FESTIVAL REVIEW: 23rd Europa Jazz Festival in Le Mans, France

By I May. 15, 2002

On May 5, the day millions of French voters went to the polls to re-elect conservative President Jacques Chirac in a landslide victory that resoundingly rejected the politics of right-wing extremist Jean-Marie Le Pen, Bernard Lubat – an eccentric, anarchistic artist who, other than the fact that’s he’s neither Jewish nor an immigrant, represents much of what Le Pen wants to eliminate in France – commanded a stage at the medieval Abbey de l’Épau in Le Mans. A multi-instrumentalist (drums, piano, accordion, voice, pots and pans) and poet who founded an artists colony in the town of Uzeste in his native region of Gascony that each summer produces a free-wheeling event reminiscent of the Burning Man festival in the U.S., Lubat, a modern incarnation of the Beat Generation aesthetic, delivered a marathon five-hour performance that concluded the 23rd edition of the Europa Jazz Festival held in this historic city on the banks of the Sarthe River.

Lubat’s avant garde musical and theatrical tour de force, in which guests including saxophonists François Corneloup, Christophe Monniot and Michel Portal and synthesist Gyorgy Kurtag also participated, made one wonder how a country rightfully proud of an illustrious intellectual heritage and unusually receptive of creative iconoclasts could three weeks earlier have placed a reactionary racist in a run-off for the highest office in the land. The cultural politics of Europe in general and France in particular are complex but while the country has no shortage of left-wing liberal cultural events like the Europa Festival that showcase cutting-edge improvisers and composers who have carried contemporary instrumental music way beyond the comfort zone of blues-based American jazz, it’s clear they represent the minority rather than the mainstream. Yet Europa Festival artistic director Armand Meignan has adapted the theme of the film “Field of Dreams” with a programming philosophy that takes the attitude “if you offer it, they will come” and come they certainly did. Despite the fact that many of the festivals concerts – like the duo of pianist Christine Wodrascka and percussionist Ramon Lopez, bassist Claude Tcahmitchian’s program “In Spirit” dedicated to Charles Mingus, François Couturier’s Wolf Gang Trio, the trio of cellist Vincent Courtois, guitarist Marc Ducret and violinist Dominique Pifarély – were intense, teeth-gritting experiences to sit through, people came in droves attracted perhaps by the ability to see and hear people on stage find an outlet for the tension and anxiety it seemed most of France – or at least 80 percent of the country—was feeling inside.

It’s still remarkable that festivals in Europe can thrive featuring headlining acts like bassist Henri Texier’s Azur Quintet, drummer Daniel Humair’s trio featuring Ducret, bassist Bruno Chevillon and guest saxophonist Ellery Eskelin, pianist Mal Waldron’s quartet with drummer John Betsch, saxophonist Sean Bergin and guest singer Sheila or John Abercrombie’s new quartet with violinist Mark Feldman, bassist Marc Johnson and drummer Joey Baron. While certainly far from commercial, the work of these visionary ensembles seemed tame in comparison to what the groups mentioned above played. At this year’s Europa Festival the sounds of the Mingus Big Band, on a tour celebrating what would have been the great bassist’s 80th birthday, Sweden’s Esbjörn Svensson Trio and the Dave Holland Quintet, while hardly simplistic, were the most melodically, harmonically and rhythmically structured music to be found.

By Mitchell Feldman