ASAD #19 Herbie Hancock & Vince Mendoza

North Sea Jazz Festival 2013 with the Metropole Orchestra

I love special moments and one-off projects, and this one has some serious star power with arranger and conductor Vince Mendoza at the helm of the Metropole Orchestra, featuring Herbie Hancock as guest soloist.

Herbie’s composition “Tell Me a Bedtime Story” was always a standout composition for me, and given the Mendoza treatment here in Rotterdam a decade ago, it brings back a ton of memories of hearing it for the first time, and then dragging it to rehearsals and jam sessions to try and get people to play it with me.

There was a short-lived music venue in London that opened just as I was at the age of wanting to scour the city for jam sessions every day. Late teens, just got a driving license… you probably know the time.

“The Rhythmic” as it was called hosted such a jam session on Sunday’s if I remember correctly, with the house band being “Quite Sane” and featuring a ton of great cats like Andrew McCormack, Jason Yarde and Eska Mtungwazi. There was a ton of Herbie repertoire being called, and for the hot minute that the place was open, I finally felt like I had found the right group of cats to be around to play this kind of music live.

I highly recommend checking out Herbie’s original recording on the album “Fat Albert Rotunda” with Tootie Heath on drums and Buster Williams on bass.

Enjoy,

Janek