JAZZ REVIEW : Milt Jackson: From Vibraphonic Booms to Whispering Contrails

Hearing Milt Jackson perform must be a bit like watching Picasso paint, Olivier act or Graham dance. Like those illustrious figures, he is an authentic original, an artist who has invented his own voice and his own language.

Jackson’s performance at Catalina Bar & Grill on Tuesday night provided clear and unassailable evidence that his playing--more than 40 years after he virtually patented the modern jazz style for the vibraphone--hasn’t lost an iota of its impact.

And it’s just as well that it hasn’t. The vibes are a hard act to love--even under the best of circumstances. With no real timbre variability, little opportunity to alter pitches and an unrelentingly mechanical vibrato, the instrument is totally dependent upon touch, upon the ability to make dramatic and rhythmic distinctions almost solely via manipulation of the mallets.

Fortunately, it’s an ability that Jackson has in abundance. His capacity to bring fire and passion to what is little more than an assemblage of metal bars and tubes is what makes him a master.

His blues playing on Lee Morgan’s “Speedball” and his own “Bags’ Groove,” for example, brilliantly contrasted hard-struck rhythmic accents with soft-as-velvet scurries across the instrument’s shining bars.

His ballad work was just as superb, especially during a dramatic duet with pianist Cedar Walton on “If I Should Lose You” and a lyrical reading of the cool harmonies of Johnny Mandel’s “Close Enough for Love.”

Once past an understandable glitch or two at the start of the evening, Jackson’s accompanists--Walton on piano, John Clayton on bass and Billy Higgins on drums--began to meld into the togetherness of a solid rhythm section.

Walton in particular seemed to gather momentum, concluding the set with two be-bop extravaganzas on “Bags’ Groove” and his own “Back to Bologna,” and fully justifying Jackson’s description of him as “my favorite piano player.”

The evening, however, belonged to Jackson. Still very much at the height of his powers, he is a performer whose current engagement should be on every jazz fan’s must-hear list.

Jackson continues at Catalina tonight through Sunday.