Live Review: Gretchen Parlato, Sam Anning Sextet

It takes a lot to make crusty Jon Faine swoon, but swoon he did in the presence of Gretchen Parlato, Maceo Parker and Sam Anning as they made an impromptu collaboration live on air at the ABC last Friday with a sublime rendition of Summertime. For once, Faine was rendered spellbound and speechless, and had to rouse himself back to hosting duties with great effort. 

Thus, with heightened expectations, the audience flock to the cavernous auditorium of Melbourne Recital Centre armed with determination to experience what Faine did.

Australian born and raised band Sam Anning Sextet - Sam Anning (bass), Mat Jodrell (trumpet), Julien Wilson (tenor saxophone), Carl Mackey (alto saxophone), Andrea Keller (piano) and Danny Fischer (drums) - quickly start off their supporting slot with the titular track of their new album, Across A Field As Vast As One. It is a heady, intoxicating plunge into long, drawn-out notes, sustained building of blues rhythms and restrained layering of melody courtesy of a languorous saxophone. Embracing everyone within its velvety mellowness, it transports us to the legendary jazz bars of New York and Chicago, our hands wrapping around the imaginary stems of cocktail glasses.

"If anyone can come up with lyrics to Sweethearts, I'll take you out to dinner," Anning says to introduce the jaunty, whimsical track with Keller's light-fingered melody skimming above the rhythmic terrain of the brass section. The sextet fluidly detach to form a quartet at key sections and effortlessly reunite again when required, but we hardly notice as we are so engrossed by the narrative of the music. As jazz groupings go, Sam Anning Sextet are unique in the local jazz scene for the calibre of every musician - each of them already established leaders of their own band - and their original, masterful compositions.

After an interval, Gretchen Parlato and her trio of musos - Marcel Camargo (guitar), Artyom Manukyan (cello), and Leo Costa (percussion) - reinvigorate the evening with a luscious, sensual turn. As the first vocalist ever admitted into the Thelonious Monk Institute Of Jazz Performance, her much-heralded vocals are unassuming at first. Delicate, moderate and often melding into the musical terrain stirred up by her energetic musicians, it finally dawns on the uninitiated that Parlato is not merely just a vocalist but actually uses her vocals as an instrument in itself. Tracks like Butterfly showcase this well, as she opens a cappella, harmonising and handclapping to set the rhythm for a good few minutes before her band joins in. Magnus, a sweet song she tells us she wrote in collaboration with her friend's young son, also displays Parlato's songwriting talent, building the entire song from a few chords of a toddler's sing-song crooning to his unborn brother.  

"'Flor' is Portuguese for flower and we are just a couple of months old, this group," Parlato nods to her all-male band. Already evoking an exotic mysticism with Parlato's breathy voice, the band seem to steer towards bossa nova territory with Costa adding to the atmosphere with controlled rattling of a huge assortment of shells, rattles and maracas that adorn his piano. Parlato makes the 'authentic' version of Flor De Lis the most memorable track of the evening by sensually building the chorus and bridge with refined vocal phrasing that jolts us with its raw yearning and urgency. Both meditative and on-the-spot improvisational, Parlato delivers a classy, understated finish to an ambrosia-filled evening. Faine, eat your heart out.