Marsalis and Redman: Tale of 2 Saxmen

“Be kind to me,” said Branford Marsalis as he strolled on stage at Catalina Bar & Grill Friday night. “I haven’t done this in a while.” Then, after looking around the jampacked room with a smile, he turned to bassist Christian McBride and drummer Brian Blade, kicked off a tempo and dug into a surging blues.

The following night, Saturday, on the same stage, Joshua Redman moved to the microphone, looked out at a similarly overflow crowd and said, “It’s good to be back.” And he, too, turned to McBride and Blade to start a sizzling set of trio jazz improvisations.

What’s going on here? The two most prominent tenor saxophonists of the mid-’90s, working on consecutive nights, on the same stage with the same rhythm section?

It sounds remarkable, but that’s exactly what happened this weekend. Redman, booked into Catalina for a six-night run with McBride and Blade in trio, a group he has been touring with for the past few months, took Friday off to appear with the Rolling Stones in a pay-per-view telecast. And, when Marsalis agreed to fly in from New York to replace Redman for the night, Southland jazz fans were given a rare opportunity to hear these two splendid young performers in a virtually identical setting.

While a comparison was not particularly appropriate--Redman has been working regularly with McBride and Blade, while Marsalis’ set was purely spontaneous--it was nonetheless intriguing to hear the similarities and striking differences between saxophonists who already are having a powerful influence upon young jazz players.

Marsalis’ performance provided a fascinating insight into his ability to find cohesion and structure in seemingly random improvising. In one extended number, for example, he began playing the old standard “Cheek to Cheek,” and somehow, along the way, transformed it into yet another standard, “Cherokee.” He did so in seemingly effortless fashion, tossing in a melodic phrase here and there, countering with swift runs, gradually urging the unfolding improvisation into unexpected new directions.

The process took place under Marsalis’ guidance via a combination of musical riffing, expressive body language and significant glances back and forth with the other musicians.

McBride, clearly enjoying himself, countered Marsalis’ every sudden shift of musical emphasis with his own swift reactions. And Blade, equally captivated, answered the frequent rhythmic alterations with his own sudden surges of percussive accents.

A final, lyrical romp through the standard “Alone Together,” with Marsalis on soprano saxophone, finished the set. Backstage afterward, Marsalis seemed relieved.

“I just flew in at 4 this afternoon,” he said. “So what you’re hearing is as spontaneous as it gets. And I wasn’t kidding about not having done it for a while, at least not on tenor. I’m working on a classical album, and I haven’t even had a chance to think about this kind of playing.”

On Saturday, Redman revealed no particular consequences from his involvement with an entirely different kind of playing the previous night. Like Marsalis, who made his own foray into pop music via an association with Sting in the mid-’80s, Redman’s style is so strongly centered in jazz that it easily maintains its own identity (and did so with the Stones), regardless of the surroundings.

Much more gregarious--at least with his audience--than Marsalis, he spent a few moments introducing the musicians and explaining where he had been before starting his program. Most of the music consisted of originals (by Redman and McBride), many of them tailored specifically for the trio format.

Despite the outgoingness of his opening remarks, Redman’s playing stance seemed a bit more inner focused than that of Marsalis. Often performing with eyes closed, usually standing in one position, his visual presentation contrasted with Marsalis, who tended to stroll the stage, his gaze flicking from side to side, frequently breaking his melodic line in a kind of physical reaction to his music, before once again picking up the thread of his improvisation.

But Redman’s playing left little to be desired. A first-rate melodist, he also has commanding control of his horn. And, as he matures as a player, certain idiosyncratic qualities are emerging in his music. The first is an extraordinary mastery of the high harmonics of the horn--a mastery that allows him to, in effect, extend the instrument’s range well beyond its traditional capacity. Another is a rapid-fire technique, which he has begun to use as a colorist device, contrasting quick virtuosity with his warm and supple tone.

In an effort to maintain their presentation as an all-star trio, rather than a backup for Redman, McBride and Blade occasionally moved to the microphone to announce tunes--a somewhat awkward procedure.

There was no doubting the warm and amiable intensity of their interaction, however. At one point, when Blade was ripping off an astoundingly powerful solo, Redman leaned against the piano, eyes wide, shaking his head in sheer disbelief. At another, McBride played a sequence of notes in a kind of musical challenge to Redman, which the saxophonist immediately responded to with a counter-challenge of his own.

It was one of many superb examples--present in each performance--of jazz in action, of the sense of sudden surprise and musical joy the music can trigger.

And the audiences, on both of these remarkable nights, responded with fervor, well aware that they were experiencing rare and memorable musical events.

At the close of the opening sets on both evenings, long lines of jazz fans snaked down the avenue outside Catalina, waiting patiently for the second show--convincing testimony to the fact that, in the hands of Marsalis, Redman, McBride and Blade, jazz is alive and well.