Bowl full of jazz

Bowl' full of jazz

■ Michael Mondezie

'We can make it if we try, just a little harder!'

A packed Naparima Bowl courtyard harmonised in full voice those timeless Black Stalin (Leroy Calliste) lyrics, when the southern performance venue staged its second annual Jazz Festival last Saturday.

Singer John G (John Greenidge), appearing with the Dominant Seventh Calypso Jazz Band, led the chorus with a defiant raised fist. Moments earlier, John G 'shouted out' Stalin's widow, Patsy Calliste, who responded with a raised fist of her own, from the front row.

It was the second week in a row jazz acts on the islands tipped a hat to the late calypso composer/ singer. Calypso icon David Rudder teamed with veteran American pannist Andy Narell to pay homage to Stalin a week earlier, on March 30.

While Rudder and Narell were sincere in intention and near perfect in execution, there was something unmatchable about hearing Stalin's music in his hometown of San Fernando. Dominant Seventh bandleader Rellon Brown summed up the moment best when he set aside his trumpet to put lips to microphone during their memorable set. 'We grow up listening to Stalin. We want to showcase the music of the classic arrangers as well. It was always well done. Give a round of applause to the arrangers of yesterday. These are the guys whose shoulders we stand upon.

'As you well know we didn't have a music programme here in Trinidad and Tobago to teach these guys. These guys are self-taught. Guys like Earl Rodney and Art De Couteau, to name a few. These guys were really gifted and really honed their craft,' Rellon said, evoking more rousing applause from the knowledgeable audience.

Canadian saxophonist Monik Nordine showed her pedigree with a moving solo atop Stalin's 'Kaiso Gone Dread' that shut eyes and swayed heads. It was left to John G, however, to emphatically close Dominant Seventh's set with a stirring cover of Stalin's 'Caribbean Man' that lifted sections of the audience out of their white folded chairs.

De ras, ensemble and diva Nigel Rojas picked up the intensity on his acoustic guitar when he appeared moments later to play American George Benson's 'Masquerade' and Mexican Luis Miguel 'Besame Mucho'. Rojas later drew howls of delight from the audience when he slowed his strum to find reggae legend Bob Marley's cadence on 'Natural Mystic'.

UWI Arts Jazz Ensemble transitioned the now crammed audience from the small confines of the courtyard to open spread of the Bowl's amphitheatre with a foot-tapping rendition of Tetsuya Shibata and Mitsuhiko Takano's 'Clock Tower Stage'. The Khion De Las-led musical combo brought a pure jazz sound to the festival with the originals 'Only See Minor Things', 'War Looms' and 'Wrong Class' before bringing the performance home with the Caribbean jazz number, 'Outta Pocket'.

Enter Charmaine Forde. With the relocated audience primed and ready, the well-travelled singer showed exactly why her talents were in high demand the world over with a sonically pleasing jazzy interpretation of Mical Teja's (Mical Williams) Carnival 2024 Road March winner, 'DNA'.

Forde, a former television talk-show host and radio DJ in her home bases of Toronto, Canada, and later Miami in the US, further contorted faces in the audience with covers of American singer/composer Bobby Caldwell's 'What You Won't Do For Love' and The Temptations' 'Just My Imagination'.

Forde ended as she had begun, with an up-tempo reprise of Teja's sing-along road jam that put the perfect seal on Naparima Bowl Jazz and left the engaged audience wanting more.

Heartfelt: A dancer performs at the Naparima Bowl Jazz Festival last Saturday. -Photos: TREVOR WATSON

SAXY LEAD: Canadian saxophonist Monik Nordine, second from left, plays a solo on Stalin's 'Kaiso Gone Dread' during a guest appearance with the Dominant Seventh Calypso Jazz Band.

FOR STALIN: Singer John G (John Greenidge) performs the late Black Stalin's classic 'We Can Make It' during his set-stealing appearance with the Dominant Seventh Calypso Jazz Band.

ROJAS' REGGAE: Singer/ guitarist Nigel Rojas delivers an emotive cover of reggae legend Bob Marley's 'Natural Mystic'.