Event

Jack DeJohnette Ravi Coltrane Matt Garrison Trio

The power trio returns to ShapeShifter Lab for another ground-breaking performance.

NY Times Review
By Nate Chinen

Oct. 11, 2015
Jack DeJohnette, who as a drummer-bandleader has rarely drawn hard distinctions between searching and finding, recently formed a trio of compatible ideals. Featuring Ravi Coltrane on saxophones and Matt Garrison on electric bass, its both earthy and elastic, capable of sneaking in and out of song form, disinclined to rush toward resolution.

During the first of its two sold-out sets at ShapeShifter Lab in Brooklyn on Saturday night, this trio flowed through a small handful of compositions, connecting most of them with solo or duo interludes. The performance began with what felt like a spontaneous invention, nonlinear even though it had a tonal center; Mr. DeJohnette triggered electronic pings along with his cymbals, and Mr. Garrison used a sampler and a looping pedal to create trippy atmospherics on the fly.

Next week the group will record its debut album for the ECM label. Then it will embark on a tour in Europe, where it has already made a strong impression, and not just because of its appealing back story, which boils down to lineage.

Mr. Coltrane, 50, and Mr. Garrison, 45, are scions of important jazz artists whose lives were entwined: the saxophonist John Coltrane and the bassist Jimmy Garrison, who played in Coltranes epochal quartet of the 1960s. Mr. DeJohnette, who is 73, has often recalled the rare privilege he had to sit in with that band, when he was coming up in Chicago.