New London got a little bit of New Orleans on June 28^th when the Donald Harrison Quintet played the Oasis Room at the Garde Arts Center.  In a show entitled “A Night In Treme,” the jazz saxophonist and bandleader known as “The King Of Nouveau Swing” demonstrated how he has successfully merged pop, R&B and hip-hop with old-school and modern jazz and traditional New Orleans African-American roots culture.  Harrison has also worked as a show consultant on the acclaimed HBO series “Treme,” set in that New Orleans neighborhood which explores the lives of various characters as they recover from the disaster of Katrina.   

On this hot night in the city, Harrison and his Quintet were, as ESPN’s Stuart Scott likes to say, “as cool as the other side of the pillow.”

Promoter Ken Kitchings, with his fifteenth jazz show at the Garde, was beaming as he surveyed a sold-out, packed house awaiting the group in the Oasis Room, the two-year-old upstairs performing space in New London’s historic Garde, which has been a bona fide success in its short existence, providing artists with an intimate space to perform and the theatre with an opportunity to bring in a steady stream of patrons without having to fill its 1500-seat main theatre. 

“It’s very heartwarming to me,” Kitchings told me.  “I’ve been doing jazz here consistently because I believe in the music and I think people are catching on that we’re serious about bringing jazz.”  Musicians have talked amongst one another about their positive experiences in the venue, prompting unsolicited calls from all over the country from bands planning East Coast swings.

With so many outdoor alternatives this time of year, Kitchings “was nervous about Summer,” he said.  “But I heard Donald was open so I said, ‘let’s grab this.’  A lot of people here, I don’t think they knew about Treme but they knew about him.” 

The New London show was a homecoming of sorts for keyboard player Zaccai Curtis, a Connecticut native whose extended family in the Whaling City attended en masse with plenty of support.  The gifted musician, who shone brightly throughout the night, was the only member of the Quintet not from the Crescent City, but “we like to think he’s from New Orleans,” Harrison joked when introducing him.

“Detroit brings a soulful element to jazz music,” Harrison told me after the show.  “He adds a different sound to what one would expect out of a jazz band.   R&B, funk, traditional jazz, all those things mixed up and he knows just exactly the most notes and rhythms to place while you’re soloing, so it’s like another color.  It’s great to have.”  Brooks’ first solo started out slow and simple then developed in speed and intensity.

“Duke Ellington said ‘there’s two kinds of music:  good and bad.’  We try to stay on the good side!” Harrison told the crowd, to some appreciative laughter.  “We dedicate ourselves to being students of music so we can bring it together in a logical fashion.  We’re finally getting to a point where it’s making sense.”  He kicked into Nouveau Swing, the title track of his 1997 release which first married R&B with jazz. 

Harrison looked like he was having as much fun as anyone, smiling and nodding at the others during their solos.  “I was enjoying the musicians,” he said to me afterward.  “I was enjoying the interaction with the audience.  I feel like I’m in the middle of the love from the audience and these incredible musicians who are pulling off music on a high level like they are.”

Young MJ, a song he wrote for Michael Jackson, followed and on Curtis’ intricate, amazing piano solo, I reminded myself to count his fingers later because I was convinced he must have seven on each hand to play like that.  That selection, along with the “jazzy but funky” Sandcastle Headhunter, both from Harrison’s latest release, Quantum Leap, gave the saxophonist the chance to really show off his gift, blowing thrilling solos in a more modern jazz sound with Moran funking it up on electric bass.

Curtis swung over to the electric keyboard as they switched gears “into the pop arena,” as Harrison put it, with a medley of songs from his CD 3D.  Though a jazz stalwart, Harrison has performed as a hip-hop MC and has influenced the rap culture as an early mentor to the Notorious B.I.G.  “Here’s one for the ladies,” Harrison cooed as the Quintet eased into a soulful version of Roberta Flack’s Feel Like Makin’ Love.  Brooks had another outstanding guitar solo here as did Curtis and while Harrison’s first solo was melt-in-your-mouth smooth, with the second one, the rhythm turned into a compelling stomp. 

During the break, I wanted to talk to Hartford’s Zacciah Curtis, but he was surrounded by family.  Instead, I sought out drummer Joe Dyson, who surprised me by saying that he’s been working with Harrison for five years, since he was barely sixteen.  “He’s been a great mentor and, in a sense, a musical father to me,” Dyson said.  “I’ve been around Donald since I was eight or nine, starting first at the Louis Armstrong Jazz Camp in New Orleans, which is a three-week program where some of the youth of the city would come and learn and Donald was the artist in residence that year.  It was during a lunch break and I was in the drum room where they had two kits set up and I was playing by myself.  He came in and said, ‘what’re ya’ll doin’ in here by yourself?’  I said, ‘I’m just practicing and learning how to play jazz.’  I came from a gospel tradition with my family.  He asked me if I knew names like Art Blakey, Roy Haynes, Max Roach, Philly Joe Jones and, of course, I said ‘no’ ‘cause I was eight years old and had never been exposed to any of that.  So he sat down and he traded fours with me and traded eights, playing a few drum fills and drum phrases of those musicians, seeing if I could catch on to it.  It was a great interaction.  That was my first experience with him.  I’ve been around him since then.  

“He’s always been around and offering knowledge and offering advice of how to gain momentum and being able to propel myself as a musician and as an artist and stay grounded within the tradition.  Donald had me on a strict diet of listening to the masters of this music, the innovators of this music as opposed to listening to some of the modern musicians of today, just to make sure I knew and learned the tradition and was able to extract new things from it and create my own voice within it and still be embedded and rooted within the tradition, to push the music forward.   It’s been a great lesson and it’s starting to manifest itself the more I’m playing with him.  The older I get, I can finally understand what he’s saying.” 

I asked him if it was intimidating that Harrison has worked with so many great jazz drummers like the ones he mentioned along with innovator Billy Cobham.  “It never was,” he replied.  “The music is intimidating.  It’s always honest and unforgiving; it lets you know what you need to work on.  So him playing with Billy Cobham only gives me more experience because Donald’s the type of person, he’s going to share those experiences with us.  Especially if you’re humble to the music and honest about saying what you don’t know.  That’s the first thing we’ve always done, just being straight honest with ourselves and having humility and he’ll let us know exactly what we need to work on.  He’ll share what he’s done with Billy Cobham or Tony Williams or Art Blakey or Roy Haynes.”