“Songs of the Heart” at Old First Concerts

After two months of solo recitals, Old First Concerts (O1C) began this month with its first combo performance since the onset of COVID-19. This marked the dropping of the other shoe, so to speak, since last month’s violin recital by Patrick Galvin marked the return of O1C to the altar of Old First Church. Last night that altar was filled with the properly socially-distanced Bow & Mallet Quintet, all of whose members were wearing masks.

The group’s name reflects the two “front line” players, bringing the bow of cellist Jennifer Kloetzel (formerly of the Cypress String Quartet) together with the mallets of vibraphonist Jack van Geem (former Principal Percussionist of the San Francisco Symphony). Rhythm was provided by Rob Wright (who also prepared many of the arrangements) on bass, Brian Simpson on drums, and Brian Cooke (who announced almost all of the selections) on piano. The title of the program was Songs of the Heart, consisting primarily of ballads from the American Songbook interleaved with a few Latin selections and two of the tunes from the soundtrack for A Man and a Woman. This concert also marked the first streamed performance that provided a separate microphone for announcements, bringing welcome clarity to all of Cooke’s introductions.

The result was a combo gig in which most of the selections were familiar. Almost always the tune was introduced by Kloetzel. Given her background in the classical genre, this may have been her first foray into improvisation; and there was some degree of variation in the inventiveness she brought to the individual selections. Nevertheless, there was a decided lyricism to the overall program; and that lyricism was served consistently by the insights of her melodic phrasing.

Van Geem, on the other hand, tended to be more in the background. This may have been due in part to a problem of microphone placement, but there also seemed to be a sense that he wanted this concert to be Kloetzel’s platform. Every now and then, a more elaborate vibraphone interjection would emerge; and these seemed to be reflections on Kloetzel’s rhetorical decisions. To be fair, microphone placement was also not that kind to Wright’s bass work, which was clearly bringing its own perspectives to the tunes selected for the program.

As to the tunes themselves, I was particularly struck by Jule Styne’s “I Fall in Love Too Easily,” which (in spite of the instrumentation) tended to remind me of the vocal work of Chet Baker. The opening selection of Richard Rodgers’ “My Romance” had a similar effect. Perhaps Baker’s lyrical-but-almost-conversational delivery resonated with my impressions of Kloetzel’s approaches to these tunes. There emerged a prevailing rhetoric of understatement, which seemed to be consistent with the shared solitude of these five musicians without an audience in sight.