Kenny Barron Sextet
Village Vanguard178 7th Avenue South, New York 10014
Kenny Barron Sextet is billed at the Village Vanguard for an evening of small-group jazz in the club’s triangular basement room, where the stage sits before an audience of 123 and portraits of jazz greats line the walls. No personnel are listed for this date, so the sextet’s lineup has not been specified. The room’s close table layout and its request for silence before the music begins put the attention squarely on the performance.
Barron is a pianist whose work, as NPR puts it, spans “driving bebop, delicate ballads, bounding calypso and rhythms from across Brazil.” NPR calls him “an institution” among jazz musicians, noting years in bands led by Dizzy Gillespie, Yusef Lateef and Stan Getz, with whom he also collaborated. He co-founded Sphere, a group devoted to interpreting Thelonious Monk’s music. Jazz in Europe has praised Barron’s “elegant playing, sensitive melodies and infectious rhythms,” a description that points to the range behind his long association with the Vanguard and other jazz stages.
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.