Jazz Break Revival XIV : The Report
Well, well, well, look at that. Jazz Break Revival has already reached its 14th Edition. We are really happy to see this constant monthly jazz event in Bandung keeps getting stronger. It just keeps going on, and on, and on, every month the jazz lovers in Bandung gets the quality jazz “meal”, for free. It’s good to see how Jazz Break Revival grows with many supports keep on coming from everywhere.
Held at the beautiful,cozy and relaxing hall of The Concordia Resto & Cafe as usual, KlabJazz together with Balai Pertemuan Bumi Sangkuriang, Melinda Hospital and Mara Radio presented the 14th installment of Jazz Break Revival. It was relaxing as always. That’s why I always love it when the first Wednesday of the month comes.
The first band to open the concert tonight was JazzFuture Project ‘09. This is a promising new group consists of youngters under 17 year old: Yonathan Godjali (piano), Hizkia Natanael (bass) and Miranti Fitri Khairunissa (violin), the daughter of Wachdach Band’s Teddy AB. Taking the drum position is the senior drummer Edward Manurung. 
This group was formed by the Teddy AB. It was really great to see young talents playing great on stage. I’m sure someday they all will rise as a great musicians. They opened their session with Kenny Dorham’s “Blue Bossa” with Miranti carried out the melody with violin. Miranti then changed her role as the singer for Duke Ellington & Bob Russell’s “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.” How fascinating to see the kids could already know how to texture their music on different styles. She kept singing on the next one, this time on Jobim’s bossa classic “Triste”. The way Yonathan play the piano amazed me. He is definately a talent to look for in the future. With still very young of age, he has a really bright future. The last song they brought was the classic Chick Corea’s “Spain”. It was cool to see how violin took charge on the main melody while supported sweetly by the whole band.
The second band was The Statement. The Statement is a band formed in 2004. Due to their activities, the band was inactive for a couple of years. During the time the band suffered changing formation too. But now they are back. Andi Danial the pianist is the only staying member from the first formation. Although The Statement has the new drummer and bassist, the soul was still the same. 
Andi Danial was attractive behind the keyboard just as before. He consistently communicate with the band members with his eyes. A series of great fusion delivered. It was almost like a vintage 80’s kind of style, and it was entertaining. Two songs came right away, “Side Walk Cafe” and “Systemic Penetration”. After two songs, Andi Danial introduced the band, Jo Harmann on bass and Gabby Christian on drums. They continued again with another number “Wholy Body” which delivered attractively. Both Andi and Jo went down the stage and presented a “conversation” between keyboard and bass, while Gabby controlled the beat in full power. Andi took his KX Yamaha, the keyboard in guitar shape to perform right in front of the audience under the stage. They closed their performance with “Angkot Bandung”, a song picturing the public transportation of the city. All the songs were composed by Andi Danial.
Time to see G/E/T. This is a newly formed group with the composition of KlabJazz’ own talents. The great young guitarist Tesla Manaf Effendi, Danang Perdhana Dalimunthe on bass and Edward Manurung back on drums. Tesla explored wildly in this group, it was even turn more like experimental, unlike the style he used to play in his other groups Tri’toones and Bayu & Tesla. Seriously they performed unbelievably. It was wild, sometimes dark, melting fusion, bop and even hard rock into their songs. The medley of “Autumn Leaves” and “Humpty Dumpty” opened up their pefromance tonight, then followed by John Scofield and Pat Metheny’s “The Red One”. Edward surprisingly moved to keyboard for a while. An interesting twist of the ageless Snow White theme song came next. Yes, it was the craziest version of “Someday My Prince Will Come” I’ve ever heard. Boppin’, rockin’, funkin’. Tesla was on fire. So were the rest of the band. It was high!
Having left the stage only for a while, Galang and Edward came back on stage, this time for 4AM Quartet. Galang and Edward became the most hyperactive players for tonight. 
It’s good to see 4AM Quartet again. This is a group that was established in 2005. All along their journey they have brought many style, from standard mainstream, be bop, funk fusion to post bop, often they combined all those styles creating their own specific music. Started with 4 personnel, later they turned as trio, due to the difficulties of finding the bassist. Now the band is back on 4 again, with Galang Perdhana Dalimunthe taking the bass position. As usual, the chemistry between them was superb. Sonny Akbar, who was once the student of Bubi Chen showed his skill again. Along with Edward Prasetya on guitar and Edward Manurung on drums, we got the complete formation again. Tonight they brought their own original compositions. The first one was the cool fusion-esque composition entitled “Rain Forest”. The second song was “Rah-Long”, a song with rising tense in the end. followed by “Plu Pirus” and the last one was “Juanda Traffic”, a song capturing the scene of the ever crowded Juanda Street in Dago Area, Bandung.
Ever heard of Kristian and the KrisKruise? Soon you will hear this name a lot. This is a brand new group that is going to color the Indonesian jazz scene up really soon. Led by Kristian Dharma, a bassist who seems to appear almost everywhere, this is a promising group that definately worth to notice. Kristian Dharma has established himself as one of the busiest bassist in Indonesian jazz. He is listed as the line up band for Syaharani and the Queenfireworks, Tangga, Rio Febrian, and also Donny Suhendra Trio. Tonight he brought his own band, Kristian and the Kriskruise with Aditya Bayu (guitar), Aryo Wicaksono (drums), Rieke Astari (piano), also featuring Putu Sutha, the winner of the third edition the singing contest AFI (Akademi Fantasi Indosiar) on vocal.
Let’s dig more about Kristian and the KrisKruise. This group formed not that long ago, just a couple of months ago. The reason behind the making of this group was explained by the leader himself, Kristian Dharma. “Being as a session player for such a long time makes you to think about making your own creation” said Kristian. And it’s really true, or else no one will remember you good enough. So, he formed this band. What interesting is, eventhough Kristian is a bassist, and he leads the band, he actually minimize the bass on his own compositions. “People will think that bass will take the lead since I’m a bassist, but it won’t be like that at all..” he said. “There’s even one song without bass at all.” he continued. Right now Kristian is in the process of making an album, and soon he will also make small concerts in several cities to promote the album. Personally I feel happy to see that another bassist dare to take the challenge to lead the band in front. Another important mission is carried by Kristian with this his band. He wants to show that jazz is not just for adults, but it could also fit to the youngsters as well. Kristian has been playing in many styles or genres, so it’s good to hear what this group offers. I believe here he is showing his true color.
It was time to see what they are going to deliver in their soon to release debut album. Kristian and the KrisKruise started at 10:35 pm with their original composition entitled “Timeless Transition”. It’s a rich composition with nice changing tempo, feels like a journey through a timeless transition. The band continued directly with “Quatrogonal Lines Porthmos”, another original composition made by Kristian. The third song was a song written by Miles Davis but later on became a Bill Evans theme throughout his career called “Nardis”. They included a playground for Kristian and Aryo to improvise together in this song. It was really entertaining. The next song brought Putu Sutha, the winner of AFI 3 on stage. He sang “Get Stupid” just by himself tonight. This song will appear in the album with a cool duet between him and Syaharani. I’m sure this song will be a hit when it comes out, for its funny, playful but sweet and cute style. This song is a very “friendly” song that won’t be difficult to absorb even for those who don’t really into jazz. Kristian took time to share about his condition. Actually he is still in healing process after suffering gout. He was out for couple of month due to the illness he suffered. Though for his passion in music he forced himself to start playing slowly again. “Please take a good care of your health, because it will make you really suffer..” said Kristian. The last song from Kristian and the KrisKruise was “Mess Up”, a song he made about how he felt when he couldn’t play his bass. Kristian and the KrisKruise has shown their ability tonight perfectly, I can’t wait to have their album which hopefully will come out this year.
Another well done session brought by KlabJazz together with BP Bumi Sangkuriang and Melinda Hospital. Interesting lineups, series of cool original compositions, nice performance in high quality were all there on stage. It was night with presentation of skills. There won’t be Jazz Break Revival next month, since we will enter the fasting month for Moslems. Stay tune for the next Jazz Break Revival in October, where there will be a special performance of Henning Sieverts, a superb bassist/cellist from Germany, as the result of cooperation with Riza Arshad/Serambi Jazz and Goethe Institut Jakarta. As usual, thank you very much to KlabJazz and everybody involved in this regular monthly event. We hope and pray, may you always have the courage, strength and spirit to keep it running for a long time to come.
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Reporter: Riandy Kurniawan
Photographer: Eghi 25
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