Sept. 11--The new band that the superb guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel brought to Chicago for the first time on Thursday night doesn't yet have a name -- or at least not a permanent one.
"Tonight, we're calling it The Squad," Rosenwinkel explained after the first set, emphasizing that this is decidedly not the Kurt Rosenwinkel Trio.
Instead, it's a cooperative or collective co-led by three equal partners: Rosenwinkel with bassist Eric Revis and drummer Nasheet Waits. Created in January, the ensemble already has done a bit of international touring and indeed functioned less as a traditional guitar trio and more as a vehicle for musical dialogue among friends.
Ideas flowed from one player to the others with seeming effortlessness, suggesting that Rosenwinkel, Revis and Waits may be on to something. For when three musicians play as sensitively and listen as keenly to one another as these three did, we're hearing a kind of soft-spoken chamber jazz that stands out in an otherwise very noisy world.
Not that the musicians lacked heft to their sound or substance to their thoughts. On the contrary, they had plenty to say. But their textural transparency, subtlety of phrase, beauty of tone and clarity of line -- generally delivered at moderate volume levels or softer -- encouraged listeners to pay very close attention.
Some of the band's most lustrous work emerged in an obscure Italian ballad, "Chiara," which opened with an unhurried and poetic solo from Rosenwinkel. Playing as if he had nothing to prove, Rosenwinkel crafted beautifully arched lines accompanied by an occasional, punctuating chord. The guitarist's colleagues joined the music-making almost imperceptibly, Revis drawing gorgeous legato phrases from the bass and Waits playing delicately with brushes. Toward the end of the work, Rosenwinkel heightened interest via complex chords that yearned to be resolved, the harmonic tension driving the piece to its close.
Revis' "August" opened with a profoundly stated solo from the bassist, who quietly sang -- or hummed -- along with his music, as if adding another melodic strand to the proceedings. He left plenty of space between phrases, allowing the music to breathe. When everyone played, the hypnotic rhythm Revis forged with drummer Waits enhanced the tune's appeal.
Not all the music in this set was quite so easygoing, however. In Andrew Hill's "Tough Love," Rosenwinkel's penchant for knotty harmonies and a restless rhyhtmic vocabulary affirmed that this trio can show plenty of edge. Bassist Revis' relentless ostinato here, Waits' surging energy and Rosenwinkel's climactic, fast-flying passages underscored the point.
Perhaps acknowledging that they were playing the Jazz Showcase -- a temple of bebop -- the trio concluded its first set with a fiery version of Charlie Parker's "Cheryl." Drummer Waits' combination of power and lucidity, Revis' unyielding rhythms and Rosenwinkel's avalanche of ideas captured the spirit of bebop, while giving it a contemporary sheen. When all three musicians were churning at once, in the closing measures, you had a sense of this trio's considerable potential.
hreich@tribpub.com
Rosenwinkel, Revis, Waits
When: 8 and 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 4, 8 and 10 p.m. Sunday
Where: Jazz Showcase, 806 S. Plymouth Court
Tickets: $25-$40; 312-360-0234 or www.jazzshowcase.com
