Charles Lloyd can’t recall when he last played the Cleveland area, though Willard Jenkins, program director for Tri-C JazzFest, said it was in Oberlin God knows how many years ago. No matter. People who saw the great musician perform at Cuyahoga Community College Metro Auditorium Sunday night will talk of his show for a long time to come. It was a concert of astonishing stamina and spirit and spirituality.

Lloyd, who is 66, doesn’t speak easily; his problematic throat can give out on him mid-sentence, he said backstage. No matter. He played this memorable JazzFest show effortlessly, whether on the oboe relative known as the taragato, the tenor saxophone, or the flute. He ruled on all of them (and shaker) Sunday night, navigating authoritatively and organically through six pieces. Then he played an encore, the “Georgia Bright Suite,” even more driving than the formal set.

For those of you who care about such information, Lloyd played, in order, “The Sufi’s Tears,” “Go Down, Moses,” “Dwija,” “Third Floor Richard” (an older tune in which Lloyd rocked, pixie-like, on flute), “Maria Carmela,” and “Ne Me Quitte Pas,” the beautiful Jacques Brel tune that launches Jumping the Creek, Lloyd’s exceptional new album.

I counted five tunes plus the encore; figuring out where one tune ended and the next began became increasingly difficult – and ever less material. This was a long-form concert, a concert like a deep conversation among friends. Among those friends were Lloyd and his group. The greater circle of friends was the audience, which burst into applause after nearly every solo. There were stretches of such intensity toward the end that the applause felt as if it issued out of a kind of embarrassment. Lloyd played so hard he seemed almost to threaten the audience; the applause served as a kind of dampening. This was rich, spiritual and challenging jazz, believe me. Lloyd didn’t say a word. He didn’t have to.

The titles of the tunes mattered less than the continuity. Lloyd and his group – Geri Allen, commanding and resonant, on piano; the witty and tricky Reuben Rogers, on bass; and Eric Harland, a whirlwind drummer – played nonstop, making the six pieces in the formal set as natural as breath. What normally would have been separations were more like segues.

Even more astonishing was that Lloyd, this retiring, courtly man, reserved his greatest power for the encore, launching the tune also known as “Sweet Georgia Bright” (this Memphis native knows his blues and then some) in tandem with Allen, the two challenging, paralleling, racing and braiding until Rogers and Harland tempered them – temporarily, of course -- only to stoke the song higher. Lloyd brought his “Georgia” fantasy to a close on a hushed tenor note.
The man knows his silence.

On “Georgia,” Lloyd blew his tenor like a man in the grip of some higher force but also in total command.
The man knows from zone.

While the harmonics his group churned out didn’t directly resemble those of Pharaoh Sanders and John Coltrane, near-contemporaries of Lloyd’s some 40 years ago, the energy and the long form did. Lloyd has been a favorite of hippies ever since his Forest Flower album of 1966. His music has only grown richer.

Singling out solos seems churlish; the structure of each tune was similar and, though the delivery varied, the depth was consistent. Lloyd, who wandered the stage nearly as often as he perched on the stool that served as his launch pad, rocked as he built his solos from the ground up. Allen, a busy and magisterial pianist, goosed Lloyd, a player of even more exceptional dynamics finesse. Rogers took several solos, each packed with humor and intelligence (not to mention sonority). Harland was dramatic and obviously gassed; tom-toms, cymbals, the whole arsenal – he even drummed on a felt buffer during one number. The empathy among the four was palpable. It spread throughout the room, full strength.
from Cool Cleveland contributor Carlo Wolff CWolff7827@aol.com (:divend:)