JOHN ZORN NEW MASADA QUARTET
Village Vanguard178 7th Avenue South, New York 10014
John Zorn brings his New Masada Quartet to the Village Vanguard: Zorn on alto saxophone with Julian Lage on guitar, Jorge Roeder on bass and Kenny Wollesen on drums. The quartet works from Zorn’s Masada songbooks, a body of more than 600 pieces associated with his Radical Jewish Culture project. Expect the group to treat that repertoire as live material rather than a repertory recital, in the Vanguard’s close, music-first room.
Zorn is described as a New York experimentalist, and the New Masada Quartet draws on the project’s meeting of the “keening Jewish klezmer tradition” and Ornette Coleman’s “renegade musical language.” Lage, Roeder and Wollesen are established Zorn collaborators, and this is not the original Masada lineup but a later quartet built around the same songbook. Roulette has called it “one of the best groups Zorn has ever had.” Reviews have singled out its “focused communication” and “exceptional musicianship,” finding a bridge between “the accessible and avant-garde”; another account hears “burning solos, telepathic group interaction, heartfelt lyricism, [and] hypnotic grooves.”
A narrow basement staircase leads to a triangular room with a red curtain and a stage at the point, where musicians play for a small audience of 123. Tables open like spokes from the stage, and the walls hold portraits of jazz legends. The acoustics are excellent, and the only sound before the music begins is the hum of the room. No food is served, only drinks at a bar. Shows start at 8:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m., with seating beginning at 7:00 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. respectively. The atmosphere is focused entirely on the music, with silence requested before the concert begins.