The James Brandon Lewis Trio @ The Jazz Arena, Cheltenham Festival - May 4

James Brandon Lewis (tenor sax); Gerald Cleaver (drums); Josh Werner (bass)

Out of the noble line of Sonny and Trane comes forth a new tenor titan. I love those saxophonists who can conjure up images or take you with them on an exotic journey, but sometimes you just want to have your ears pinned back by a bit of wildly expressed fury. On Sunday lunchtime in Cheltenham you can go for roast beef and Yorkshires or you can come to the Jazz Arena and let James Brandon Lewis physically rearrange the entire contents of your skull. This isn’t intellectual, this is purely physical.

The Trio wander on stage looking very friendly and amicable, take up their positions and it all explodes. An avalanche of rolling drums, even the cymbals sound like bombs supported by Werner’s hustling bass lines. Lewis, himself, is blowing long, loud notes and then some more frantic blowing forces the rhythm section to keep up. That, I believe, was Alicia. 

The second piece, Just James, offers more opportunity for further furious blowing as Lewis rides a lovely bass groove from Werner; full of attack he drives a full blooded solo up into the higher voices on the sax. Next we get a reprieve as the bass bounces into a mellow groove. Josh Werner was the coolest man at this year’s festival, looking like he was the teacher in an American High School where the kids discover he used to play bass in Talking Heads and is the best musician ever to come out of Idaho. This time the sax is plaintiff and pastoral, folding in more melodic lines, Lewis is still bold, assertive and defiant in both his stance and his playing as his solo grows on and on simply becoming more. Taylor’s hard hitting drums and Werner’s rushing bass provide the foundation as Lewis erects an edifice of overwhelming sound.

A stuttering Latin-esque piece follows with a flurry of high-pitched split notes and scattering sax fragments (and I conclude that Mr Lewis has definitely had his Weetabix) My notes include the only expletive I have ever noted down at a concert along with ‘This is brilliant’ as Lewis beats us all into agreement. The next piece, a call to prayer with Arabic hints, opens with harmonic notes from the bass. We plunge into sheets of sound and the drummer digs in, his cymbals look like they’ve been tested in battle. I know how they feel. A drum solo builds up moments of tension and release with a cymbal crash. He speaks with two voices setting snares in conversation against kettle drums before he collapses the discussion into a series of runs and fills. His hard hitting is supported by the size of his sticks; Cleaver is wielding some serious furniture. 

Next a four square groove has Lewis blowing forcefully but melodically over the top, repeating phrases before a series of interjections extend the space between the tune’s melodic line with the drummer chopping down forests behind him. Werner’s bass solo is full of funk and soul and slides. Lewis, now soft voiced, comes in again, breathing low through the sax like Lester Young.

There is a warm and welcoming tone to the tenor as it opens the next piece with the drums building to a crescendo that stops and falls away behind the sax which takes off in a complex, intense solo featuring frantic flurries of notes and wails. The drums are rolling and pounding with great explosions of cymbal splashes; the bass drives it all onwards before it all falls away to a romantic close. The romantic mood carries into Mona Lisa. The sax chuckles its way into a hint of Somewhere Over the Rainbow and on into a passage of pure swinging bebop. They close with a ballad after a plea from Lewis that we keep the music alive. The piece itself is full of tragedy and ghostly cymbals.

Being a simple soul, I enjoyed the pummelling fury of the first half of the set when they set off at a pace that was clearly unsustainable. It took me back to the youthful days of punk rock energy. The second half was more varied and more subtle but still showed what a great band this was. The festival sets tend to be 75 minutes long; sometimes that feels like an age but for the James Brandon Lewis Trio, it passed in a blink. Dave Sayer