Free Jazz At The Mall

Weekend update.

Had a blast playing last Friday at Corcho (see Do Whatcha' Wanna Do Video). Fun crowd. Nice having a drummer. The last few weeks at Corcho it has been just trumpet and tuba duets. It's always nice to have Lalo there to help us rock out. Saturday the same group played at Capellina. Fun, but we are mostly background music for the people enjoying their dinners. On Sunday I played with 2 very cool Mexican cats in the Plaza Pozuelos, our little mall. You know you've made it when you're playing in front of Sofa City.

They began construction of the "Mall" a few months after I arrived (fall 2004)in Guanajuato. All of the locals were very excited to have a McDonalds in our town. The Gringos, not so much. Since the arrival of the mall, Guanajuato has gotten it's first "American" grocery store, appropiatly named the "MEGA". It is convenient, however we still love supporting our next door tiendas, meat markets, and fruit/veggie markets. Mexico is set up perfect for living without a car.

Back to the gig. Sunday I played with Sibrian, bass and Lalo on drums. Free jazz at the mall. In this case "free" has 2 meanings. By the very nature of a mall the jazz we played was free of charge. Sibrian is a bassist from nearby Leon,GTO(the BIG city). Whenever he and Lalo and I play we never use music. Every song is completely improvised, free. Sunday we found some very cool places at the same moment. The one ballad (slower tempo) we played sounded like we had rehearsed it for years. We also played the Wayne Shorter classic "Footprints" in 4/4 not the usual 3/4.