After Dark with Beth LaMontagne

January 18, 2006

Music Hall comes around

Earlier this month, I wrote about the Music Hall and how their schedule seems to be improving. The show that prompted this revalation, is getting some mild media hype, except here, where I've been pumping it like a slot machine handle.

I guess I've always liked Maria Schneider since I met her while studying in music school. I always thought writing was what I wanted to do, but at the time I thought my medium would be music not words. Her technical abilities are astounding, smart while simultaneously beautiful, a compostional feet that is far more difficult that one might think. Below is my quick preview. I hope my ranting has brought at least one person over to the nerdy, dark side of jazz fandom.

The second show that caught my eye is the Maria Schneider Orchestra on Jan. 22 at 7 p.m. Her music is what I'd call psychedelic jazz, using instruments in ways they were never meant to be played. Her pieces are long, sexually infused symphonies that take patience and a love of modern composition to appreciate. Going to see the Maria Schneider Orchestra is almost as much about seeing her cunduct as it is listening to her music. She's like a acid-head hippie at a Dead show, moving and swaying to her own pieces as if they were moving her.

Most people I know will likely hate her stuff, or give me a reluctant frown when I ask them to go with me, but regardless, I'm impressed. In nerdy jazz circles, which I was told is pretty much the nerdiest nerd you can be, Maria is a red-headed goddess. The fact that the Music Hall is attaining well-know experimental musicians, like her and Kronos, makes me think they are trying to schedule programming geared at more than just the wealthy senior citizens and their grand-children. I say, give me more and I will certainly come.

Posted by blamontagne at January 18, 2006 12:43 PM

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