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by Seth Rogovoy
LENOX, Mass., Aug. 30, 1996 -- Cuban trumpeter Arturo Sandoval kicked off this weekend's Tanglewood Jazz Festival on Thursday night with a display of his raucous, Latin-tinged pyrotechnics and flair for showmanship.
The burly Sandoval was an effusive, engaging presence, leading his sextet through a program mixing upbeat barn-burners and lush ballads. He was also a sort of musical ubermensch or one-man band, variously playing trumpet, flugelhorn, timbales, synthesizer, piano and jaw's harp. He even proved himself a vocalist to contend with, at one point dazzling with some instrumental mimicry that could give Bobby McFerrin a run for his money.
Sandoval got the evening off to a flying start with his own composition, "Swing It," the title track to his new album. He hit the ground running, flying up and down the scales while his band vamped behind him. It was a dazzling display of technique whose impact was somewhat undermined by the generic nature of the music and the journeyman-like quality of his backup band. These factors, combined with a poor sound mix that gave the Steinway grand piano and the saxophone a hollow, metallic quality, were present throughout the concert. Sandoval's enormous presence and virtuosity, however, overshadowed these faults and made for a lively, exuberant program.
Sandoval's playing was full of wit and personality. "It Never Gets Old" was a slow, bluesy number that referenced jazz pioneer Louis Armstrong's blowsy sound. For "Street of Desire," Sandoval sat down at the Steinway and let loose a Gershwinesque cascade of notes before moving into a slow, langourous ballad that had Charles McNeil shadowing on soprano saxophone. The tune was lush and romantic with a pop quality to it, but again, it was Sandoval's technique -- he played piano like he plays trumpet, with a fierce and uncompromising physicality -- that put the number over.
Sandoval closed out the first set with an extended jam set to a cha-cha-cha rhythm that had the entire audience at the Seiji Ozawa Hall clapping in unison. It was a celebration of percussion, with Sandoval rapping on his timbales when he wasn't engaging in some hip-shaking gyrations that would have shamed Elvis Presley. The tune went through a series of permutations, starting out like classic Tito Puente, moving into a Santana-like, Latin-rock mode, and climaxing in George Clinton funk territory, with Sandoval playing power chords on his synthesizer.
More than any other, the influence of Dizzy Gillespie was apparent throughout the evening -- both Gillespie the bebop trumpeter and Gillespie the mugging showman. In the second half of the program, Sandoval acknowledged the debt on a version of his mentor's "Be-bop" and on his own "Blues For Diz." On the former, the trumpeter unleashed a torrent of notes, carving out phrases with incisive agility in the upper registers and exploring the depths of the lower registers. On the latter, he spit, bit and squealed out notes in short, syncopated groupings, before he put down his horn and scatted everyone's parts for them -- bass, drum, saxophone, even an anomalous opera singer -- before trading fours with McNeil.
Sandoval's ensemble provided pleasant, capable backup, but not one of the musicians seemed up to the task of duelling with the bandleader. McNeil came closest, but the saxophonist's solos were merely echoes of Sandoval's, besides being betrayed by their poor sound. The same went for pianist John Stephens. But in a sense, the members of Sandoval's ensemble were to be pitied more than anything, as they were in the service of a master craftsman and showman. The best they could hope for was to stay out of his way and let him blow, which for the most part, they did. In that sense, the show was a rousing success.
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