Here's one that they don't particularly like in my
monumental Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD,
LP & Cassette. Two measly stars they give it. But then they're not that
keen on Weather Report either, partly because Wayne Shorter didn't play enough
sax with them. I was slightly disappointed myself when I saw Shorter playing
with an electric quartet at the North Sea Jazz Festival back in the late '80s,
but it wasn't long before he was appearing again in the acoustic settings of
what one might uncharitably call his 'dotage'.
The thing about Mr. Weird, as he was dubbed, was that he
was never afraid to experiment. Like Herbie Hancock in that respect, who also
broke purists' hearts when he went all Future
Shock. But I suppose the greatest and most influential jazz musicians, like
Duke Ellington and Miles Davis, were not only not afraid to experiment, but
also felt that it was their appointed
duty to do so.
And what lovelier
music with which to experiment than Brazilian? Richard Cook and Brian Morton,
the compilers of the mighty reference tome, found 1974's Native Dancer
'a bland samba setting which does more to highlight Nascimento's vague and
uncommitted vocal delivery than the leader's saxophone playing'. I have to
stamp my feet and take issue with that on several counts: Milton Nascimento is
one of Brazil's most original talents, with an extraordinary ethereal falsetto,
and if he sings wordlessly at times, it is far from vague or uncommitted; the
music that he and Shorter concocted (roughly sharing the writing credits, with
one track by Herbie Hancock, who features on piano) has little to do with samba,
nor bossa nova for that matter; and the leader's saxophone – both tenor and
soprano – is integral to the successful fusion of genres. So there, Messrs. Cook
and Morton!
The gorgeous
Nascimento staple, 'Ponta de Areia', is I guess a case in point, with
Nascimento's wordless vocal giving way to Shorter's soprano that slows things
right down in a delicate mid-section before the group comes back to lead us out.
'Beauty And The Beast' is a stop-go Shorter composition in which the Brazilian sits
out. Shorter's soprano sax soars high above an earthy theme prodded by
Hancock's funky piano refrain. Nascimento returns to sing 'Tarde' in the more
traditional vocal vein of someone like Caetano Veloso, before ceding to a
beautiful Shorter tenor solo that's just long enough to satisfy any purist.
Neither Nascimento's singing nor Shorter's tenor and soprano playing are in any
way uncommitted in the dramatic 'Miracle of The Fishes', which ends the first
side in rousing fashion.
Shorter's
'Diana' opens Side 2, a brief vehicle for his soprano sax and Herbie Hancock's
elegant piano. It ushers in 'From The Lonely Afternoons', possibly the most seamless
combination of wordless falsetto and (tenor) sax on the album. Shorter switches
back to soprano sax for 'Ana Maria' to slow down the pace, before Nascimento
comes back into the mix for a simmering 'Lilia' propelled by Roberto Silva's
superb drumming, Airto Moreira's percussive armoury and the insistent organ of
the splendidly-named Wagner Tiso. Hancock's 'Joanna's Theme' wraps up the
proceedings with a typically Herbacious piece that offers Shorter space to
illustrate that 'less is more'.
I brought this
one back from New York many moons ago, along with Miles Davis' In A Silent
Way. I must have been fusion-mad at the time. Native Dancer is
arguably Shorter's most successful attempt to fuse jazz with any other kind of
genre, be it funk or, as in this case, Brazilian music – or a bit of both, as
on Weather Report's Tale Spinnin' the following year. He had been an
established star since his tenure with Art Blakey, but the album opened the
ears of the world outside of Brazil to the extraordinary voice of Milton
Nascimento. Search as hard as I might, I have still not found a more satisfying
showcase for his talents than this lovely lyrical precursor of what we now call
'world jazz'.
