Jazzes

I went to see Tatsuya Nakatani and Assif Tsahar at DKDC last night. Recently saw Tatsuya at Big Ears (and it was incredible) so I was excited to see he came here to Memphis. I wasn't familiar with Assif but he plays saxophone so it was more of a free jazz performance than before. It was pretty cool getting to see and note the similarities and differences in his performance in two different setups so close together. Tatsuya made a lot of the same kinds of sounds with his drums (UGH! I just lost my post and was almost finished and had tried to back it up but only up to here was saved! so I'm annoyed that I have to now try to reconstruct all my thoughts! anyway...back to where I was...something about or like: it seems like his mission is to dredge every sound possible out of his drums) but he gave more space for the other performer to move around in as well. They'd occassionally drop out and let the other play solo (not so much solos) and his playing would unsurprisingly be more reminiscent of what he did at Big Ears. I mean, it wasn't diametrically opposed or anything. By himself it was more abstract and with the saxophone player it was more jazz (although very free, avant-garde, and (to sound self-contradictory) abstract jazz). Assif is a great saxophone player too. We even got an encore, and it was kinda adorable 'cuz they seemed a little surprised by it. "Does this mean we do an encore?" And while it was short, it was incredibly intense. Assif came on with a veritable assault on the sax. I think we got a pretty rare treat seeing them play together as it's the first time they've toured the US together. They've toured Europe and Japan together before though. Tatsuya lives in New Mexico but Assif is from Israel. I was worried at first there was going to be a pretty bad turnout but it ended up being alright. I got there right when the show was "supposed" to start and there was almost no one there (figured it would start close to on time since it was an early show and there was going to be another show after). It only started about thirty minutes later and by that time a decent crowd showed up. It wasn't packed or anything, but it was respectable. It was actually pretty nice as it wasn't so packed as DKDC often is but with the small space it felt very intimate. And both of the musicians weren't mic'd or anything. So all the sound was right there. And they even had some quiet passages where they were both just breathing into their instruments (Tatsuya also had some auxiliary thing that he'd blow into, not sure exactly what it was) and everyone was so quiet and rapt at attention that you could hear it clearly, just this blowing sound. I picked up a few cds afterwards: Nakatani Gong Orchestra: Live Concert at Silo City, Tatsuya Nakatani: Gong, Assif Tsahar/Tatsuya Nakatani: I Got It Bad, and Assif Tsahar/William Parker/Hamid Drake: In between the Tumbling a Stillness. Luís was there and got to talk to him a bit. Also talked to this Andrew guy that I'd met before, though only ever briefly, at the first Memphis Concrète and a few other shows around. Small world as he's friends with Peter from fasttrack and he was there too but I didn't recognize him at first 'cuz his head and facial hair are completely different. Talked to him a while as well. Anyway, good time, great show. Hopefully I remembered everything I'd said before. I actually remembered a few things I'd forgotten to mention the first time so maybe it wasn't all bad in spite of my brief bout of petty rage when it first happened!