By Ruth Ann Ruiz
The Post Newspaper Features Editor
“We grew up in a home with his tunes,” said Chris Brubeck as he spoke to the audience before the tunes composed and written by his father, Dave Brubeck, became music to their ears Saturday evening at Stude Concert Hall on Rice University’s campus.
Then the Brubeck Brothers Quartet began the concert and there I was at my first professional jazz and chamber choir concert, which happened to be a performance of the oeuvre of Dave Brubeck’s work.
I was not sure what to expect because jazz had always been elevator music, something I never really noticed – or so I thought.
Is jazz music intended to make you want to move, swing, dance, I wondered as the spirit of the music began creeping into me, I wanted to grab a martini and sashay across a grand ballroom. This feeling was created with two bass guitars, a pianist, and a light touch from the percussionist, Dan Brubeck another of Brubeck’s sons.
Without any announcement, Dan whipped up the energy with his musical hands and drumsticks, bringing the rhythm up to such a level that I felt I might just have to stand up and dance. In a music hall with no dance floor, however, it seemed most appropriate to enjoy the feeling and not act on it.
One minute my mind moved into that grand ballroom. Then my mind found a hidden-away jazz club to hang out in as the music continued to stir my dancing desires.
The audience who, like me, maybe, had been dancing in their minds, came alive with applause when the quartet completed their piece which was to be the first of many songs that evening.
For the next piece, the Brubeck Brothers stepped aside, and the Paul English Quartet, along with the orchestra began to play. The chamber choir added their voices to the instruments bringing out the lively spirit of the piece.
Throughout the evening the Brubeck Brothers Quartet and the Paul English Quartet would take turns blending their talents with the other musicians.
Prior to coming to the concert, I had wondered what a chamber choir was and how a chamber choir would sing jazz music. With the first bar of music sung, I was able to understand a chamber choir delivers a level of sound that is intended for a small chamber where you would not want a full choral sound, nonetheless, the chamber choir sound provides all the enjoyment of listening to trained human voices singing in unison.
As far as how would a choir perform jazz, that was part of the delight in the evening.
The choir’s unison voices sang jazz along with pieces that fall in the genre of sacred music, while the instrumentalist’s fusion of jazz and orchestra styles created an evening of musical enchantment.
The choir, like me, looked to be feeling the movement of the music in their bodies. They were allowing themselves to sway gently. Though their voices were in unison, their movements were independent expressions.
They added casual claps and finger snaps to their movements. It all looked and sounded like that place in my mind where jazz music resides as a place of solitude. Gently, the music moved and stirred, and then the solo saxophone insisted on attention, and the audience showed their pleasure with generous applause.
The next piece began with the pianist and next the percussionist joined. The music created a feeling of comfort. But that feeling didn’t last because the saxophone took over, introducing a mournful tone and forcing the listener to pay attention, reminding those present that life is not always comfortable.
The saxophone’s force was not a brute painful force it was more of a taunting that beckoned to be followed.
The choir came in with an extended “Ahhh,” through which only a choir could possibly deliver so much communication as it repeats a simple vowel sound. The communication from their voices soothed and softened the tone of the mournful saxophone.
Looking at the seat just below me, I witnessed another soul who had been captured by the spirit of movement as her hands moved to the music. Perhaps at one time she had been a musician herself.
The solo notes of a piccolo filled the auditorium indicating we were going into the desert with a piece titled, “The Desert and the Parched Land.”
As the piece moved along, I sensed it was not the desert in the American Southwest that we were visiting. The music was expressing a deeper, denser, more engulfing desert than the ones I have known in the United States. The piano keys provided an echo indicating the desert was a formidable, lonely experience.
The piece moved into a seeking, a longing, a desire for some sort of redemption.
The next piece was a song of a sole human alone in an arid region, titled “Forty Days.”
The lyrics of both pieces set in the desert indicated they were influenced by the accounts of the Israelites wandering in the desert and Jesus Christ’s 40 days in the desert.
Between songs, Chris Burbeck would share a little about his father.
“My dad was a cowboy, a California cowboy,” Chris said.
Each piece in the performance was unique in how it communicated an aspect of the composer’s reflections on his life and the world while combining powerful aspects of jazz traditions to further the communication.
After intermission came a piece titled “Autumn in Our Town.” Once again, I felt I was someplace I had never been as I experienced the composer’s guidance to an autumn he had known.
The autumn of the performance was pushing or maybe the flowing of a river to a place of darkness, to a place the river knew it had to go but was not in a hurry to reach. There was a sense of dread in each musical note.
The audience was truly moved by “Autumn in Our Town” and indicated this as their applause swelled with intensity just as the intensity of an advancing tide.
“Are You Now or Have You Ever Been a Democrat or a Republican” was the title of the next piece. The lyrics captured the questioning spirit and political nature of the piece while the music worked up to the energy of a full marching band.
The audience responded to the questioning piece with their own questions as they applauded with hesitation, less vigor than for other pieces.
Each piece throughout the concert had been a musical journey into places far away or places within our souls. Then the final piece, “Take Five” brought us back to ourselves, back to feeling life running through our veins, back to a spirit of fun and lighthearted entertainment.
The concert was the finale for the 2023-2024 season of the Houston Chamber Choir, which is under the direction of Robert Simpson, who reported he was pleased to end the season with the bang that was the celebration of Dave Brubeck.
“We deeply appreciate the community support surrounding this multi-pronged initiative to educate and enlighten more people about Dave Brubeck’s legacy,” Simpson said.
Though the concert was the finale for the choir’s performance season, it was actually the beginning of a major undertaking. The musicians will reassemble in the days following the concert and record the music of Dave Brubeck and continue with the “Voice of Brubeck” project.
Professor of Music Composition, Arthur Gottschalk, spearheaded the concert and recording project.
“With this project, our purpose is to celebrate, promote, and preserve Dave Brubeck’s symphonic, chamber, and sacred vocal music. This brings together stellar musicians and singers, including the talented men and women of the Houston Chamber Choir,” Gottschalk said.
“The voice of Brubeck,” will be reordered and released on PARMA Recordings’ Grammy-Award-winning Navona Records label. The ensuing commercial album by PARMA Recordings and Navona Records is expected to be released in late 2024.
If you would like to know more about Dave Brubeck the composer and the upcoming CD, you can find that information at: https://www.voiceofbrubeck.com.
The Houston Chamber Choir will continue to enchant audiences with Brubeck in their touring for 2024-2025.
