Jazz Veteran Finds an Ecstatic Sound

Thursday March 24, 2011

From the Wall Street Journal

Jazz Veteran Finds an Ecstatic Sound
By Larry Blumenfeld

Trumpeter Dave Douglas was just out of high school when he heard a new Lester Bowie LP, “The Great Pretender,” 30 years ago. “Lester was playing the trumpet in unorthodox ways that no one else was doing,” Mr. Douglas recalled recently at a SoHo cafe. “He had a beautiful tone, yet he used it in strange ways. He wasn’t afraid to include ugly sounds. I found that exciting and interesting. Plus, there was this sense of mystery to his music.”

Mr. Bowie, who died in 1999 at 58, was a singular jazz figure. As a member of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and with his own bands (especially Brass Fantasy, a brass-and-drums nonet), he embraced both avant-garde values and the techniques of jazz’s earliest trumpeters, employing smears, blats, growls and half-valve winces in new ways. He covered jazz standards and pop trifles.

Mr. Douglas, through his playing, has revealed Mr. Bowie’s influence from the start. Brass Ecstasy, the quintet he has brought to the Village Vanguard for a six-night run ending Sunday, makes overt reference through its name and its three former Brass Fantasy members: French horn player Vincent Chancey, trombonist Luis Bonilla and tuba player Marcus Rojas.

Read the entire article here

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