The Blue Note 7 interprets
the great composers of jazz
By John Mark Rafacz
How does The Blue Note 7, a septet of some of today’s finest jazz musicians, chronicle seventy years of music from the quintessential recording label in jazz history? According to Bill Charlap, pianist and musical director for the Blue Note Records 70th Anniversary—On Tour, it would be foolish to try.
Charlap says he, the band, and Blue Note Records agreed from the start of their collaboration that the tour—scheduled to visit more than fifty venues including a concert at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 8, in Eisenhower Auditorium—could not begin to encompass a record label synonymous with great jazz since 1939.
“This could only be a snapshot. There’s no way that we could be comprehensive. You couldn’t be comprehensive even choosing to honor one of the great artists that recorded for Blue Note. You could do ten albums of Horace Silver’s music alone,” says Charlap, himself a Blue Note Records artist, speaking by phone from a tour stop in Columbia, Missouri.
“But that said, it was my goal to act as an organizing force between myself and the rest of the players in the band,” he says. “Remember that this group is built on most of the players bringing in arrangements for The Blue Note 7. So, somebody had to work as a guide. We touched upon as many varied artists and composers as possible and as many varied frameworks for improvisation as possible, too. We didn’t want to have an album of all ballads or all up-tempos.”
In January, the septet released Mosaic: A Celebration of Blue Note Records, which is available in one- and two-disc formats.
In addition to Charlap (pronounced Shar-lap), the deluxe line-up of septet musicians features trumpeter Nicholas Payton, tenor saxophonist Ravi Coltrane, alto saxophonist and flutist Steve Wilson, guitarist Peter Bernstein, bassist Peter Washington, and drummer Lewis Nash.
“The Blue Note 7 is a true collaboration, an all-star band comprised of the next generation of major players, all leaders in their own right,” says Bruce Lundvall, president of Blue Note Records. “They are also the A-list of accomplished arrangers and composers, steeped in the Blue Note tradition, re-imagining this time-honored repertoire in a fresh way.”
At each stop on the tour, The Blue Note 7 performs a selection of classic tunes from a pool of works by Lee Morgan, Thelonious Monk, Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard, Duke Pearson, Joe Henderson, Bobby Hutcherson, Dexter Gordon, Cedar Walton, McCoy Tyner, Wayne Shorter, and other notables whose compositions are gems in the illustrious Blue Note Records catalog.
“It’s a list of the focal figures in jazz,” Charlap says. “Many, many of them.”
Charlap, who grew up in New York City, has himself become a central figure in jazz in the last decade. One of the finest jazz pianists, he formed the Bill Charlap Trio in 1997 with the unrelated Washingtons—Kenny on drums and Peter, part of The Blue Note 7, on bass.
“Peter Washington is the quintessential bassist in jazz today,” Charlap insists. “… He has incredible experience, time, sound, choice of notes, feel. He’s a brilliant soloist. He’s a brilliant team player—and all the time lifts the band with his … sound, and the depth of his playing, and the logic of his line.”
The pianist’s father, Mark “Moose” Charlap, was a Broadway composer who wrote the music for Peter Pan. His mother, Sandy Stewart, is a cabaret and jazz singer who earned a Grammy nomination for her recording of “My Coloring Book.”
Although an appreciation for Broadway composers influences his music, Charlap says, he is specifically enamored with American popular songwriters. The Bill Charlap Trio’s lauded recordings include albums featuring the music of Leonard Bernstein, Hoagy Carmichael, and George Gershwin.
“That certainly is a cornerstone of what I love to do when I work with my trio,” he says. “I think it’s a cornerstone of what many, many jazz musicians do, but perhaps I have a special feeling about some of the music because I grew up around it, and I love to mine the catalog of those great composers.”
Charlap says his title of musical director for The Blue Note 7 may not be the best description of what he does.
“I would say I’m more an organizing force than a musical director because all of us are co-leading this band, in a sense,” he points out. “There’s a lot of equanimity and equality within the band.”
Those band mates include trumpeter Payton, a New Orleans native and son of the gifted jazz and classical bassist Walter Payton. The trumpeter studied with pianist and educator Ellis Marsalis, patriarch of the America’s most famous jazz family, at the University of New Orleans.
While he also received mentoring in his teen years from trumpeter Wynton Marsalis, Payton is not obscured by anyone’s shadow.
“Nicholas is very much … his own man in terms of who he is as a trumpeter. He stands completely on his own,” Charlap says. “He just has such a breadth of musical knowledge. He seems to be able to come at the music from every point of view—the past, present, and the future all at the same time. He’s a master soloist, a brilliant musical thinker, and I think there’s nobody like him in the world of jazz trumpet today. [He’s] inspiring on a night-to-night basis.”
The septet’s tenor saxophonist has a surname that’s among the most revered in jazz, but Ravi Coltrane, like Nicholas Payton, has found his own way in the music world. Son of legendary saxophonist John Coltrane and pianist Alice Coltrane, Ravi Coltrane was born in New York and grew up in Los Angeles.
“Ravi is one of the most sincere players I’ve heard,” Charlap says. “He always approaches the music from a fresh point of view. He has a beautiful sound that just fills the room—and great depth to his playing and great originality. He’s just a wonderful musician.”
Wilson, a native of Hampton, Virginia, plays alto sax and flute for The Blue Note 7.
“Steve is known as one of the best team players on the New York scene, which means in the world,” Charlap says. “He can blend in a section. He’s just the best at that. As a soloist, he has all the soul, all the vision, all the harmony—the blues, bebop, modernity—and he can really sing through his horn. He just seems to have it all. I think he’s the perfect alto player.”
Like Charlap, the septet’s guitarist Peter Bernstein is a product of New York City.
“Peter Bernstein is the epitome of taste. He never wastes a note. His sound is very rich and deep,” Charlap says. “He’s informed by so many of the greatest voices in jazz guitar—people like Kenny Burrell and Charlie Christian and Grant Green and Jim Hall, but they all come out Peter Bernstein. … He’s a perfect team player and brilliant soloist all the time.”
Phoenix native Nash, who handles percussion for the septet, has been on the Eisenhower stage a number of times with various ensembles.
“Lewis is one of the most highly valued musicians on his instrument in the world for a very good reason. He is an absolutely brilliant rhythm-section player who swings so hard and has such elegance and depth to his musicianship on all levels,” Charlap raves. “He’s a musician and instrumentalist, which I can say for all the musicians in this band. It’s not about bravura and instrumental playing necessarily, it’s music first and foremost. The instrument is a tool. Lewis just lifts the band’s spirit. He’s a brilliant performer, a brilliant soloist, and certainly one of the greatest drummers in jazz today.”
Not long after performing at Penn State, The Blue Note 7 finishes its North American tour April 14 through 19 with an engagement at the jazz mecca Birdland in New York City.
Artistic Viewpoints, an informal moderated discussion featuring Bernstein, is offered in Eisenhower Auditorium one hour before the performance and is free for ticket holders. Artistic Viewpoints regularly fills to capacity. Seating is available on a first-arrival basis.
Blue Note Records 70th Anniversary—On Tour
Featuring The Blue Note 7
7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 8
Eisenhower Auditorium
Adult $41
University Park Student $20
18 and Younger $34
Corvette America underwrites jazz presentations at the Center for the Performing Arts.
