Concert Review: 'Humbug Jitterbug' - CompCord Big Band

Concert Review: 'Humbug Jitterbug' - CompCord Big Band
Feat. Guest: Valery Ponomarev - trumpet, Gerry Brown - drums
The City Winery
November 29, 2021


A bright brash blast of brass opened the Composers Concordance “Humbug Jitterbug” concert at the City Winery Loft last week. Conductor and MC Gene Pritsker introduced the evening as repping the signature dance of the era and a tip of the hat ala Charles “Bah Humbug” Dickens to the opening of the holiday season.  Pritsker’s title piece (…really fast…) eased into swing with a bright tenor  sax solo before finishing with a flourish.

Over the course of the concert, the pieces would explore an old school throwback of classic Big Band sound while also pushing the boundaries of the genre to new territory in typical CompCord style. John Clark accepted Pritsker’s invitation to “take things where we want” in his Una Stanza A Milano offering a musical impression of a 'Room in Milan'. A reflective trombone opening is joined by a tenor sax then swings out with a bold trombone solo followed by a sax solo joined by horn and trumpets.

Ginka Mizuki offered an imperiled Dodo bird jitterbugging to escape extinction in her 'Dodo' with the bird ultimately resurrected in Michiko Suzuki’s mournful clarinet solo. A trumpet adds its commentary while various other horns pay their respects.

Alon Nechustan turns the mood with his 'Left Hand of Darkness' like a score of a swing era noir film. Piano, tenor sax and various horns each take their turn down that road featuring serious drumming.

Singer Melanie Mitrano makes her first appearance in Luis Jordan's (as arr. by Gene Pritsker) bouncy 'Doug the Jitterbug' which features the rarely heard piccolo trumpet and the incendiary drumming of  Gerry Brown, well traveled veteran of the Stevie Wonder band, among others, with the trumpet section adding its own colors.

Latin flavor was added by Costa Rican Carlo Castro Mora with his premiere, (one of seven on the night,) of 'El Grito Necesario' (the necessary cry) which ends fittingly with a collective audience scream.

Ada Rosati’s 'Make Up Girl' turns to a mellower side suggesting a woman getting ready for an evening out, looking  at herself  in the mirror as she gets ready with the mood steadily brightening  as she approaches readiness. 

We head back into Latin territory with 'El Jitterbug' as Jay Rodriguez and his  sax conjure a swinging Bronx with an extended drum solo and horn fanfares. While right  at the heart  of his genre, Rodriguez captures the sense of a night of dancing in a very specific urban neighborhood in a city where varied musical sounds  meet each other in a free flowing encounter.

'Merrily Christmas' by Melanie Mitrano and Gerson Galante could easily be a feature in one of the era’s big holiday spectaculars. Metrano’s  voice has the sugar plum quality that could quickly add this song to any holiday playlist. Her rolling “..merrily, merry, merrily’s…” dance over band’s melody like proverbial sleigh bells.

CompCord’s Co-Director Dan Cooper’s 'Recognition' uses surging waves of sound of drums, bass, sax and horns for a surround-sound effect that filled the loft.

The evening ended most fittingly with bass trombone player Dave Taylor’s take on the Beatles’ 'Why Don’t We Do it in the Road?'. The piece began with Taylor’s spoken word reflections on the erotic lives of the bonabo chimp, our closest cousin, which continued to wind their whimsical way throughout the piece. Taylor’s vocal performance was nearly a mirror of his trombone. In the week that saw the premiere of Peter Jackson’s documentary series Get Back, this was a perfect fit. Even more so fitting that the film includes footage of mating bonobos which inspired McCartney and Lennon.

Throughout the evening a truly all-star band, each worthy of mention, kept a steady stream of music flowing over which soloists in turn would rise  and take their musical  shots, laying down challenges for the next player to follow. Sometimes call and response and sometimes counterpoint but with that constant flow of music that we  could  dance to. All jitterbug, no humbug.

-  Eli Y. Jack