La Serena Beach Jazz

Some photos from a fantastic free jazz concert on the beach in La Serena. Flash just made everything look like white ghosts so I have embraced the blur!

The first group was a five piece with piano, guitar, bass, drums and a frontman who sang and played flute and saxophone. They were all super tallented but the frontman was particularly gifted and spiralled off on outrageous solos. The obese guitarist "Piqueño" was great too, with tight question and answer sections with the pianist. Sometimes his solos verged on metal. The bassist, who looked like a physics teacher, was the only one not to play a solo.

And who could blame him because the next act "Bass" was comprised off three bass guitarists. The sat down to tune their basses and out of the melé their first song emerged. The set continued with an appropriately unusual mixture of ambient, jazz, funk, experimental, world, and even some Chilean folk. A typical song sounded like hearing 3 ten minute long bass solos played simultaneously. But not nearly so bad as that sounds. The Maestro played a solo piece which thumped, rolled and widdled. The uber-tallented-one played a mind-boggler, just as much of a technical feat as a musical one. Then they regrouped in a sloppy way to finish on a crescendo.

The last group of the night where a nine piece with drums, purcussion, guitar, bass, sax, flute, trumpet, trombone, and a wierd brass instument I didn't recognise that sounds like a big trumpet. They played an afro-latin sort of style and also some bluesier numbers that sounded like a latin version of the band from Blues Brothers.

All in all a great night on the beach!