Birth of the Cool

Between September 25 and October 1 in Melbourne, the Melbourne International Festival of Brass is happening. If you haven’t heard about it, you’re not alone - the smallness of the marketing budget is such that no-one but brass players ever gets to hear about it (and lots of them don’t either), but I’m telling you about it now, and in particular, a concert that I’m playing in.

In 1949, Miles Davis formed what now seems like an unlikely alliance with Gerry Mulligan and put together a nine-piece band to play an assortment of arrangements and compositions by Mulligan, John Lewis and Gil Evans. The instrumentation was rather unusual — a french horn, trombone, baritone saxophone and tuba provide what might be called a robust bottom end, balanced only by Miles’s trumpet and Lee Konitz’s alto exploring the realms above middle C. The effect is that of a mushy centre with a brittle crust — the richness of the lower and middle registers allows licence for all manner of chromatic bizarreness to take place under a comfortable breadth of sonic cover, while the melody lines have the space to soar, plunge, wail or flurry at will. Now and then Mulligan’s baritone emerges from under the doona to play for a while, then goes back to making strange shapes with all the others.

All this is going to be reproduced live by a bunch of very distinguished Melbourne jazz musicians, and me, on Monday 25 September at 6.30pm in Melba Hall, the big white building facing onto Royal Parade from the Parkville campus of Melbourne Uni. Tickets can be bought online from the link above, and I’m pretty sure they’ll be available at the door on the day, too.

September 14, 2006. Uncategorized. 3 Comments.

3 Comments

  1. Francis Xavier Holden replied:

    I’ve got it marked in - I’m not sure if I can make it.

    September 19th, 2006 at 11:26 pm. Permalink.

  2. Suzette replied:

    Good stuff, Dan! My sister and I went and really enjoyed it. That was my first experience of a live brass band - it was terrific. Sorry I didn’t come and say hello afterwards; but you all disapeared and I would have felt like a groupie if I’d hung around. Enjoy the rest of the festival, and thanks!

    September 26th, 2006 at 8:38 am. Permalink.

  3. Dan replied:

    Thanks Suzette — I’m so thrilled that you came along! Shame that we didn’t get a chance to catch up — maybe next time!

    September 27th, 2006 at 9:51 am. Permalink.