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Who: Herbie Hancock
Where: Gem Theatre
When: 3-2-2005
By Nick Scott
The evening got off to a delayed start because of some technical issues, but once the band finally came on the music was relentless. The crowd just seemed very excited to see this jazz master and his all-star group come to our jazz town. I cannot think of another time I was part of a crowd that gave a standing ovation before the show even began. Herbie and company seemed stunned that this little Midwestern town would have so much jazz love in them. We did not want to disappoint them, and it felt like they wanted the same.
The very first song was "Dolphin Dance", a Herbie Hancock original that was savagely reworked and rearranged. I did not even recognize the tune, but it was nice to see Herbie moving forward instead of looking back. Herbie had a couple of computers set up that he was messing with throughout the show to add electronic effects and such. "Dolphin Dance" seemed to use these effects the best of all songs that night. They mixed in great to add a layer of noise that helped accentuate the music. Throughout the rest of the first set, the electronic sounds seemed forced and a little unnecessary. I like to see jazz artists experiment, but the feeling was never as intense as when Herbie was playing the piano. The entire first set consisted of songs written by Herbie Hancock, Michael Brecker, and Roy Hargrove. Brecker and Hargrove were the Saxophone and Trumpet players respectively in the band. I wondered why it seemed that on some tunes Brecker would lay out, and on some tunes Hargrove would lay out, but once Brecker announced the tunes I realized that they just did not want to out do the composer of each piece.
Surprisingly, my favorite moment in the first set was the interaction between the bass player, Scott Colley and drummer Terri Lyne Carrington. Of all the members of the group, I had not heard these two play yet, but I was not disappointed. I would have liked to see Carrington use brushes a little more, but her sound was edging just towards overpowering, not quite there totally. When the band let the rhythm section play by themselves it was wonderful. It became very obvious that they really held down the music and without them it would have been chaos. When they were featured, they seemed to sprint on the line of rhythm and chaos like a football wide receiver running just along the sideline, but barely in bounds. They worked so well together and had that intuition that a bass player and drummer must have to make a band really jam.
The second set was pure magic. They opened the set with a Wayne Shorter tune that featured Brecker on EWI (electronic wind instrument) it got the crowd nodding and clapping. As they breezed through a few more tunes with more energy and intensity than I have seen in a long time, I just surrendered and enjoyed myself.
If Herbie Hancock is out to prove that jazz is not dead with this tour, then for at least one night in Kansas City, he was right.
