Rudresh Mahanthappa

I liked it, but not for reasons you'd normally think. The sound was, well, the sound of panic and utter confusion. But I believe that's about the state of the world right now. It was refreshing to me to be tuned in to the way life is NOW. I just sang Faure's Requiem, and it's a gorgeous work. But to hear something that is going on now was revitalizing, revivifying. It zapped me. I used to live with a guy who built his own instrument and was into microtonal music. I felt like some of the rifts and the style I'd heard before, but it was done very, very well and expressed the rhythms exactly. Well, I don't know it you would call them rhythms. It seemed to me that each guy was up there for himself and played chunks of sounds. There was no melody, no rhythm no interrelationship in parts. When the guy came out with the double-necked guitar, I was on the edge of my seat. I'd read about them but never seen one. I was breathless waiting for him to play the second neck. I was not disappointed. He made such a huge variety of noises, from sitar to heavy metal and back, and the sound was so loud, it was like a tank. If he played that thing walking into a dangerous situation, I know everyone would scramble. This music was cutting edge, experimental, and I congratulate them. My only complaint is the lack of soft/loud, fast/slow dynamics. Wall of sound is in.

The first half of the program featured a blend of Indian classical music (with some tabla and Rez Abbasi on guitar) with energetic jazz, sometimes atonal...the result, for me, was music that had no reference point. There was nothing to hang onto...you were just present in the midst of it. I can't even say it had a beginning or an end. It was more like "on" and "off"...which is very different from a Western approach where you recognize a beginning and know when it's time for the end. I liked it this "groundlessness." because we humanoids constantly seek to anchor ourselves to something "permanent," and when things change, we are all out of kilter. The nature of reality is that things are dynamic, in flux, etc. All things come and go. Rudresh Mahanthappa'a musical interpretations show he understands the Eastern Philosophy/Religion regarding the present moment which is why I call this, "Now Jazz." The second half of the program was strictly Western instruments: stand-up bass (François Moutin), double-guitar (David Fiuczynski), Dan Weiss (Drums) and Rudresh on sax. The caliber of these players individually would blow your mind: put them together and OMG!...the synergy of this level of musicianship reaches a plane most of us have never visited. I was in a trance and in some other galaxy. This is music to be experienced.