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The first Friday of Jazz Fest opened under cover of dark grey clouds that promised to eventually burst, but the first storm at the Fair Grounds came just after noon in the Jazz Tent in the form of Kidd Jordan and his Improvisational Arts Quintet?s cathartic and brawny excursion into free jazz.

With his 80th birthday just around the corner, Jordan made a crack early in the set about whether he and his bandmates ? William Parker on bass, Joel Futterman and Maynard Chatters on piano and Alvin Fielder on bass ? would still be around after the show. From the first few bars of their hour-long improvisation, though, it sounded as if the band could outsmart ? and certainly outplay ? a little thing like mortality.? [ Read more ]

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