Jazz Fest - My Day 3 - This post is brought to you by Red Bull

Sadly this was another show that took convincing to leave the house, but I knew I'd regret not going to see the legendary Paquito D'Rivera. So I tracked down some of his music online and after the first bar no more convincing was needed. One would think it shouldn't take so much convincing to get me out to see phenomenal jazz for free, but once I'm home it's hard to pry me out again. Also, in this case, I'm not a huge fan of the alto sax. I am, however, a big fan of latin jazz and it only seemed right that after seeing Arturo Sandoval last year I should see his buddy Paquito.

I had no real desire to see Occhipinti but still caught about 1/2 a song (10 minutes) and rather enjoyed what I heard. Not sure I would have wanted to see the whole hour. I was lucky enough to catch a pretty smokin' drum solo accompanied by latin piano riffs though. This drummer (Dafnis Prieto - love that name) looked about 12 years old and played with the energy of one. Even the sax player was visably impressed - tossing his head back in laughter by the things young Mr. Prieto was doing.

By then I was looking forward to Paquito. I figured if he put on half the show that Arturo did last year it would be phenomenal. My mistake for having such high expectations. They were obviously very good musicians (the guy has 8 Grammys) but it wasn't exceptional. Paquito himself is quite the charmer and jokester so that was fun, and I did enjoy his playing. As I mentioned alto sax is not one of my favourite instruments but his tones were really nice and warm. That is until he brought out the soprano - definitely not my favourite instrument. Again, they're VERY GOOD - it just wasn't doing it for me. The smattering of sound issues didn't help matters either. Paquito also seemed very irritated by it. Then once the weedly solos and high notes for the sake of high notes started I knew I was done. I guess it comes down to the fact that I was hoping for more of the Cuba sound and it was more straight ahead jazz which I suppose I've been leaning away from as I get older because even though it's always different, it's still the same.

I then headed over to the Commodore to try to catch a bit of Ivan Neville. Turns out I didn't have to rush. I got there during intermission and the crowd was sparse and remained so and the change-over ended up taking 45 minutes!!! If it wasn't for the fact that I ran into a friend I would have left before they even took the stage. I'm glad I caught a bit of them but I could just as easily have taken a miss. Another case of Really Good Musicians, but the music was samey-samey. Perhaps it's because my funk-education comes from hours and hours of Tower of Power but I just couldn't get into their groove. A person I work with also happened to be there and felt the same way - he left after 4 songs. That was 2.5 songs longer than me. At least I got to see my friend which was really nice. He did end up staying longer so hopefully we can get a report from him as to the rest of the show.

(no pictures this time - my seat at Paquito was directly in front of the doors and Centre staff)