groundhog day at the wangaratta jazz festival of 2008
another midday start at the same stage to see a melbourne based outfit
way out west previously heard of but never actually heard
apparantly they have appeared at a few overseas jazz festivals
this according to the festival program which gave them a big rap
wonderfully atmospheric, intensely evocative - a treat
there's a big crowd in attendance and so the anticipation is high
presumably most of the crowd like myself well sated and into it
following on from a most enthralling day of music the day before
there's wine-sippers in abundance and a few little ones running around
and so a very easy and relaxed atmosphere as the band starts up
all very kind of gentle, groovey, cuban-ish sounding noises coming forth
sax and trumpet up front with 2 percussionists laying in the beat
composer, leader and main man peter knight on trumpet and flugelhorn
paul williamson making a nice deep sound on the baritone sax
dave beck on the regular drum kit now looking far more relaxed
last seen the previous night providing noises to an intense lost and found
ray pereira obscured at back of stage providing the south american percussion
howard cairns stands quietly at the back and plucking away on double bass
and to complete the lineup dung nyugen seated and on electric guitar
the sound is all very nice - an appropriate start to another long day
peter knight takes the time to introduce tunes with some background
on quite a few occasions making reference to their inner-city origins
suggesting a common bond that infuses their music - fair enough
it's all very pleasant latin-jazz-rock-eastern-mixed-up-stuff
though for these ears at this time maybe over-reaching a bit
trying too much to be all things to all people and kind of blanding out
though with a few notable exceptions from the man seated stage left
dung nyugen pulling some exquisite sounds from a precisely tuned guitar
then swapping to a dan tranh - single stringed lap-based instrument
his contributions adding something quite unique to the sound
in the end there was plenty of very polite applause
a lovely way to start the day really
but there's more....
