REVIEW:

Sid Jacobs

Los Angeles guitarist, Sid Jacobs, warmed up the audience with a succinct avowal that he did not vote for Mr. Bush. But he did not need to make political statements to get our sympathy for he is a player of such elegance and depth of expression even the president of the US might manage to appreciate his virtuosity. With Hammond organist, Pete Whittaker and Mark Doffman on drums, Sid Jacobs played in a trio format that gave the guitarist ample space and support to demonstrate his remarkable skills.

As a musician, composer and teacher Jacobs has an enquiring, even cerebral, attitude to both the process of improvisation and the techniques of the guitar. Where other players concentrate on a particular approach in order to control the complexities of this instrument Jacobs revels in pushing technique in all directions. He plays equally with or without the plectrum and can finger pick with the control of a classical player to bring a melody out of the chords. He obviously spends time working out new harmonies and fingerings as he moves through a melody. The perfect exposition of this was a sequence of Bill Evans tunes arranged for solo guitar in which Jacobs gave a virtuoso illustration of the range of timbres and expression he can draw from a box with five strings, and all without raising the volume or touching an effects box. At the same time he also showed he can put life into a standard such as Green Dolphin Street through to Wayne Shorter’s Footprints, played with sparse lines imbued with great feeling.

Throughout the evening Pete Whittaker held down a bass line on the Hammond while playing some beautifully restrained solos, never pushing so hard as to overshadow the quiet elegance of the guitar. This was balanced by driving yet reserved work from Mark Doffman on drums who demonstrated how a great solo can use space, even silence, to build tension and perspective.

This was not an evening of high-volume funky jazz but by the second set the whole room, right back to the usual talkers at the bar, were listening in silence to the masterful improvisations of Sid Jacobs playing in a trio that, as far as I know, had never performed together before. Another of the miracles that is jazz.

© Paul Medley