Photo credit: Leiko Napoli Photography
“Ah!”
Milwaukee-born saxophonist Lenard Simpson shouted that exclamation with some frequency during his trio date Friday night at The Jazz Estate. Whether to catch his breath or to express the joy he may feel while producing florid, melodic rushes of notes on his instrument, his interjections between the music weren’t necessary to keep the audience’s rapt attention between the bustle of table service drink ordering and passages of conversation.
Simpson is a youthful player who has only recently graduated from Northern Illinois University with his jazz studies degree. Much of his time on stage was dedicated to classic repertoire from composers including Charlie Parker, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Hoagy Carmichael and Herbie Hancock, which he interpreted tunefully yet with an understanding of the dissonant potential of his instrument, best expressed subtly with the occasional breathy attack he applied to his mouthpiece.
Simpson has yet to record a full album leading a band, though when he does, doubtless he will include his own compositions. Or he should, judging by the quality of what little of it he played Friday. Simpson’s original work largely seems to reflect a more meditative approach to his playing. This might have been best expressed by the part of a trilogy of pieces based on his favorite Bible passages. An aesthetically ambitious church praise dance team would have a delightful challenge bringing visual life to his sonic meditation on Matthew 6:30-36, and here’s hoping all three parts of his scriptural exploration will be part of his first proper long-player.
No matter the pace of his playing, the other two thirds of Simpson’s group were up to providing him with sympathetic collaboration that encouraged each member to stretch his limits. Drummer Devin Drobka was all over the place on the Estate’s small kit, excelling especially at his use of brushes and keeping ecstatic variations on swing rhythm patterns on numbers such as the standard “All of Me.” Upright bassist Clay Schaub dug into walking rhythmic lines with fiercely manic relish and otherwise played around the length of his strings, giving the body of his instrument occasional percussive thumps.
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Simpson has relocated to the jazz-rich environs of Chicago, but he hasn’t been forgotten by his family. His parents occupied prominent seats in front of the venue’s main room, attentively and enthusiastically taking in the magic their son and his accomplices were plying. Doubtless their son’s artistic and professional ascent is doing them proud.
