Coltrane 100

MARK TURNER points to the paradoxical pleasures and glaring omissions provided by contemporary ‘tribute’ jazz performances

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ON May 25 this year the greatest living jazz saxophonist, Sonny Rollins, died at the aspirational age of 96. You might have expected the most popular jazz radio station in Britain to enter into a period of mourning, playing wall to wall Rollins riffs and telling the many stories which littered his life. But there was, literally, radio silence.

How could the passing of the legendary “saxophone colossus” be ignored?

One answer might be found in the frequent tributes, recordings, interviews, and analysis of Miles Davis because of Miles Davis 100 - a celebration of the centenary of the great bandleader and trumpeter who died in 1991. There were competitions, adverts for rereleases, and collections on vinyl. Live tributes around the globe, coincidentally synchronised with a revival in sales of vinyl, and even compact discs.

And, there are tribute nights, almost always sold out, by otherwise struggling trumpeters and jazz musicians, on a weekly basis for much of the year, wherever you are in the globe.

So, the unfortunate passing of an equally great jazz legend may have been irritatingly poor timing for a global campaign already in progress and designed to persuade the old to rebuy Kind of Blue: “Never mind Rollins. Miles! Push Miles! Rollins was 96 anyway. We can do a Rollins 100 in less than four years!”

Was the silence about Rollins because of a contractual obligation? Or am I wrong? Maybe money is not at the root of everything. Or maybe capitalism has only so much room for sentiment and celebration at any one moment.

However, we now have Coltrane 100. Any socialist disdain at the big bucks being harvested by the celebration/exploitation of an artist who died at a tragically young age, must be tempered by the perspective that jazz is still a minority form of music, undersold, underheard and underappreciated in comparison with the established rock and pop mainstream.

The first jazz album I bought, in 1984, was Coltrane’s only album on the Blue Note label, Blue Train; even then, older than I was. The title track is my personal favourite, but for some reason is missed from many of the tribute shows on the circuit. One jazz artist has rightly corrected me for using the term “tribute” with regard to these shows, because “it’s jazz. It’s different in every performance.” And of the shows I’ve seen so far, the artists are at pains to say that Coltrane would not want exact replications of his riffs and tunes.

If you are a jazz saxophonist you have to be exceptional to even try to perform Coltrane in front of an audience, so the experience has an artistic validity of its own.

Nonetheless there are common factors: Giant Steps, Love Supreme, My Favourite Things and Naima are usually in all of the shows. Bizarrely James Carter’s tribute at the Nice Jazz festival also included Henry Mancini’s The Pink Panther Theme!

But the attraction of these shows is not the “notiness” of Coltrane’s solos, impressive as they are, nor the innovations in harmonic language, which most lovers of jazz are happy to leave to the musicians to drool over, but the haunting, emotive sound, which is unique to him.

Saxophones are often thought of as the nearest instrument to the human voice. Like great singers, the finest saxophonists are immediately identifiable by their sound and Coltrane is a striking example of this.

And if saxophonists, like Craig Crofton, can capture the spiritual yearning of ballads like Naima and the mesmeric drone of A Love Supreme they will be the nearest most of us will get to experiencing Coltrane’s greatness.

Coltrane 100 tours and One Off Shows:Craig Crofton Quartet: for tickets, dates and venues see: craigcrofton.co.uk;Alex Astbury Quartet: for tickets, dates and venues see: tdepromotions;One Jazz Presents Coltrane at 100 — Denys Baptiste and Gary Crosby: for tickets, dates and venues see: abneypark.org;Coltrane at 100; EFG London Jazz Festival: for tickets, dates and venues see: efglondonjazzfestival.org.uk;100th Anniversary Concert and Symposium — Royal Birmingham Conservatoire: for tickets, dates and venues see: bcu.ac.uk.

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