2010-02-23
Chicago Tribune Review by Howard Reich
the rhythm and the drum — it was a part of their life, like eating and breathing and speaking.
Two years ago, the gifted Chicago pianist-composer Ryan Cohan went on tour in Africa and couldn't believe what he saw — and heard.
Sent abroad by the U.S. State Department and Jazz at Lincoln Center, as part of their Rhythm Road program, Cohan and his band experienced the African continent as few Americans do.
"We were in Rwanda learning about the genocide … and learning about that firsthand was really overwhelming," says Cohan, 38.
"Just about everybody you met was directly affected by it. ... But you could see the spirit of the people, how resilient they were, that the country was moving forward.
"In Zimbabwe at the time, there was an election coming up three weeks after we left, and there was a lot of brutality going on in the country that was not being reflected in the press.
"And the ambassador we met was saying, ‘We can't let this be another Rwanda.' … The human experience of all this overwhelmed me."
So much, in fact, that Cohan composed an evening-length jazz suite reflecting the experience. The epic work, titled "The River," will receive its world premiere performances in several Chicago-area locations this week.
If movements such as "Storm Rising" and "Forsaken" portray the mass killings and terror in Africa, vignettes such as "Kampala Moon" and "Last Night at the Mannenberg" explore the natural beauty and musical splendor that Cohan encountered during a monthlong tour.
But because this is jazz, Cohan won't find out exactly how his work sounds until the performances begin, for he says he has given his musicians ample latitude to develop his themes as they wish. Specifically, each movement of "The River" will embrace a great deal of improvisation, while the connective material between movements will be even more freely improvised.
Yet Cohan is taking less of a risk here than one might think, if only because of the caliber of musicians he has enlisted for the project. Each player stands as a formidable soloist in his own right, including John Wojciechowski and Geof Bradfield on saxophones, Tito Carrillo on trumpet, Lorin Cohen on bass, Jon Deitemyer on drums and Victor Gonzales on percussion.
Because Cohan took extensive videotapes of the drumming sessions he witnessed across Africa, he hopes to bring some of the spirit of that work to "The River."
"The drumming was unbelievable," says Cohan, who was commissioned to write the piece by Chamber Music America.
"We saw some incredible percussion groups, and saw how the rhythm and the drum — it was a part of their life, like eating and breathing and speaking."
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