Jazz & Blues Beat By Austin Bealmear
Chris Walters’ Yay! Everybody Yay! City Lore Music New Orleans born musician Chris Walters is an independent artist who has resided in Nashville since 1989. Chris can usually be seen gigging with the likes of J.D. Souther, Peter Mayer, Bela Fleck, Nashville Symphony Orchestra, and the Jeff Coffin Mu’tet. Walters’ third album further explores his unique and compelling sound, offering nine new tracks ranging from jazz trio excursions to fully orchestrated original songs featuring an eclectic mixture of musicians from Nashville and around the globe. This is music that makes you want to write poetry, not a review, but I won’t try to compete with Danny Coots remarkable liner notes. Walters’ pallet is so colorful it’s like a stroll through the world’s largest museum, or cocktails at a sidewalk café. Six tunes are by Walters, and three of the nine are instrumentals. The tour starts with a sardonic love
28 july—september 2012 | THE NASHVILLE MUSICIAN
song about a fat cat who’s got everything but “He Ain’t Got You,” then cuts to a tortured soul in a haze of absinthe and despair hearing the voice of “La Chanteuse Josephine” — a haunting musical saw played by Natalia Paruz over Denis Solee’s string and woodwind arrangement. “Bootsoles” is an earthy drone with guitar and harmonica that to me somehow combines Paul Simon, Mose Allison, and the Dali Lama. The title tune is a celebration, with tuba, kazoos, and solos by Solee and Rod McGaha. A gypsy fortuneteller’s lair is created with help from Peter Mayer on mandolin, a Romanian poem, and a bit of the pop hit “Que Sera Sera” while Walter’s vocals ask “Do You Really Want To Know.” Walters reflects on the eternal tug of war between men and women with a chant-like rhythm from mother Africa in “Woman’s Greatest Weapon.” His piano chops get a workout on “Malambo” and “Panama” and the album ends with what sounds like a phone call from the twilight zone using Cole Porter’s classic “Every Time We Say Goodbye” lyrics over a string quartet. Chris is also a graphic artist and award winning animator. You can see some of his animations set to his original music — and check out the record — at www.cityloremusic.com
The Kelli Cox Collaborative Kelli Cox Music Female pianists in early jazz may have been rare, but there was no shortage of virtuosity. In the 1920s it was said that Lovie Austin from Chattanooga, Tenn., could play for singers and dancers in vaudeville theaters, and write a chart for the next act at the same time! A century later, one can name a number of excellent lady keyboardists, some here in Nashville. Pianist Kelli Cox has been a fixture on Music City’s jazz scene for well over a decade, fronting her own ensembles and playing everything from jazz to choral concerts, to country and rock & roll. Cox formed the Collaborative in 2008 as a creative outlet for herself and a band of local jazz veterans who often
work in genres other than jazz. The band’s first project was recorded in April at Hot Haus Studios in Nashville, Tenn., by Mike Holmes and features Cox on piano, Tisha Simeral on acoustic bass, Ted Tretiak on drums, Steve Herrman on trumpet and flugelhorn, Greg Cox on trombone and Mark Douthit on tenor and alto saxes. Special guests are John Birdsong, acoustic bass, John DiModica, electric bass and Willie Cantu, percussion. The record includes four original compositions as well as new arrangements of four jazz standards. You could call this a progressive jazz group that blends modern bebop with blues and Latin influences. Of the originals, Cox has “Gotcha!” which sounds like something the old Jazztet might have done, waves of shifting harmonies in the horns over a bolero rhythm and lovely solos, plus “Saying Goodbye” — a hymn-like ballad for trombone and piano. Greg Cox’s “Constant DeTayl” is a Latin-ish groove in honor of saxist Dennis Taylor with a wicked tenor solo by Mark Douthit. Herrman’s “Winter’s Solace” is a modern workout for the horns over a piano riff, and a cool coda for bass and drums that ends the album. Standards include an old hardbop line by Hank Mobley with Cox on B3, a clever acoustic trio version of the Rodgers-Hart classic “I Didn’t Know What Time It Was” that puts the melody in 5/4 — it works so well I wonder why Rodgers didn’t think of it — and an arrangement of Herbie Hancock’s 1964 classic “Cantaloupe Island” that uses the horns, electric bass, funky fusion drums, and Cox on Fender Rhodes, to make it sound like Hancock wrote it for his Fat AlbertMwadishi bands five years later. I don’t know if that was her intention, but it really works. Jeff Clayton’s “Blues on Parade” is in the Bobby Timmons “Moanin’” bag, complete with funky horns and a shuffle backbeat. This is solid, modern jazz all the way with a great sound and groove. Look for it at www.kellicoxmusic.com