Si­mon Lee

Al­though the sound­track of the sea­son is dom­i­nat­ed by aguinal­dos and Trib­utes to Tito (who is all now fir­ing one with Daisy) and the colour scheme leaned heav­i­ly to­ward na­tion­al and cha­co­nia red, Sat­ur­day night's Com­mu­ni­ty Park evening of "smooth mu­sic" was a blue af­fair, pre­sent­ed by the Blue Range As­so­ci­a­tion, in Blue Range Av­enue, Blue Range. Blue food was con­spic­u­ous­ly ab­sent but there were sev­er­al main cours­es of smooth mu­sic, some pi­quant vo­cal desserts and an ex­plo­sive Ba­jan af­ter din­ner liqueur, served by Ar­turo Tap­pin, the Aretha Franklin side­man with a tail­full of locks cas­cad­ing from un­der his Be­Bop straw porkpie hat.

Sean Thomas, pres­i­dent of Jazz Al­liance of T&T, and one of the re­gion's lead­ing drum­mers, must be con­grat­u­lat­ed, along with the Blue Range As­so­ci­a­tion, for as­sem­bling a mu­si­cal menu show­cas­ing some of the is­land's emerg­ing and ful­ly de­vel­oped jazz tal­ents. Be­sides the ven­er­a­ble trum­pet of Er­rol Ince and his Satch­mo's en­sem­ble, Thomas's own quar­tet fea­tured chunky and in­ven­tive key­board play­er Wayne Guer­ra. Dean Williams, who made a place for him­self on the so­ca scene pulling strings for Xtatik and is now De­stra Gar­cia's main axe man, de­liv­ered a set of sen­su­al George Ben­son-in­flect­ed smooth gui­tar, mark­ing him as one of the young lo­cal mu­si­cians who em­braces the chal­lenge of tak­ing his in­stru­ment to ears be­yond our shores.

LEFT: Singer Vaugnette Big­ford with star jazz drum­mer, Sean Thomas, at Jazz in Blue Range, on Sat­ur­day.

CEN­TRE: A cou­ple dances at Jazz in Blue Range.

RIGHT: Ba­jan sax­o­phon­ist, Ar­turo Tap­pin.Williams was joined by Ja­maican vo­cal­ist, Vaugh­nette Big­ford, who like Guyanese-born Ruth Os­man, has been bring­ing wel­come lyri­cal colour to lo­cal jazz events. Any ten­den­cy to­wards schmaltz in Williams's love af­fair with his fret­board was pre-empt­ed by Wayne Guer­ra's in­jec­tion of jagged key­board chords, jux­ta­pos­ing cut­ting jazz with the sweet­ness. Oth­er fret­board vets–no­tably Tony Voisin and Rus­sell Du­ri­ty on bass–stepped up to the blue stage tent, at one point pro­vid­ing ac­com­pa­ni­ment for Can­dice de Fre­itas' swoon­ing ren­di­tion of the clas­sic Feel Like mak­ing Love. Blue Rangers and guests were for­tu­nate to hear an in­ti­mate set from sax play­er Tap­pin, on a fly­ing vis­it from home base New York and his busy cir­cuit of re­gion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al jazz con­certs and tours with soul queen Aretha Franklin.

Turo has mel­lowed in­to a show­man, wav­ing his tail-length, mid-calf locks in time to his struts and chops. If Williams ca­ressed his gui­tar, Turo made pas­sion­ate love to his sax but gave plen­ty space to his back­ing mu­si­cians– Thomas di­a­logu­ing with the horn and Big­ford "cool­ing it down" with a melt­ing ver­sion of the No­ra Jones hit Don't Know Why. Al­though he's just as able de­liv­er­ing what Ed­die Grant calls 'Sarf' (soft) or easy lis­ten­ing, Cre­ole-in­flect­ed smooth jazz and ramp­ing reg­gae, Turo re­mind­ed the Blue Range of his own range, veer­ing from Char­lie Park­er-style Be­bop delir­i­um to swing–and with an ear and eye to Trinidad, a kaiso im­prov on Old la­dy Walk A Mile and A Half–be­fore con­clud­ing with his ex­tra­or­di­nary so­lo rasp­ing breath and fiery flute fi­nale.

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