Kaleidoscope of moods from duo in perfect sync
Chucho Valdés and Gonzalo Rubalcaba Barbican, London
Before the two superstars of Cuban jazz piano appeared on stage, a spokesman for the EFG London Jazz Festival came on to introduce them. She told us to expect witty musical interplay, but insisted there was no question these two giants would ever be in competition.
She was wrong, of course. Friendly rivalry is the lifeblood of jazz, and over a 75-minute set we saw a dazzling display of it, from two players who are the top of their game, and interestingly contrasted. Chucho Valdés, now in his mid-70s, is a big slow-moving giant of man. Gonzalo Rubalcaba, 22 years his junior, is small, sharp-suited and hyper-alert. He almost disappeared inside Valdés’s arms, when they embraced on stage.
Once seated at their respective gleaming grand pianos, their musical styles turned out to amusingly match their appearance. Valdés had a kind of lordly ease, even when the notes he played were blisteringly fast. He liked splashy gestures such as glissandos on the black keys, and often conjured an orchestral grandeur. Rubalcaba’s was full of nervy energy, throwing off wrist-breaking octaves and bass patterns as tight as a coiled spring.
Sometimes these contrasts stood out in relief, as one pianist would toss a pattern to the other, who would then pick it up and inflect it in his own way. But often they blended into a seamless whole. A two-piano texture is hard to manage; the sound can easily become clotted, but these two players have honed the art of keeping it clear.
In Hermeto Pascoal’s Republico we heard a syncopated bass, a curling middle part, an offbeat chordal patter and a melody, each as clear as a line in an etching.
Naturally the evening was permeated with the hectic bass patterns, sideslipping harmonies and catchy melodic riffs that make Cuban jazz irresistible.
But this was far from being a concert of easy-going toe-tapping dance numbers. Every piece had interesting twists and turns, above all the first, a long complex piece by Rubalcaba entitled Joan. It began with tentative gestures, more modernist than jazz, passed and back forth. Eventually these congealed into melodies with a Cuban rhythmic impetus, but every so often a surprisingly Tchaikovskian gesture would emerge, bringing a Russian melancholy into the tropical ambience.
Valdés contributed two pieces, one of which, Punto Cubano used a persistent bass pattern as the frame for a kaleidoscope of different moods and styles. The evening’s dominant mood, captured in Duke Ellington’s
Caravan which the duo played as an encore, was sheer joy in musicmaking, expressed through unbelievable quickness of both mind and fingers. Virtuosity is sometimes condemned as “empty” but this fabulous concert proved it can be intoxicatingly full.
The EFG London Jazz Festival continues until Nov 19. Tickets: efglondonjazzfestival.org.uk