Szilárd Mezei

A couple years ago I came across this post. It was the first time I had heard of Szilárd Mezei. Nád/Reed is an incredible album, and after many listens it is still powerful each time I play it. Mezei's compositions and arrangements are vibrant. Sometimes the themes are full of pathos, and other times they are kinetic and mysterious. With the 14-piece ensemble, Mezei often divides the players and has them playing contrasting themes simultaneously.

I've recently been hunting down more recordings of Mezei's music. They are consistently exciting and beautiful both in terms of composition and improvisation. One thing that always strikes me about Mezei's music is how charged with emotion and feeling it is. His music exudes character and richness, akin to the music of Mingus. As one reviewer put it, Mezei's music is a revelation.

Here's a piece from his 2010 album Tönk (though it was recorded by his octet in 2007). It has the awesome title "Female Boxing." I love the boldness and punchiness of the theme. Once the theme drops out, the rhythm section still maintains the punchiness as the other instrumentalists flutter around. In the latter half there is wonderful interplay between Mezei on viola (or Albert Márkos on cello?) and Gergely Ittzés on flute. On a side note, check out the gorgeous cover art on the album.



Credit must go to Mezei's musical collaborators who bring his music to life, such as his dynamite rhythm section of Ervin Malina on bass and István Csik on drums. Csik in particular is phenomenal every time I hear him on recording.

Here's a video of Mezei's International Ensemble performing in Serbia in 2004. It's a great example of the beauty of Mezei's compositions/arrangements being further enhanced by the arresting saxophone solo of Matthias Schubert.



One collaboration I would love to see in the future is between Joe Morris and Mezei. I think their musics compliment each other very well, and Morris already has a penchant for making amazing music with violinist Mat Maneri. It would be awesome to combine their rhythm sections, too. Let's take Morris' bassist and Mezei's drummer. So here's what I would like to see: Szilárd Mezei (viola), Joe Morris (guitar), Timo Shanko (bass), and István Csik (drums).

According to Mezei's website his quintet will go on a US tour some time in 2011. I can't wait to get more details about that. Maybe my dream quartet will make an appearance in Boston on this tour!

Marc Ribot at the Cedar Cultural Center

On Saturday I went up to Minneapolis to see Marc Ribot perform at the Cedar Cultural Center. It was an awesome evening. I met up with four friends at the Cedar, and before the show we stepped next door to eat dinner at Chai's Thai Restaurant. It was delicious. I had some kind of red curry with chicken and potatoes. The food was great, but what made it amazing was the company we shared together. Lots of laughs and fun.

We then stepped back over to the Cedar just in time for the show. After some words from the director of the Cedar about new air conditioning and heating systems being installed, Marc Ribot made his way on stage. He was wearing a long leather jacket and carrying his trusty flat-top acoustic guitar. My friend and I disagreed about the make of the guitar. I thought Gibson; he thought Stella. I still think it was a Gibson, but if anyone knows, chime in. It's the same guitar that's featured in the second video from my previous post. (Note: the picture above seems to confirm the Gibson theory.)

Anyway, now we get to the important part: his music was wonderful. He played maybe five or six songs for a total of about 30 minutes. For the first couple minutes I was anxious about whether he'd succeed musically in his endeavor. What I mean is that in his music he puts himself way out there without a safety net. Each song begins with a structure or theme of some sort, but from there he goes whichever directions inspiration leads him. For those first couple minutes I was nervous he'd get himself into dead areas musically that would cause me to be embarrassed for him. However, after a couple minutes, I knew I could trust him to make compelling music no matter which directions he was going.

Here's a live performance of his in Dallas from September of 2010, but I believe he played these songs at the Cedar as well.



During his set, I was impressed with his virtuosity. He knows the guitar and music so well, but he always first and foremost plays the way he wants to. Or so I imagine. I don't really know anything about how he approaches music, never read any interviews with him. As someone who likes a bunch of avant-garde guitarists, I sometimes wonder how much technique (traditional or idiosyncratic) certain guitarists actually have. What's important is not how close their technique comes to traditional standards but how rigorous, disciplined, and developed their own techniques are. That's something Joe Morris has helped me to understand. I really admire Ribot for his technique and ability to make very powerful music on guitar.

I would have liked him to play for another hour, but that wasn't the deal. After an intermission, he returned to the stage to accompany a screening of Charlie Chaplin's The Kid. That was a great experience. My favorite scene can be found in the following clip starting at 0:37 seconds. It's the moving scene when the mother and her estranged child encounter each other, not knowing that they are mother and child. It's interesting watching this video with Chaplin's original music. I can't remember what exactly Ribot was doing during this scene, but it seemed to bring out the emotional power way more than the Chaplin soundtrack. I was in tears during this brief scene.



The movie ended, rather abruptly I might add, and Ribot left. The concert was over. A couple friends and I went down to the Chatterbox Pub to play Farkle, drink Shamrock pop, and eat sweet potato fries. Great evening out in Minneapolis. Ribot is fast becoming one of my favorite guitarists.

Thoughts on Marc Ribot

The first time I ever heard Marc Ribot must have been in high school when I listened to Tom Waits' Rain Dogs. That was a great album, but it wasn't pivotal to me or my musical tastes. Years passed without much thought of Ribot. In fact, for a long stretch of time I confused Marc Ribot and Mick Ronson (David Bowie's guitarist) in my head. Then about two years ago I was visiting some friends in New York City. One friend, a good musician that I respect, had mentioned that Marc Ribot was his favorite guitarist.

Later that week I attended a performance of Allen Toussaint's group at the Village Vanguard. Marc Ribot was playing acoustic guitar in this group. I was hoping for some powerful guitar playing from Ribot but was disappointed. He took maybe one solo during the whole set, and his role in the group was strictly supportive. I was left with the impression that Ribot was somewhat of a bland guitarist. When my friend said Ribot was his favorite guitarist, I wondered what the attraction was to Ribot's style.

Two years later (i.e. this past week) I came across a video on youtube of Ribot's group Ceramic Dog.



It's heavy, with gnarly guitar shredding and a ripping rhythm section. I especially love how he and the rhythm section turn the measures inside out. (Turns out the drummer, Ches Smith, also plays in Mary Halvorson's awesome trio.) Finally I was seeing a side of Ribot that spoke to me. If you go back and read older posts here, you'll see that I love heavy guitar solos. So I downloaded Ceramic Dog's album Party Intellectuals. I listened to it and wasn't too thrilled. It's good and has amazing moments, but on the whole I was again left with disappointment. For all the promise his playing had for hitting my sweet spot, there was still a blandness that made the whole album not live up to that promise.

Still, Party Intellectuals sparked my curiousity with Ribot. Then, yesterday, I found that Ribot will be performing at the Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis on March 19th. On the Cedar's website they linked to the following video.



This is a rendition of Albert Ayler's song "Ghosts." Here we go! Now this is guitar music that hits me. I looked into Ribot's discography and saw that his 2001 album Saints was entirely solo guitar renditions of songs. I downloaded this album and listened to it three times in a row last night. It's very beautiful and moving music.

Musically, Ribot's playing is a nice contrast with my two favorite guitarists, Joe Morris and Keiji Haino. I love Morris, Haino, and also Derek Bailey to death, but sometimes I crave a guitarist who is a little more anchored to song structure and melodic development. Ribot balances structure with free-wheeling improvisation extraordinarily well. Much more so than the aforementioned guitarists, Ribot follows melodic lines around twists and turns. His sense of melody and structure typically is very skewed and leads into mysterious regions, but his improvisations are coherent and moving. It's amazing how at times when he is playing Ayler tunes he evokes the feeling of Sunny Murray on drums, both in the pulses of rhythm and the vocal moaning.

There's lots to be said about the music of Saints, but you're better off just listening to the album. It's wonderful. I am so grateful that I kept exploring Ribot's music until I found a side of him that speaks to me. May you find some joy in hearing him too.