A Review

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Will Calhoun may be best known for his work as the drummer with the Black/Rock band Living Colour. In 2005 Will produced and recorded what I considered at the time, and still do, one of the most underrated CD/Video releases for that year. 

 The opulent “Native Lands” is a 15 track CD featuring the likes of Pharoah Sanders, Wallace Roney, Marcus Miller, Mos Def, Orin Evans, Nana Vasconcelos, to name a partial emergence of stars in this galactic constellation. In addition to Will’s outstanding compositions, also included on this CD are works written by Mongo Santamaria(Afro-Blue), Wayne Shorter(Nefretitti) and Elvin Jones(Three-Card Molly).

To cap off this package Will includes and hour plus video channeling and documenting his world travels thru Brazil, Morrocco, Egypt, the outback of Australia, and other locales, and demonstrates how gaining this first hand knowledge of world music carried him to a level that augments his musical creativity and increases his zest for multicultural views.

On the night of May 11, 2009 the Native Band consisted of: Marcus Strickland on soprano saxophone, Corey Wilkes on trumpet, Robert Rodriguez on keyboards and Mark Kelley on bass.  The set consisted of fives tunes, all pretty much follow2ing the CD format. The opening was an extended version of Mongo Santamaria’s classic “Afro-Blue” which featured some Coltranish runs on the soprano sax by Marcus Strickland.

This was followed by an uptempo, jazz/rock version of Will. Kevin Eubanks, and Wallace Roney’s composition “Pyramids”. The third number was Will’s composition “Umoja” featuring Will on Brazilian percussion and keyboards, giving it a very Latin flavor with a very effective hook at the end that included the voice of Martin Luther King,Jr. on the topic of poverty. “Naked” another Will Calhoun composition, explores the funky side of Native with the jazz/rock percussion and a standout solo on wood flute by Marcus Strickland.  The set concluded with yet another Will Calhoun composition “Dorita”, which did not veer much from the CD version.

Overall, a awfully grand outing, outstanding percussion and saxophone work, It instilled in me a faith that there will be a continuance of great world/jazz/3^rd world music in the future.

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