Steve
Griggs - Reviews
Jones
for Elvin - Volume 1
CD review
by Jason West from AllAboutJazz.com (November 1999)
Imagine yourself
stepping out of an old barn-turned-music studio and into a lush, green
pasture surrounded by Evergreen trees. The early afternoon sun is high
overhead—it’s a clear, spring day—and you’re about to record your first
CD as a leader. Sitting next to you is one of the world’s most admired
jazz drummers, Elvin Jones. He flips through your charts and asks you
to sing some of the melodies. You do and moments later embark on the
most memorable musical experience of your career.
"Playing with Elvin
was like coming home," says Steve Griggs without hesitation. On May
19, 1998 the Seattle saxophonist/composer—whose unique talents are sure
to influence scores of players and composers fortunate enough to hear
his music—and a group of local musicians including trumpeter Jay Thomas,
guitarist Milo Peterson, and double bassist Phil Sparks recorded with
Elvin Jones for the first of a three-day session at Bear Creek Studios
in Woodinville, WA. Vintage microphones were used to record onto two-inch
analog tape. The quintet itself played together in the Bear Creek’s
spacious mainroom, unhampered by sound-isolation booths, allowing for
optimal interaction among the musicians. A small group of friends and
relatives, including Elvin’s wife Keiko, attended the sessions. In the
spirit of their favorite Blue Note recordings, producer Griggs and engineer
Joe Hadlock ran this session as intimately as possible, keeping distractions
to a minimum and giving the musicians every opportunity to lift the
music from the page and make it sing. The result: Jones for Elvin sings,
and as the title suggests, it definitely swings. Its nine songs are
studded with melodic and harmonic jewels set off by Elvin, the rhythmic
centerpiece.
At 72, Elvin Jones’
legacy is well established. A summary of his career would take more
room than is available here. More than once his drumming has changed
the course of jazz, most notably as a member of John Coltrane’s groundbreaking
quartet.
"He would sweep
his brush across the (snare drum) head for the whole bar and it felt
like a wave coming up on the beach," says Griggs in reference to Elvin’s
playing on Ellington’s "In a Sentimental Mood," captured in one sensuous
take.
Jones’ brushwork,
his rim-shot accents, the bearhug rumble of toms, ubiquitous cymbals
that crash like affirmations, his transcendental growl—it’s all here.
Listen to his time-feel on the title cut; how Elvin swings. Such stuff
defies description.
Great artists demand
great themes to improvise upon, and Griggs’ compositions prove fertile
ground. "I try to write from emotions," Steve relates. "Sometimes I
write from theory or rhythm, but usually it’s a matter of living with
a mood or an emotion and trying to figure out what that sounds like."
Sounds like the
crazy-legs blues of Jay’s Maze—that find the Thomas in his element,
and climax with a Griggs/Jones energy duet; the cyclical triplet-pull
of Sparks; the me gusta Latin/swing propelling You’re the Berries—these
sounds, to name a few, jump out. Rich ensemble parts pairing the blue
and green tone of Griggs and Thomas’ horns texture every tune.
My personal favorite—and
the sincerity of this music encourages the personal—is a waltzing lullaby
written for Steve’s wife, Doris, entitled Healing. During the tenor
solo, there is a moment when the moonlit, andante tempo is sliced by
lightening arpeggios, rapidly illuminating chord tones that modulate
through six or seven different scales, and are resolved pianissimo in
a single, whispered breath.
If there’s an underlying
theme of Jones for Elvin, it’s friendship’s noble thread. Every member
of the quintet is honored with a song (Milo’s Mellifluous Milieu sounds
like its humorous, cantering title), and ultimately those of us who
listen well are honored, too, with beauty, intimacy and surprise ‘round
every chorus. Music can impart valuable lessons, and given the chance,
many of us will learn these tunes intuitively and sing them for our
friends, just as Steve sang for Elvin on that sunny day in May.