Most of this summer’s “Jazzstock Festival” slipped past me, but I caught most of the events during the Columbus Day weekend at the Colony Café in Woodstock. On October 9 I heard the SUNY New Paltz Student Band, which played like professionals, and the superb saxophonist Joe Lovano and his ensemble. Vocalist Judi Silvano functioned mostly like a second horn; like Lovano, her dexterity and imagination were impressive. Several pianists played on October 10 in a Thelonious Monk birthday tribute. Patrick McKearn, Vinnie Martucci, and Paul Duffy all had interestingly different takes on Monk’s style. But I think I was moved most by Teri Roiger, whom I’ve previously heard only as a vocalist, playing straight transcriptions of Monk solo performances with great love and understanding. Burrill Crohn also showed some of his jazz documentaries, made for ABC-TV (those were the days!) and not currently available.
I wore out before the end of a long “Poetry/Spoken Word and Music” program that evening, but what I heard was quite fine. I was particularly eager to hear the magnificent vocalist Jay Clayton, one of the greatest jazz singers I’ve ever heard, and she did not disappoint, especially as she joined forces with her electronic equipment for some dazzling multi-tracking. It’s frustrating to know that Clayton lives in Kingston, where I sometimes see her in audiences, and to have so few opportunities to hear her. But at last I did have one. Next year I’ll have to pay more attention to Jazzstock, which offers some very high quality jazz indeed.
On Thursday, October 27, I heard and saw a wonderful concert at home. Pianist Marilyn Crispell, who has played for large audiences at Maverick Concerts, the Colony Café, and at many venues around the world, performed a webcast concert. I have heard Crispell numerous times and admire her adventurous and powerful improvised music (she doesn’t call it “jazz” and neither do I). She was at her best during this webcast, which was brilliantly directed by Burrill Crohn. I can’t remember an event at which the range of Crispell’s playing was so much on display, from intimate lyricism to furious dissonance. If you’re sorry you missed it, don’t fret; it remains available for the next three weeks, and you can watch it as many times as you like during that period. Go to www.todocast.tv and look for Event TDC-E1503.
I’ll finally get to hear the Woodstock Chamber Orchestra in its new venue, the Woodstock Playhouse, on Sunday, November 13, at 3 p.m. Conductor Miriam Burns, second in the Music Director Search Season, leads works of Lars Erik Larssen (his Concertino for Trombone and Strings, with soloist Sean Scott Reed), Grieg, and Borodin. Mozart’s Symphony No. 38 will be a definitive test both of Burns’s abilities and of the current level of the orchestra. The same concert is played on Friday, Nov. 11, at 8 p.m. at Olin Hall, Bard College; info on these concerts at www.wco-online.com.
Saugerties Pro Musica presents a free (!) concert by the West Point Saxophone Quartet on Sunday, Nov. 6, at 3 p.m., at its usual venue, Saugerties United Methodist Church on the corner of Washington Avenue & Post Street. Pianist Mikhail Bukhman plays at the same venue on Nov. 20. No program listed yet, but there’s information on this series at www.saugertiespromusica.org.
On Saturday, Nov. 19, at 8 p.m., the Hudson Valley Philharmonic offers a rare opportunity to hear a winner of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, the most prestigious (and richest) piano contest in the world. Di Wu will perform Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with the orchestra, in a concert which seems to consist entirely of highlights. The concert also offers a first opportunity to hear a recent work, “Laconica,” by multiple prize-winning composer and area resident George Tsontakis. And HVP music director Randall Craig Fleisher will demonstrate his fine abilities as a Mozart conductor in that composer’s final symphony, the Symphony No. 41, known as the “Jupiter.” The concert takes place at the Bardavon 1869 Opera House in Poughkeepsie, and much information on the orchestra and Bardavon/UPAC programs at www.bardavon.org.
The Rhinebeck Chamber Music Society continues its 2011-12 series on Sunday, Nov. 20, at 4 p.m. with a concert by the Lark Quartet (pre-concert talk at 3:30). The program includes the delightful “Italian Serenade” of Hugo Wolf (the only well-known instrumental work of this great song composer); a group of four single-movement works by Mendelssohn published after his death as Op. 81; and the superb String Quartet No. 2, “Intimate Letters.” These programs take place at the Church of the Messiah on Montgomery Street in Rhinebeck; information is available at www.rhinebeckmusic.org.
Perhaps the most unusual November classical music event is Henry Purcell’s “King Arthur” performed by the ensemble Kairos: A Consort of Singers. When was the last time you had a chance to hear any Purcell theatrical work other than his masterpiece “Dido and Aeneas”? I can’t remember one. Kairos describes the work as “Monty Python with more shepherds, harpsichord, and recorders.” There will be two performances: Saturday, Nov. 5, 8 p.m., at Christ Episcopal Church, 20 Carroll St., Poughkeepsie; and Sunday, Nov. 6, 4 p.m., at the Holy Cross Monastery, Route 9W, West Park (not too far south of Kingston). Tickets are $25 ($15 seniors, $7 youth) but you can save $5 on regular priced tickets by buying in advance at 256-9114 or www.kairosconsort.orgt/concerts.htm.++
