Jazz music entails a complex musical genre that requires advanced training to synchronize with other players and instruments. The typical reviewer may experience difficulties in detecting many visual and phonetic aspects throughout the musical performance. A musical performance involves several interactions between the music, text, artists, audience, and environment, all of which may contribute to a superb performance. To effectively understand and analyze a musical performance, the reviewer should research the ensemble and the instruments involved. This essay analyzes Elio Villafranca’s concert in Nash, Arizona, which applies parallelism and juxtaposition through intricate rhythms and melodies, scorching solos, and incorporation of African retention.
On the evening of February 29, 2020, Elio Villafranca, along with his crew of jazz master performers, delivered rich, sparkling back-to-back shows at the Nash Arts Centre in Phoenix, Arizona. Elio Villafranca acted as the band director as well as a pianist. Slavov played bass for the diameter while Lewis Nash was on drums, and Arturo Sable played the percussion, which comprised the rhythm unit.
Freddie Hendrix played the trumpet, Burton played the trombone, whereas Todd Marcus played bass clarinet in the brass and horns group. Greg Tardy and Vincent Herring also shared the tenor saxophone and clarinet responsibilities, with Tardy on tenor saxophone and clarinet while Herring played the alto saxophone and flute. Maria Eugenia also made an appearance as a dancer. The musical performances majored on loss, travel, discovery, family, and overcoming one’s struggles.
The themes were brought to the forefront of the show as Elio Villafranca performed songs from his grammy-nominated album, Cinque. In this album, Villafranca explored the story of Joseph Cinque, a 19th-century brave African slave. After being sold and shipped to a Cuban farm, the latter mounted a successful insurrection on board the slave ship La Amistad (Vincent and Linsdey). Cinque tells the grueling but heroic biography of Joseph Cinque through the prism of Latin-influenced genres peculiar to the Caribbean setting, which includes Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic, where Cinque resided at the time of his voyage. Bebop and gospel-centered hard bop jazz musical styles were mixed with Cinque’s Latin tendencies.
Elio’s performance included three of the five movements related to Cinque’s tale, as well as two songs from Elio’s previous work Caribbean Tinge (“Caribbean Tinge” and “Sunday Stomp at Congo Square”). Cinque classified the tracks as part of the more significant movement. For this review, the first two portions of Elio’s concert, named “Cinque and Narration,” “Capture,” as well as the concluding song, “Palo de Muerto,” are of particular interest.
These songs highlighted Elio and the band’s world-class virtuosity and narrative talents with their intricate rhythms and melodies, scorching solos, and new incorporation of African retention. Cinque and Narration began with an aural soundscape of African slaves plodding aboard a ship, their shackles clinking against each other among the ocean wave sounds (Wells). Following this, Terrence McKnight narrated Joseph Cinque’s foreboding early life. An equally sad song subsequently accompanied these tragic circumstances.
The song’s genre was primarily Latin, particularly in terms of rhythm. Once it got to the solos, the song also went into bebop lines. In terms of song structure, the song began with a slow, mournful ballad performed by a muffled trombone and supported by a persistent, ominous timpani rhythm (Borge). Following this introduction, the horns and woodwinds expanded into a complete melody that maintained the sluggish pace. Following this initial passage, the song moved on to three improvised solos. The alto saxophonist’s initial solo is by far one of my favorite. The soloist burst into a wide variety of bebop riffs and melodies throughout around 40 bars. This soloist collaborated intensely with the percussion section, which synchronized perfectly with the dynamics and rhythms of the saxophone.
The pianists and trumpeter took turns performing the last two solos. Notably, the trumpeter used a mute, which felt helpful in portraying the song’s melancholy and gritty tone. The song finished with a reprise of the opening theme after the solos. Interestingly, The percussion ensemble performed polyrhythms after the piece, which was one of several clear pieces of evidence of African influence in the group’s performance (Hester). Overall, I found this opening music quite intriguing and excellent in conveying Joseph Cinque’s solemn beginnings.
Section two of Cinque, or Capture, expanded on the preceding song’s concepts. “Capture” is primarily Latin in nature, delving deeply into evocative polyrhythms and similar African Retention-influenced approaches (Hester). The opening passage had a sharp, stunning theme with accentuated horns.
The woodwind ensemble highlighted notes and forceful, assaulting strikes on the snare drums and cymbals from the rhythm section. Elio accompanied this abrupt opening on the keys, who likewise played crescendoing, rhythmic sounds. Following this, Elio took an improvised solo, supported simply by the tempo section. Elio’s solo included a diverse spectrum of tunes and ideas. The solo, which lasted about 80 bars, featured bebop sections and rapidly-paced chromatic runs.
Furthermore, using a predominantly polyrhythmic structure, the tempo section echoed Elio’s shifting volumes and melodies. Overall, Elio’s solo, backed up by the rhythm section, successfully represented the tension and desperation that Joseph Cinque could have felt after his first arrest in his African birthplace. The song concludes with a vocal chorus done by Elio himself after his solo. This solo chant is a tribute to the field cries performed by African communities across the Caribbean and America (Vincent and Linsdey). It is just another remarkable example of Elio’s knowledge of and devotion to African retention methods.
The night’s concluding song, “Palo de Muerto,” brought the saga of Joseph Cinque to a close. This song was primarily Latin in nature and relied mainly on the percussion section’s polyrhythmic touches. In terms of musicality, we can classify the track as comprising an ABA formation. The A portion included an upbeat, uptempo percussion song, whereas the B section featured a slow, melancholy theme.
The horns and woodwind group introduced some Caribbean-influenced and lively songs. With the inclusion of a call-and-response segment, the concluding A section returned to the original percussion melody. Elio sang a short series of songs during this call-and-response portion, to which the crowd responded by shouting back. This call-and-response demonstrates Elio’s interest in African Retention. Ultimately, despite the lack of solos, this last song provided a beautiful finale to the night, conveying an upbeat, dance-like vibe paralleling Cinque’s triumphant insurrection against his slaveholders. Overall, Cinque and Narration, The Capture, and Palo de Muerto wonderfully presented the narrative of Joseph Cinque via a showcase of Latino and Afro – Caribbean music (Vincent and Linsdey). I enjoyed the concert since it was a welcome change from the conventional “swing” and “bebop” performing styles.
Furthermore, the narrative part of the event contributed to the act’s originality and showcased Elio and the band’s incredible creativity. I would not alter anything about this performance, save maybe lengthening it to include more music from Elio’s Cinque. Regarding how this performance relates to the course topic, the featured songs provided a great illustration of some of the musical concepts discussed in class, including what “African Rhythms” or “Jazz music” are.
Works cited
Wells, Christopher J.” ‘You Can’t Dance to It’: Jazz Music and Its Choreographies of Listening.” Daedalus, vol. 148, no. 2, 2019, pp. 36–51.
Borge, Jason. “Tropical Riffs: Latin America and the Politics of Jazz.” Latin American Literary Review, vol. 45, 2018, p. 103+.
Hester, Karlton E. “Pan-Africanism in Jazz.” Routledge Handbook of Pan-Africanism, Routledge, 2020, pp. 465–475.
Vincent, Joshua, and Lydia Lindsey. “Jazz Is African Diasporic Music: Reconfiguring the Uniquely American Definition of Jazz.” The Journal of Pan African Studies, vol. 10, no. 5, 2017, pp. 156–189.