Art Ensemble Of Chicago

On a dreary Sunday morning in a freezing Milanese January, my curiosity gets the better of my proverbial laziness, and I decide to face an exhausting early rise (!?) topped off with total gridlock traffic: armed with a tram ticket (but also with a discman — "Isn't Anything" by My Bloody Valentine: excellent, folks!... we'll talk about that another time, though) I leave the house shivering, heading for the Teatro Manzoni, where, shortly after, I'll be lucky enough to witness the best jazz concert of my listening career.

Waiting for me is a monstrous line at the box office; but the friends I'd arranged to meet have already gotten their hands on the precious tickets, so we get in without any trouble.

At around 11:20, Roscoe Mitchell (saxophone) takes the stage followed by Malachi Favors (double bass), Don Moye (drums and percussion), and the great Joseph Jarman (saxophone), who only yesterday, after a ten-year hiatus devoted to spiritual pursuits, rejoined the Art Ensemble Of Chicago lineup for good — the band that, more than any other, has managed to fuse jazz, avant-garde, and African-American music. The only one missing is the great trumpeter Lester Bowie, who, sadly, "left the city" in 1999 but, as is romantically noted during the opening introductions, is present in spirit among his musician friends... Jarman, Favors, and Moye — dressed as African tribesmen, complete with painted faces! — mark out, together with Mitchell, the first twenty minutes of music with percussive sounds of hypnotic, tribal cadences, showing an audience in reverent silence how jazz is (was?) an inspired, fervent, and ironic music (helped along by the heavy use of toy instruments).

The territory here is avant-garde jazz, and the echoes of their masterpiece "Fanfare For The Warriors" are frequent. The structure of the concert is dynamic: a rising climax that lends tension to every new instrumental addition. The peak is reached when Mitchell, setting aside percussion, picks up the flute (every musician in the group handles hundreds of instruments with ease, all of them laid out on stage) and begins delighting listeners with characteristic free-jazz hiccups, followed by Jarman on saxophone and by the celebrated, superb pianist Kirk Lightsey, special guest of the Milan date, who walks on stage at that very moment.

The audience, initially a bit skeptical, is now tuned in to the frequencies of the great African-American combo.

Mitchell, with his torrential phrasing, is the group's real drawcard… He sometimes plays alto and baritone saxophone simultaneously in a dazzling display of showmanship, without ever losing sight of the inspiration and meaning behind what he's doing. No room for self-indulgence, to put it briefly…

The five musicians are having fun, joking around and showing off the experience built up over thirty-five years of career: this is a case of true virtuosos at work.

The show lasts about an hour and a half, during which anything and everything happens, and the minutes between start and finish seem to fly by. A memorable performance, rich in ideas, quirks and pathos.

Ride the wave of great music

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