Late-start jazz artist jumpstarts Middlebury

Author: Melissa Marshall

No programs were distributed at the Middlebury College Center for the Arts on Saturday night - the audience would have to submit themselves to the smooth rhythms and changing beats of the Miles Donahue Band without a sheet of folded paper to highlight the stops along the way. However, the crowded room, filled with students, town residents and faculty, did not seem to mind being at the mercy of a man who didn't get serious about jazz until he was 45 years old.

Prior to Donahue's heart and soul commitment to a genre, which defies definition, he spent 20 years playing pianos at typical lounge gigs, weddings and parties to support his family. Christopher Lizotte '07, host of the WRMC Jazz show "Bebob and Beyond," interviewed the group. According to him, this move was a significant gamble. "Practically no one, even so-called 'superstars,' can make a living just playing jazz - they have to teach as well," said Lizotte. "Another way that musicians continue to make a living is by crossing over into more popular types of music. Take Medeski, Martin and Wood, for example. Their collective improvisation and relatively static harmony is characteristic of the 'jam band' phenomenon, and same goes for the Jazz Mandolin, Project, Soulive and John Scofield."

However, for starting so late in life, Donahue has made quite an impression on the industry, recording a couple of high-quality CDs on Ram Records before establishing his own company, entitled Amerigo Records, in 2002.

Live performance seemed to come as easy as breathing to Donahue on Saturday night. His soulful renditions revived Middlebury College, which, according to Lizotte, has scarcely been visited by jazz musicians from outside Vermont in the last five years.

In his debut performance at Middlebury College, Miles Donahue was accompanied by John Lockwood on the bass, Alain Mallet from France on the piano and Marcello Pelliperi from Italy on the drums. As such, they were a group of performers lending themselves well to Middlebury's reputation of promoting international diversity. Dorothy Mitchell '09 commented, saying, "I was impressed by the fact that even though three of musicians were reading off music scores for many of the songs, they sounded like they had the songs memorized. The members of the quartet played off… each other amazingly well."

Donahue was predictably stellar on the saxophone as well as on the trumpet, being hailed by Boston Globe jazz critic Bob Blumental as "one of the best-kept jazz secrets…Equally adept on trumpet and various saxophones and a composer of grace and originality." However, a stand-out surprise and audience favorite was drummer Pelliperi, who stunned the audience with a snare solo using his bare hands in the second half of the concert. This display of artistic improvisation won over Abel Fillion '09, who was initially somewhat skeptical.

"I was a little worried after the first set, but they came back with a stronger second half, starting out with a sweet Latin groove, and the drummer played an awesome solo," said Fillion. "Also," he said, "[Pelliperi] looked like Nigel from Spinal Tap, which is cool."

The concert, which was innovative at times and had the audience tapping their feet and bopping their heads almost the whole way through, featured mostly Donahue originals, a few of which were based on changes to standard tunes, such as "It Could Happen to You" and "Mobilized," which is based on Charlie Parker's "Confirmation." Some of Donahue's tunes, including "Uppy," "Bounce" and "Ditchdigger" leaned more to fusion-oriented mixed with a rock vibe, while others were more straight-ahead swing tunes, and still some classics managed to slip themselves in, such as Miles Davis's "Donna Lee."

The end of the performance finally made it clear why no programs were given out at the beginning - the program apparently sang for itself.