television.” And he would have certainly been right.
McPherson joined Milwaukee native Brian Lynch as guest artists with the Conservatory’s jazz program. Backed by the We Six “house trio,” they offered an object lesson in the way jazz opposites can attract.
McPherson is a fiery post-bop player who made his name with the mercurial ensemble lead by Charles Mingus, and his playing hasn’t lost its heat now that he’s in his 70s. In the helter-skelter Dizzie Gillespie blues that ended the set, McPherson stepped up with blistering runs and the occasional honk. But even in the set’s ballads and medium swing numbers, he pushed the envelope, slipping and sliding across the steady tempo set by the trio, as if the bar lines were only tentative suggestions.
Lynch plays with no less heat, but he tends to match the rhythm beat for beat, his lyrical swing right along with the trio’s agenda. He has a fat, flugelhorn tone that doesn’t hurt his dexterity one bit. And he’s adept at dropping familiar signatures—a little Bird here, a little Monk there—into his lines in just the right place, a sort of challenge to audience attention spans.
McPherson kept everyone on their toes, bringing in standards with fresh arrangements of standard’s like “Spring Is Here” and “Sweet and Lovely,” which started off like a classic soul Stax record before slipping into a easy swing. Pianist Mark Davis, bassist Jeff Hamann and drummer Dave Bayles took a back seat to the featured soloists, but did their part with solid accompaniment and some tasty solos of their own, particularly Hamann, who can dance multi-octave leaps around the fingerboard (plucking harmonics here and there) with beautiful results.
No Tivo necessary.
