When Riga becomes a city of rhythm for a couple of days

From vinyl on the «Noass» decks up to jazz aces and Brazil rhythms in the Dome garden

During the hottest days of last summer, when everybody was craving ventilators and water, Rigans and city guests were craving good music. So there was the 22nd international improvisation, jazz, and global music festival «Rīgas Ritmi» taking place in the «Radisson Blu Latvija» hotel, art center «Noass» and Riga Dome cathedral garden.

«Riga Jazz Lounge» concert series at the «Radisson Blu Latvija» hotel offered jazz music performed by the double bassist Andris Grunte together with the festival guest artists for many days in a row. The art center «Noass» at the AB dam, for the second year in a row, hosted the only Latvian jazz and improvised music sound recording company «Jersika Records» stage with a wide program — vinyl DJ sets, documentary movie screenings and of course, various jazz for two days in a row. And the Latvian Radio 1 studio hosted workshops by the festival stars, as usual.

Meanwhile, the «JAZZin.lv» team this year spent two nights at a pleasantly cool (in all senses) Riga Dome cathedral garden. Prior to both festival concerts, the bell rang three times, typical for concert halls and less popular with open airs, and then the events were opened with a speech by the founder of the festival Māris Briežkalns. And both concerts had plenty of wise music listeners.

On June 30th, the listener rows were unbelievably full: a carefully selected jazz audience, musicians, and composers featuring Maestro Raimonds Pauls got together to listen to the «Modern Standards Supergroup». And the stage hosted drummer Billy Cobham, trumpeter Randy Brecker, saxophonist Bill Evans, pianist Niels Lan Doky and bass guitarist Linley Marthe on one stage — and I’m pretty sure that the audience has listened to all of them numerous times within their own bands and programs (at least I am one of them).

The official communication of «Rīgas Ritmi» stated as follows: «The masters on stage turn pop hits to virtuously performed jazz pearls». And so it was: during the whole concert, there actually was modern pop music in jazz arrangements, and the jazz aces began the night with Shakira, which was followed by «The Weeknd», Billie Eilish, Anderson Paak, Dua Lipa, Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus and «The Black Eyed Peas». Not being very well-informed about pop music since I’m not usually listening to that, I couldn’t figure out where most of the original compositions performed came from, but what I heard from the stage did sound masterfully and jazzy. Although one could feel that the grand masters would get more fun if they played their own music.

This actually is the only question that still stayed unresolved in my mind that evening — why in front of the comparatively wide jazz fan audience, the listeners who, I bet, are regularly listening to the many times «Grammy» nominated artists, did the musicians decide to play pop music arrangements? I have many answers to this «why» in mind, but musicians should know better. Great solo pieces demonstrated the true skillfulness of every musician present, but to get my own piece back together after a concert, I went home to give their own albums another listen.

After a break, in the second part, the audience was listening to «Very Cool People» that during this summer festivals could indeed be met everywhere — together with the young but already known vocalist Paula Saija, Jāzeps MEdiņš Riga Music school graduate and «Riga Jazz Stage» international concert 3rd place winner. «VCP» stubbornly keep calling themselves a jazz-funk band, and there’s a little bit more left of funk than from jazz in their music, but those genres definitely stepped into the background if compared to the band’s earlier history. There’s more from all the other genre fusion now, and even though the major part of the new compositions contains quotes on quotes from the Soviet movie classics and other tunes we’ve already heard long ago, the «very cools» still can do a nice party.

On the second day, July 1st, the «Rīgas Ritmi» concert at the Dome cathedral garden also consisted of two parts: the music fans came together to listen to two different art forms, and many did like the concept of a two-part night. In the first part, we were listening to the singer Clark Beckham which, as Māris Briežkalns mentioned, Riga was waiting for during the last four years (which isn’t anything new lately). A couple of years ago, the 30-year-old Clark, with a wide range voice, became the popular TV show «American Idol» jury and audience’s favorite and was also noticed by his majesty Quincy Jones, setting up a management contract with the artist.

I usually do believe Quincy and his choices, and the young singer at the festival concert demonstrated his singing and guitar playing skills at the same time, freely behaving on the stage. And the same couldn’t be said about his accompanying musicians, who lacked something — if not interplay, then maybe some synergy between them, and as a result, many bored faces were noticed among the audience. The concert went well, the musicians were amazing, and the leader was trying to do his best, although something was missing — something I could not find the right words or technical terms for. Many call it a cherry; I call it trusting the musician. The program contained both world-known composition arrangements (for example, Stevie Wonder’s «Very Superstitious») and melodic Clark Beckham’s author songs with a personal story behind them. It was great that the foreign guests were accompanied by our Latvian brass artists (Latvian Radio big band, «Very Cool People») Laura Rozenberga, Kristaps Lubovs, and Reinis Puriņš — and the Latvians didn’t miss their drive at all.

And in the end, there was a true Southern rhythm party performed by an international global music band, «Ayom». Musicians call themselves musical seafarers who traverse the Black Atlantic from Brazil to Angola and Cape Verde with a distinctly Mediterranean identity. Their name, Ayom, refers to the «Lord of Music» who exists in Afro-Brazilian mythology (Candomblè) and taught humans to play music and sing. Blending century-old traditions with the black and rhythmical language of lusophone cultures, «Ayom» provides a hot-stepping and spiritual voyage across the African diaspora. The «face» of the band is a percussionist and vocalist, Jabu Morales, who convincingly began the concert dressed in her red jacket with almost a spoken word melodic declamation that later turned into a skillful singing, percussion playing, and passionate dancing at the same time.

«Ayom» leader on the stage was joined by accordionist Alberto Becucci, guitarist Ricardo Quinteria, bassist Francesco Valente and percussionists Timoteo Grignani and Walter Martins. Party dresses, shiny jackets, absolutely amazing unity of the band — and the audience got instantly carried away in one rhythm. Seemingly contrasting concert episodes (from gentle accordion sounds to expressive tap dance that was demonstrated by one of the percussionists during the show) definitely left an impression on the listeners. On every musician’s face during the concert, one could see genuine joy about what they were doing — and this emotion got instantly sent to the audience. And the audience believed it.

The 22nd «Rīgas Ritmi» festival was bright; then, as usual, it will be followed by the «Art of Riga Jazz» concert series at the Latvian Radio 1st studio in autumn; meanwhile, summer and Riga will be waiting for jazz rhythms and the rhythms of the other genres. We’ll be waiting for that, too.