Domo Branch & Friends
The Hub, Edinburgh - 17/08/24
Domo Branch, drums; Joe Block, piano; Jonathon Muir-Cotton, double bass.
Widely-acclaimed New York drummer and band leader Domo Branch, one of the rising stars of a classic, elegant, but also free-spirited style of jazz, left the late-night crowd at The Hub in no doubt that music is a performance which very much needs the audience as part of its (in this case, intimate) artistic exchange.
“This is your living room, and we are all family here… so feel free to make some noise!” he declared, before the trio launched into the opening number of a fizzing, multi-textured musical evening. John Coltrane’s classic ‘Naima’ (from the landmark 1959 album, ‘Giant Steps’) is a meditative ballad. Branch opened with subtle toms and cymbal splashes, before being joined by bowed bass and undulating waves of piano.
The tune’s shifting core alternates between E flat and B flat and carries a universe of feeling in the notes that float across and between them. Here was the one overlap with his set at last year’s EIF, when Branch was teamed up with stellar Scottish musicians, having delivered an afternoon of conversation and drum examples.
This time his collaborators were multi-award-winning bassist Jonathon Muir-Cotton, performing with him for the first time, and equally fine Philadelphia-born pianist Joe Block, who is a regular arranger for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Their infectious musical communication soon moved the tempo up several notches with the swinging self-penned Branch tune ‘Harlem Boogie’ (a nod to his personal roots).
Both upbeat and thoughtful was Joe Block’s ‘Horizons’, created to boost spirits at the height of the Covid pandemic. “He wanted to write something singable for the times,” explained Branch by way of introduction to a number full of hope and longing.
That led naturally into the Blues-inflected ‘Something About Belief’, from the four-part ‘Integrity Suite’ (Wynton Marsalis, 2018). This illustrated the range and depth of the trio, and also highlighted the deep affinity all three have with Marsalis’ music. Branch and Block are among his regular collaborators.
A responsive night-time audience was by now thoroughly swept up by the combination of jazz tradition and boundary-pushing improvisation which Domo Branch brings to his own projects, and to all his collaborations. His sense of deep association with Edinburgh and the EIF is heartfelt, sincere and mutual.
So it was entirely appropriate that the evening should include a subtle reworking and expansion of Bob Theile’s ‘What A Wonderful World’, made globally famous by the great Louis Armstrong. This ended with some community singing, conducted from the drum set.
The one vocal number of the night was Allie Wrubel and Herb Magidson’s haunting and soulful song, ‘The Masquerade is Over’. For this the trio was joined by astonishing young singer Oni Marsalis, whose expressive capacities and tone lie way beyond her years. That led into the delicate ‘A Memory’, because, as Branch poignantly reminded us, “We will never be in this room together again at the same time… You are making history.”
How to conclude a magical evening? With a stomping encore via a specially composed 12-bar ‘Edinburgh Blues’. Domo Branch clearly loves Scotland’s capital city and its premier festival. The feeling is evidently mutual, so one can only hope that he will be back again soon, following planned appearances at Ronnie Scott’s in London at the end of next month and then later in October.
Domo Branch: https://www.domobranch.com
Joe Block: https://www.joeblockmusic.com
Jonathon Muir-Cotton: http://www.jonathonmuircotton.com/home.html
