Gato Barbieri - Alive In New York (1975)

Dicen que no hay dos sin tres, y entonces menos hay uno, dos y tres sin el cuatro. Me refiero al cuarto cap{itulo de la saga latinoamericana del Gato Barbieri. Cerramos este capítulo pero seguro que volveremos con más Gato en cualquier momento.

Artista: Gato Barbieri

Álbum: Alive In New York
Año: 1975
Género: Latin Jazz
Nacionalidad: Argentina

Lista de Temas:
1-Milonga Triste Barbieri, Manzi, Piana
2. La China Leoncia, Pt. 1
3. La China Leoncia, Pt. 2
4. La China Leoncia, Pt. 3
5. La China Leoncia, Pt. 4
6. Baihia
7. Lluvia Azul

Alineación:
- Gato Barbieri / Sax (Tenor), Guiro
- Ray Armando / Percussion, Conga
- Ron Carter / Bass
- Howard Glover "Johnny" Johnson / Tuba, Clarinet (Bass), Flugelhorn, Tambourine
- Eddie Martinez / Piano, Fender Rhodes
- Paul Metzke / Guitar
- Portinho / Drums

El Gato acababa de disfrutar del éxito de la banda sonora de la película "El Último Tango en Paris" que compartimos aquí en nuestro espacio cabezón, una composición enormemente melódica y melosa (que repito, personalmente no me gusta nada) y el Gato termina su saga de cuatro capítulos dedicado al jazz latino.
Chapter Four es un perfecto colofón a las tres grabaciones ("chapters") precedentes y nos muestra las dos caras de Barbieri; la más salvaje, contenida en la suite de cuatro partes dedicada a La China Leoncia que ya habíamos escuchado en Chapter One y también la más dulce, con la "Milonga Triste" y, especialmente, con "Lluvia Azul", ambas contenidas en su Chapter Three. Un sólo tema nuevo, "Baihia" y ninguno de su Chapter Two.

"Chapter Four - Alive In New York" fue el último trabajo de esta brillante época y el que daba paso a una nueva transformación en la música del músico argentino. Su siguiente disco sería Caliente que incluiría una conocida versión del clásico de Carlos Santana, "Europa". Pero esa es otra historia.

Como siempre, algunos comentarios de terceros, ahora en inglés...

Taken from three nights of recording in February of 1975, Gato Barbieri's Chapter 4 is a continuation -- albeit in a concert setting -- of the music explored on his first three chapters for Impulse. Finally available on CD this set includes three Barbieri compositions, including the four-part suite "La China Leonicia" and his ubiquitous "Milonga Triste." The band here includes percussionist Ray Armando, bassist Ron Carter, multi-instrumentalist Howard Johnson (here on tuba, flügelhorn, and bass clarinet), pianist Eddie Martinez, guitarist Paul Metzke, and Brazilian drummer Portinho. The band here is full of warmth as well as fire, and the blowing is full of passion. Barbieri's bands in the early and mid-'70s were well rehearsed, and deeply in tune with his brand of Latin jazz. The empathy in the rhythm section is utterly uncanny as Carter, Martinez, and Portinho create a shape-shifting backdrop for the frontline players to wind and entwine one another, incorporating formal notions of song into the action. The opening "Milonga Triste" is a case in point as Gato plays the melody, Johnson, in his own gift for lyricism, plays contrapuntal fills, and Metzke trots out elongated fingerpicked figures for Barbieri to solo off of, never losing the lyric in the process even as the intensity of the tune grows with every chorus. The suite begins as a free blowing exercise where modes are kept hovering about for the frontline players to improvise from until a melody is established and a direction taken that changes continually in the following three parts. The album's closer, "Lluvia Azul," begins as a ballad of dreamy quality and becomes a Latin jazz steamer by the end of the first third of its ten minutes, and becomes a lyrical orgy of harmonic invention and chromatic interplay with burning salsa rhythms fueling the entire thing. Chapter 4: Alive in New York is one of Barbieri's finest moments on record.

Thom Jurek

The final installment of Gato Barbieri's excellent Latin America series features the fire-breathing Argentinean tenor saxophonist leading a smoking international septet—with Howard Johnson (bass clarinet, flugelhorn and tuba), Eddie Martinez (keyboards), Paul Metzke (electric guitar), Ron Carter (bass), Portinho (drums) and Ray Armando (percussion)—at the Bottom Line back in 1975, a time when jazz was moving in many directions. A post-Coltrane avant gardist with a firm grounding in the tenor saxophone tradition, Barbieri merged the world music of his native continent and the blossoming fusion movement into a uniquely personal mélange that remains exciting today.
The satisfying set begins with Barbieri's "Milonga Triste, a melancholy tango that showcases the leader's sensual sound swathed in an opulent textural tapestry of interwoven rhythms and tones (enriched by Johnson's superb bass clarinet backgrounds). The album's centerpiece, "La China Leoncia, an extended four-part suite by Barbieri, is constructed similarly, but unfolds even more dramatically. It begins with the composer's poetic recitation over an airy backdrop of fluttering tuba, keyboards and percussion, seamlessly segueing into the second section, which opens with Martinez's processional piano and gives way to Carter's insistent bass line and Barbieri's flamenco-inspired handclapping. Then the tenor enters, gradually building in dynamics until it shrieks and squeals fervently in the third section. Metzke's cavaquinho-styled strumming opens the final movement, where Portinho's drumming and Johnson's flugelhorn push the leader's high-energy horn.
The penultimate "Bahia spotlights Barbieri hearkening to Coltrane's '50s persona in the opening strains of a beautiful ballad (over the lush cushion of Johnson's tuba) and moving on to the master's uninhibited '60s tone (mingled with a Rollins-esque coarseness) later in the song. The final selection, the leader's "Lluvia Azul, a pretty melody first heard in a Chico O'Farrill arrangement on the previous Chapter Three: Viva Emiliano Zapata, features the whole band in an Afro-Cuban styled descarga jam that was quite novel at the time.

Russ Musto