KSTV: Playback session - Weather Report's Black Market

Alec Harper (tenor sax, soprano sax); Will Barry (keyboards); Flo Moore (electric bass); Jas Kayser (drums); João Caetano (percussion).

(Screenshots by Ken Drew)

Weather Report's 1976 album Black Market was the band's seventh album and the first to introduce Jaco Pastorius. The Wayne Shorter-Joe Zawinul outfit was at the height of its powers, playing arena and stadium gigs before arena and stadium gigs became the norm. Tonight's Kansas Smitty's session would attempt to get somewhere near the magnificence of the legendary musicians heard on the album and in concert halls around the world. 

Shortly before the live stream set began Kansas Smitty's presenter Osei Mensa chatted to Will Barry. Keyboards maestro Barry indicated he and his band mates had their work cut out in trying to do justice to the music and its principal composers, Messrs Shorter and Zawinul. Six of the album's seven tunes would be played (the one omission being Three Clowns) in the order as on the recording. 

Black Market first up, the memories of hearing the band at Newcastle City Hall came flooding back. The line-up on those two occasions featured Pastorius (Alphonso Johnson had recently departed) and Peter Erskine (Chester Thompson and Michael Walden were no longer involved). Alex Acuña was on the tour, and, from memory, Don Alias. Cannon Ball, composed in memory of Zawinul's one time employer Cannonball Adderley, tested the Kansas Smitty'd crew to the limit. Unsurprisingly, Alec Harper (Shorter) and Will Barry (Zawinul) rose to the task - Harper impressing on soprano sax (for some, Shorter playing soprano over tenor is the preference), Barry somehow summoning the sound of Zawinul's three-sided, multi-tiered keyboards set up. 

From Shorter's Elegant People to Pastorius' sole compositional credit, Barbary Coast, tonight's Kansas Smitty's all-stars were having a ball. Even in these Batman and Robin masked times, it was evident from the shining eyes that they were having the time of their lives, not least when they successfully negotiated several particularly fiendish sections! 

To the finale, a percussion face-off between Jas Kayser and João Caetano on the album's closing number, Alphonso Johnson's Herandnu. If there had been a real live audience present, the applause would have taken the roof off. These guys are the business! Finally, a word, one word, about bassist Flo Moore...superb.  

Russell