Jazz Review : Pianist Camilo Vivid, Volatile at Catalina Bar

Michel Camilo blew into Hollywood’s Catalina Bar and Grill on Tuesday from the islands. The pianist, born in Santo Domingo but now a New York resident, began his set with “Island Stump,” a heavy-handed helping of Caribbean overkill.

His approach to the keyboard is busy, boisterous, blistering; also vivid, volatile and vital. Though now well into his 30s, he seems not yet to have learned to use space. He is, however, a composer of unquestionable talent. Almost every work had a Latin flavor of one era or another, from updated merengue or bambo to latter-day samba.

Several pieces began unaccompanied before bursting into tempo with Michael Bowie on bass and Cliff Almond on drums, who match him in unrelenting intensity. Camilo’s use of parallel unison lines, and fast-moving octaves in the right hand, is phenomenal, but one yearns for relief, which came just twice: in a gentle and beautiful ballad, “In Love,” simply stated in single note lines, and in the only non-Camilo piece, the seemingly inevitable “Softly As in a Morning Sunrise,” delivered in a welcome, straight, swinging four-beat.

The West Indian territory often invaded by Camilo was staked out years ago in a more discreet manner by Monty Alexander; but Camilo, whatever his excesses, is a brilliant and controversial artist who deserves serious attention, which he no doubt will be receiving through Sunday.