Outside the Box
9/15/2023 12AM
Guitarist Bill Frisell's new combo, FIVE, is a double trio, with two bassists and two drummers who have collaborated with him frequently over the years.
Genre-bending guitarist Bill Frisell
brings two new combos to the Palladium
By Scott Hall
Unusual collaborations have been a hallmark of Bill Frisell’s career for decades, so it’s entirely on-brand that the venerated guitarist, composer and arranger will perform with two unconventional and entirely different combos when he visits the Center in October.
To be sure, Frisell has solid jazz credentials, having studied in the 1970s under guitar legend Jim Hall and gaining attention in the early ’80s as a session player at ECM Records and sideman for veteran drummer Paul Motian. Since then, however, his musical path has been far from typical.
These days, the multiple-Grammy nominee is known as an Americana innovator as much as a jazz cat, blending folk, country, blues, rock and other genres into a style marked by subtlety and space rather than blazing speed. His sonic signature includes the use of electronic effects such as reverb, echo and looping to conjure atmospheric layers of sound. He has collaborated with folk singers, classical orchestras and New York avant-garde pioneers. He has interpreted traditional standards and works by composers as diverse as Thelonious Monk, Aaron Copeland and John Lennon.
Playing the Palladium on Oct. 21 for the first time since a 2017 appearance with saxophonist Charles Lloyd, Frisell will perform with both halves of a coheadlined tour. His new ensemble, the Bill Frisell FIVE, is an amalgam of musicians who have backed him in the past in various formats: bassists Thomas Morgan and Tony Scherr and drummers Rudy Royston and Kenny Wollesen.
The other combo is Owl Song, a trio led by Grammy-nominated West Coast trumpeter-composer Ambrose Akinmusire, with Frisell on guitar and New Orleans-based drummer Herlin Riley. Frisell and Akinmusire have worked together frequently since they first met in 2013 while playing together at, of all things, a birthday tribute to singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. Like the FIVE, this unusual lineup has performed only a handful of times.
By phone from New York City, where he was playing a weeklong stand at the Village Vanguard after returning from a European tour, Frisell discussed the origins of these new projects. The following interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Applause: Your new combo, the FIVE, is essentially a double trio. How does that work?
Frisell: It's something I've been thinking about for years, and then it just took forever to get everything all lined up. I just had this dream about all these guys I played with so much, in a trio with Rudy and Thomas, and then a trio with Kenny and Tony, and then sometimes Kenny and Thomas will play or sometimes Rudy and Tony will play, and I’ve played duo with all of them, so the connections are super strong. When we finally did it, it was like the most far-out thing for me, being right in the midst of this. I'm surrounded by all these guys, and I'm getting this incredible sort of stereo thing going on. I probably have the best seat in the house.
The choices that Tony makes, just intuitively, are not the things that Thomas would do, and the same with Rudy and Kenny, so it feels like they can really play. No one has to hold back or edit anything, so this amazing counterpoint starts happening. Like the drums, I really wasn't sure how that would work, but they both seem to be completely free, and no one's tiptoeing around each other. It's like they can really go full out, and somehow it's working. I think it's more about the way the personalities of the people themselves are interacting with each other. It's not so much about the instrument. It's more about the way of thinking that they all have.
What do you enjoy about working with Ambrose Akinmusire?
He's like one of my heroes, he's so fearless. He just has something in his imagination about that combination (of instruments), and now, I'm really excited that we actually get to see where it can go from there. Every time I hear Ambrose or play with him, I come away having to rethink things, or it's just super inspiring as a person and as a musician.
You seem almost driven to collaborate with as many people in as many styles as possible. Obviously you draw inspiration from working in these different settings.
That's my whole musical life. Every time I play with someone else, that's how I learn, and you learn so fast. You know, you can practice all you want, and then if you just sit down with somebody for a minute, it's like, you learn a thousand times faster. I just thrive on that, I think. I've been so lucky too, in that way,
just so many opportunities that come up.
You studied clarinet in younger days. Does that affect how you approach music now?
My heart never was really in it, but I did it for a long time. All the way through even two years of college I was a music major with clarinet, and you know, I always did well, first chair and all this stuff, but somehow, I wasn't connected spiritually or something. But then years later, I realize how much I'm so thankful for all the basics, learning to read and learning to count and playing in an orchestra or a band and trying to blend with other instruments.
And also the breathing, playing a wind instrument – I still find myself breathing with what I'm playing. It's sort of connected to your body more, or the way your natural breathing or phrasing would happen. My memory of the clarinet is like there’s sort of a pressure, you're blowing through this thing, and there's pressure in your body, and I think that feeling has impacted the way I play guitar, too.
You seem to favor solid-body electric guitars, in particular the Fender Telecaster, which is not traditionally considered a jazz guitar. What do you like about it? (Commonly associated with country music, the “Tele” was one of the first mass-produced solid-body guitars, with a simple design dating to 1950.)
Well, everything just works, you know? It's so simple, it’s like they got it right, way back then. There's nothing really that you don't need, but it's got everything you do need. And then also, I have to say, I do love playing other guitars, but it's the traveling part that’s just such a challenge. So a Telecaster, you can drag it behind a truck or something and it will probably come out still playable, where if you had some fine archtop guitar, to try to get that on an airplane, it's just hopeless these days. So a lot of it’s just the practical part, too. With a screwdriver, you can kind of take it apart and put it back together and fix it. But I do love Telecasters.
Bill Frisell FIVE and Ambrose Akinmusire’s Owl Song
Saturday, Oct. 21, at 8 p.m.
The Palladium
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