Plucking, strumming, bowing, bending, tapping, and rolling, the trio collectively conjured interpretations of songs old and new with shimmering facility, crossing through American roots, jazz, ethnic, blues, pop, rock, time and space for fluid mixes that defied any fixed genre categorization.
Billed as "Bill Frisell's Beautiful Dreamers," the three musicians have often played together over the years. (They've taken as their name the title of the increasingly prolific Frisell's first album, Beautiful Dreamers, for his new label, Savoy Jazz, released in August 2010.) For close to two hours on Monday, the players came off as creative coequals, even as Frisell drew from his rich sonic palette with astounding acumen, getting just the right sound, note by note. It energized their adventurous version of the 1964 Little Anthony and the Imperials hit "Goin' Out of My Head."
The lone encore was an otherworldly reading of "Strawberry Fields Forever" - a particular treat, as said Fab Four nugget was not among the 16 Beatles and solo John Lennon tunes on Frisell's latest album, September's All We Are Saying . . .
Frisell gently set up the lush atmospherics on " . . . Fields" as Kang pursued the nuanced vocal melodies on viola. Later on, Frisell produced his own mesmerizing twists on the original's backward guitar and other studio craft, shining brightly, if also coming off as if he were just applying his vast, humbling skill set to do his logical part on the cover effort.
Their lively reading of Blind Willie Johnson's "It's Nobody's Fault But Mine" (on the combo's namesake Beautiful Dreamers disc) was both spacey and earthy, as was their sepia-toned yet sublimely warped take on Stephen Foster's 1854 goldie, "Hard Times Come Again No More."
It all made for one beautiful, decidedly dreamy set.
