Attention in the PRESS:

bret saunders: jazz
Payne brings choro to Dazzle
By Bret Saunders
Sunday, February 13, 2005 -
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E202%257E2705955,00.html

CD Review: Inspiration

Missoula Independent June 3, 2004
Antonio Mello, Dexter Payne, & Thiago de Mello
Inspiration (Ethos Brasil)

Brazil and its music(s) radiate something irresistible to foreign musicians: Paul Simon, David Byrne and Arto Lindsay, to name a few, have proved fruitful cross-pollinators.
 
Sometimes, though, the most satisfying Brazilian-flavored records aren’t the artsy egghead hybrids, but those closer to the tradition of artists who brought the country’s music to American ears in the mid ’60s: Joao Gilberto and Antonio Carlos Jobim. Inspiration grew out of a collaboration between clarinetist Dexter Payne, a “reedman on a musical pilgrimage,” Brazilian guitarist and composer Antonio Mello, and percussionist Thiago de Mello. All three musicians play bossa nova with winning subtlety, fitting together like pieces of an intricate, intimate puzzle. Payne’s clarinet (he occasionally switches to alto sax) carries most of the melody on these 11 tracks (including a Jobim cover); finally, a virtuoso musician who really hears the Brazilian whispers, and not just the carnival clamor. (Andy Smetanka)

http://missoulanews.com/Archives/News.asp?no=4097

March 15, 2004 Rio daily *Jornal do Brasil*
by  famous columnist, Mrs. Hildegard Angel

Grammy no Rio
Radicado em Nova York desde 1966, o arranjador, pianista e percussionista Gaudencio Thiago de Mello, várias vezes indicado ao Grammy, está no Brasil para lançar o CD Inspiration, gravado no ano passado ao lado do violonista Antonio Mello e do clarinetista Dexter Payne. No repertório, obras de Tom Jobim e K-Chimbinho, grande músico hoje quase esquecido. Thiago aproveita também para iniciar, no estúdio PlayRec, a gravação de seu próximo CD, com a participação de feras como Paulo Sergio Santos, Zé Bigorna, Paulo Russo, Jorge Pescara, Carlos Malta e Maurício Einhorn. Apenas três cantoras foram escolhidas: Ithamara Koorax, Andrea Dutra e Cris Dellano...

Buffalo News / 06.30.2003
Olmsted Camp:
Artie Traum, Dexter Payne

You know you went to a good concert when you leave with three CDs.

That's what this writer did Saturday night, as music pioneers, Artie Traum and Dexter Payne, visited the
Olmsted Camp in Sardinia, headlining a benefit for the Western New York Land Conservancy dedicated
to the spirit of the late country blues singer, Judy Roderick, whose family has owned the camp since 1944.

Roderick set the coffeehouse folk scene ablaze in the early 1960s with a breathtaking voice that combined
the power of Bessie Smith with the grace of Joan Baez, influencing many young blues singers, from Janis
Joplin to Bonnie Raitt.

Her 1965 masterpiece "Woman Blue" featured Traum on acoustic guitar, and was his first studio recording.

"When I first recorded with Judy," he recalled after the show, "she was only 19, but she was so polished.
To meet her family and come here for the first time is great. This place has a funky, old-time feeling that's
very appealing."

"We came here often to visit Judy's family," said Payne, whose relationship with Roderick began in 1975,
performing together with the Big Sky Mudflaps, and lasted until her 1992 death due to complications from
diabetes. "Buffalo's been great to us, and it's wonderful to be back at the camp."

Founded in 1909, the Olmsted Camp is 190 beautiful acres of woods, streams, and farmland. Its buildings
have seen major restoration over the last decade, including the dormitory/barn that the band played in front of.

The impromptu band, which also featured accomplished guitarist Mike DeMicco and drummer Sam Zucchini
of The Zucchini Brothers, was quite sharp, despite never before playing as a group.

They opened with "Dark Road Blues," a Bukka White tune with a mellow, Robert Johnson feel, and a great
harmonica solo by Payne.

The highlight of the first set was Traum's epic "Long Journey," a jazzy composition reminiscent of Bela Fleck
that opens his 1999 release, "Meetings with Remarkable Friends."

Traum danced around the guitar like the polished veteran he is, cooling off only to give Payne and DeMicco
the spotlight. "Niagara" followed, an endearing bluesy folk number inspired by a visit to the Falls, from
Traum's latest release, "South of Lafayette."

Following "Lucky So & So," a reworked Duke Ellington piece that featured vocals and a crisp alto sax solo
by Payne, the set was appropriately closed with Roderick's "Country Girl Blues," off of "Woman Blue."

The second set was a wild one, featuring "Yankee Swamp," which Traum wrote for The Band to perform on
"Meetings." Mose Allison's "Your Mind is on Vacation" got everyone jumping, with brilliant clarinet work
by Payne and hot solos by DeMicco and Zucchini.

Brazilian music legend K-Ximbo's "Mais Uma Vez" was a wonderful pre-samba number that gives an idea
of the new musical path Payne is taking.

Closing with a moving rendition of her "Floods of South Dakota," it was clear to everyone that the spirit of
Judy Roderick is alive in well, from Sardinia to Sao Paolo.

- Seamus Gallivan
 
 

 
  MISSOULIAN ENTERTAINER October 11, 2002

"the inimitable Dexter Payne, saxman with heart and a damn fine clarinetist, as well."

      BIG SKY JOURNAL
                 spring 1999  -Jon Jackson

"I  am  glad that  Dexter  Payne  took  a  couple of years
to ramble  around Cuba, Mexico, Brazil. He  picked up a
lot  of new  tunes, new  chops and new vitality. But  I'm
deeply pleased that he's home. Unfortunately, he doesn't
spend enough  time  around  here,  rationing  us to a  few
forays a year. But  if  he shows  up in  your town, go see
this master  alto  sax  player. It's  a  cool, mellow sound,
sometimes  airily  reminiscent   of  Desmond,  or  Shank,
but  it has more humanity,  more earth,  more fire. If you
add the sweat he's invested  in his musical woodshedding,
you've got an elemental  genius. He's  more of a humorist
on  baritone,  which  is  fine,  and  his  clarinet  work has
been tremendously  augmented by  the music he learned in
Brazil, particularly.

This is a very accomplished musician... and well worth
driving  a  hundred  miles  or  more to  hear."

                                              ©1999 Big Sky Journal
 
 
 

The Jazzman Cometh  by Carlotta Grandstaff 
(Bitterroot Star  3/18/98)
 

The word from Grantsdale Cut-Off Road is that jazzman Dexter Payne, who is not a traveler, is home after almost three years of peripatetic wanderings far, far to the south of here.

As that old non-jazz tune goes, "he's been everywhere, man." Payne, who plays an alto sax and clarinet jazz that is simply sublime, left his Grantsdale home in April 1995 for points south on a musical odyssey that began in Tijuana and ended in Buenos Aires.

Ensenada, Tecate, La Paz, Mazatlan, Morelia, Tempoztlan, Mexico City, Puerto Vallarta, Veracruz, Chiapas. Guatemala, Havana, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, Panama. Cartagena, Venezuela, Manaus, Rio de Janeiro, Iguazu Falls, Buenos Aires. And he says he's not really a traveler. We might disagree, but who are we to contradict someone's confirmed self-image?

Along the American jazz route, Payne survived just as many adventures as one would imagine. There was the outdoor concert with the Tijuana Big Band, and the really great gig at the Internacional Hotel atop Argentina's famed Iguazu Falls. There was the concert for the Lacandon Mayans, the three-village jungle tribe deep in southern Mexico, who wanted to hear not jazz, but American top 40-style radio music, but settled for jazz anyway. There was a kind of cease-fire in Chiapas so the mardi gras celebration could continue. There was the gig for the politically incorrect gangster of Amazonas who, among other nefarious doings, has been selling off chunks of the Amazon jungle to the Japanese; and there were the people of Central America, weary of war, revolution and massacres whose "amazing spirit" has them searching for a third way out of their civil strife.

In Managua, the streets are unnamed, and Managuans negotiate by landmarks. ("Turn left at the old theatre that was bombed.") In Mexico City, there was no work; not for the locals and not for itinerant jazz musicians. In Manaus, the Brazilian jungle city famed for its improbable opera house, there was the television gig where Payne snagged a job with the Friday night house band on a televised amateur hour. Also in Mexico City, there was the job for a sculptress who hired him to record some "bizarre, Aztec, new age" tunes for the moving fountain she was sculpting. In Argentina, it's the pampas that, perhaps like our wide, open plains, inspired "Argentine cowboy music" - the "soulful" sound of the big Argentine open. In Rio, it was the recording sessions with "sambistas" - samba singers - Beth Carvalho and Noca da Portela.

And it was always about the music. Loaded down with alto sax and clarinet, Payne hit the road, catching rides when and where he could, to explore his interest in the influence African music has had in the Americas, an influence brought to these shores by African slaves. In this country, African music is the mother of ragtime, Dixieland, blues, jazz, rock and roll. To the south, the African musical influence begat samba, bossa nova, Cuban "cha-cha-cha," and Payne's favorite: Brazilian choro. "My interest has to do with the south and central American expression of African music. A friend introduced me to choro and it's just great, great stuff."

How does one describe music in words? And, more specifically, how does one describe choro? Payne does it by comparing it with other, more familiar musical styles. Like our ragtime and Dixieland jazz, choro blends two distinct musical cultures: European harmony and melody with African rhythm and syncopation. Out of choro grew samba, in the 1950s, and, the following decade, bossa nova. Like bossa nova music, which reached its zenith with the famous 1960s Astrud Gilberto recording of "Girl from Ipanema," choro is a form of music with deep cultural roots, but few listeners. And like bossa nova, it's held dear by musicians, but by few others.

By the time Payne landed in Manaus, he was deep into it - the jungle and the music. There, before his visa ran out, he and Rio composer and guitarist Antonio Melo recorded a CD of original choro/jazz titled, appropriately enough, "Manaus." With hints of jazz greats Artie Shaw, Coleman Hawkins and Ben Webster, "Manaus" is reminiscent of that 1940s jazz sound with just enough of a latin
touch to spice it up.

Payne returned to the Bitterroot only recently, and plans to stay long enough to play at South Second Street's Spice of LIfe's Wednesday night jazz gig with David Horgan,  Don Maus and Tom Wasland. And he'll rejoin his old Big Sky Mudflaps friends to play at the Rainbow Bar on the other side of Second Street in Hamilton on March 21. In his brief visit, he'll also be casting about for a record label to promote "Manaus." Then it's off to Colorado where he'll spend some quality time with mom and dad.

Like all travelers, Payne left behind a passel of new friends, in this case, strung out in a long line across the breadth of the Americas. The money for a traveling jazz musician is about what one would expect: not much. But the prestige accorded musicians in Latin America made up for that. "Musicians have a more respected place in those societies than they do here." People here ask, "but what's your real job." There, they don't ask about "real jobs," being a musician is like being a college professor.

So, after all this time on the road, after jazzing it up in jungles and cities, swank tourist spots and remote villages, where would Payne most like to return? "Some places it was harder than others. But everywhere I went I met interesting people. I want to go back everywhere."                    ©1998 Bitterroot Star

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CD Reviews: Inspiration

bret saunders: jazz
Denver Post
Sunday, February 13, 2005 -
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E202%257E2705955,00.html

Payne makes the challenging appear effortless on "Inspiration" (Dexofon Records), a trio date with Brazilian guitarist Antonio Mello and percussionist G. Thiago De Mello. Payne's breathy clarinet tone is a soothing complement to his bandmates' thoughtful interplay. Relaxing and intellectual at the same time, "Inspiration" might remind American ears of the classic Stan Getz/Charlie Byrd collaboration, "Jazz Samba."


Missoula Independent June 3, 2004
Antonio Mello, Dexter Payne, & Thiago de Mello
Inspiration (Ethos Brasil)

Brazil and its music(s) radiate something irresistible to foreign musicians: Paul Simon, David Byrne and Arto Lindsay, to name a few, have proved fruitful cross-pollinators.
 
Sometimes, though, the most satisfying Brazilian-flavored records aren’t the artsy egghead hybrids, but those closer to the tradition of artists who brought the country’s music to American ears in the mid ’60s: Joao Gilberto and Antonio Carlos Jobim. Inspiration grew out of a collaboration between clarinetist Dexter Payne, a “reedman on a musical pilgrimage,” Brazilian guitarist and composer Antonio Mello, and percussionist Thiago de Mello. All three musicians play bossa nova with winning subtlety, fitting together like pieces of an intricate, intimate puzzle. Payne’s clarinet (he occasionally switches to alto sax) carries most of the melody on these 11 tracks (including a Jobim cover); finally, a virtuoso musician who really hears the Brazilian whispers, and not just the carnival clamor. (Andy Smetanka)

http://missoulanews.com/Archives/News.asp?no=4097
 

 
CD Reviews: Kambeng 

UJAMA NEWS
Feb 2002  (Vol lll No. 1)
CD Reviews
Kambeng - Boubacar Diebate & Dialy Kounda
Kambeng--Unity is Boubacar Diebate's debut CD. Boubacar, a master kora player,
is in the lineage of West African griots- oral musical historians.... The music that is
generated on this new release is rhythmic, folky and beautiful. The arrangements
incorporate Ancient African, Modern and Western musical elements with the use
of both African and Western instruments. Kambeng produces a powerful and
captivating sound.
                                      -Robert Oyugi
 
 
 

GLOBAL RHYTHM Apr ’03
Out of Africa

Boubacar Diebate & Dialy Kounda
Kambeng  (Bantaba Artists)
The celestially rustic tones of the kora, a 21-stringed West African harp/lute, arguably
sound as good in progressive settings as traditional ones. Boubacar Diebate's music
belongs in the former. Along with players Foday Musa Suso and Kaouding Cissoko,
Diebate puts the kora front and center in songs with arrangements designed to move
the body and edify heart and spirit. Though based in Boulder, Colorado, Diebate comes
from a long line of Senegalese griots. This album, according to the brief liner notes, is
his "contribution to the establishment of peace and love between all people." While there's
no printed lyrics or explanations as to what the songs are about, the nine tracks mix
Afro-pop, reggae and sharp symbiosis of modern with folkloric. Drum set and djembe
lock the beat as the alternately full and sparse kora tones are supported by guitar, bass,
recurring saxophone and rich vocals, befitting Diebate's griot status. From the opening
paean "Africa" to the elegant "Saya," this array of tribal stompers scores.
                                                                                            -Tom Orr
 
 

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