Concert Review-Ray Brown Trio in 1999

Although every college student is expected to study, their college life will be worthless unless they find something fun to do. I decided that enjoying jazz was the best thing to do for fun, and I was hoping to go to a good jazz concert some day in my college life. Fortunately, the hope was fulfilled in Oakland. I went to the concert of Ray Brown Trio with my friends, and I can say that their performance gave me a one- night sweet dream.

The concert was held at a Japanese sushi restaurant, which is called Yoshi's. I was wondering if the place would be quite small because it was a restaurant, but to my surprise, Yoshi's was large, and about two hundred people in the audience were waiting for the start in the concert hall.
When I went into the hall, I soon realized that the restaurant was very famous as a place where jazz concerts are held, because there were many pictures of famous jazz players such as Oscar Peterson, Miles Davis, Marian Macpartland, and Toshiko Akiyoshi. The hall was filled with an atmosphere that I had never experienced before.

The three members of the trio were introduced by announcement, and they showed up on the stage in turn: Geoff Keezer on piano, Karriem Riggins on drums, and finally the leader Ray Brown on bass. Ray Brown is one of the most influential bassists; he was discovered by the outstanding trumpeter, Dizzy Gillespie who asked Brown to join his band.

Brown began to work with Charlie Parker in spite of his young age of 17. His brilliant talent has always been in the mainstream of jazz history. One noticeable fact of his career is that Brown joined the Oscar Peterson trio as a regular bass player from 1951 to 1966. It was clear that he had become the most sophisticated bassist at that time, but he never stopped practicing bass after he got such prestige.

There are three songs that I would like to discuss on that concert. The first song is called "West Coast Blues," which was written by the guitarist, Wes Montgomery. The up tempo song was played as a third song; however, while I was listening to the song, I could not tell that it was blues because it sounded so peculiar. Although I tried following the twelve bars blues form over and over, it seemed more than twelve bars. I did not know why it was happening, but when I saw the score, I realized that the time of the song was different from typical blues. While I had already known that the typical blues is in 4/4 time, the song was in 6/4 time. I thought it was very interesting. The other important thing is that after the piano solo, bass and drums began to "call and response" in stead of playing bass solo. After that, they moved to a drums solo, and Karriem played very fast; it sounded like thunder.

The second song called "Things ain't what they used to be," was composed by Duke Ellington in 1941. The song was very familiar to me because it was one of my favorite songs in his collection. Moreover, I had once listened to it in class before the concert. They played it in cerebration of his birth one hundred years ago. Actually, they also played Ellington's tune "Cottontail," but I definitely liked the former song. Before I listened to it, I had hated the bass sounds, and believed that the bass could not be a main part of the songs, but I was completely wrong. Ray Brown started the song with his solo, which was about four minutes long. It was a fairly long solo; however, I did not get bored at all, and I think all people there were attracted by the sounds produced from his big fingers, which were longer and bigger than normal fingers.

The audience was mainly middle-aged people, and they clapped their hands not only after songs or each solo but also when they noticed songs that they were familiar with. Ray Brown sometimes urged the audience to clap by indicating the player's back when one was playing solo. In the last part of the concert, Ray Brown brought out a special guest, Kevin Mahogany. Then, the audience got really excited.

Kevin Mahogany started his musical career when he was 12 years old. Although he is primarily a singer now, he did not begin with singing; in stead, he learned playing saxophone at the Charlie Parker Academy. It was around the time that he was a university student that he got interested in singing and decided to be a singer. The tall and fat jazz singer was very good at joking as well as singing. He told the audience some jokes before he sing, and all the people laughed very much. I think that joking is really an important strategy to attract the audience in the beginning, and he was very good at doing that.

I was so impressed because all the people were crazy about Mahogany, even before he started singing. What I liked about him is that he had a very smooth, rich and warm voice, but it could never be told from his looks.

I was so glad that I could experience his wonderful ability. Especially, when he was singing a kind of jazz-fusion song called "Still Swinging," which he composed himself, I was so impressed by his scat singing. The song was very quick, but his "verbal improvisation" was very fluid and clear.
It is very hard to describe concert on paper, but I would like to mention that it was a great concert. All the performers had wonderful talent, and there was an active relationship between the audience and the players.

Fortunately, I had a good table, which was in the second row, thanks to the welcome priority for handicapped people. The most valuable thing is that I could see the concert from different points of view. I think that during the concert, I could tell the songs by referring to musical forms that I knew. I experienced an enjoyable and precious night, and at the same time, spent only twenty-three dollars for a ticket to my dream.