Native Dancer - Wayne Shorter

Jan

7

Native Dancer - Wayne Shorter

≡ Category: 1970s, Highly Recommended, Reviews, World Fusion |
≅ Written by: Michael Kydonieus

JAZZBO NOTE HIGHLY RECOMMENDED RECORDING

Rating:

Native Dancer (on the Columbia label) was the start of an enduring friendship between saxman Wayne Shorter and Milton Nascimento, one of the great popular singing stars of Brazil.

Shorter had previously shown his interest in Brazilian music as early as his cover of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s Dindi on his Blue Note release Supernova. Of course, during his years in Weather Report, he worked extensively with a number of Brazil’s best percussionists, including Airto Moreira (who also appears here) and Dom Um Romão, which may be how he heard of Milton in the first place.

On Native Dancer, the ever humble Wayne Shorter does a remarkable thing — he essentially becomes a guest on his own album, even though he’s ostensibly the leader. Milton Nascimento contributes and sings on a full five out of nine compositions. Shorter also uses many musicians from Milton’s then current band: Roberto Silva on drums and Wagner Tiso on keys. Clearly, Shorter is intent of achieving an authentic Brazilian feel on Native Dancer. At the same time, he introduces a jazz sensibility, similarly to how it was done with Astrud Gilberto’s Girl From Ipanema. This is jazzy Brazilian music, not Brazilian flavored jazz.

Yet, Wayne Shorter’s contributions (and those of pianist Herbie Hancock, his bandmate from the Miles Davis years) are essential to the success of Native Dancer. They provide a muscularity and intellectual rigor that is often missing from Milton’s own albums. Milton Nascimento is a wonderful composer, and the music on his albums can be very pretty indeed, but Native Dancer is downright beautiful. That’s because jazzmen Shorter and Hancock have the knowledge of harmony and the chops necessary to fully exploit the structure of Milton’s tunes.

Not only that: for some reason, cosmic forces aligned and Shorter and Hancock were at a stage in their musical development when their sound jibed perfectly with Milton. In the 80s, both Shorter and Hancock tried to recapture that magic with Milton on separate projects. In both cases (Miltons and A Barca Dos Amantes), their efforts sounded forced.

Whether we’re talking about the lilting Ponta De Areia or the menacing 5/4 of Lilia, Shorter’s soprano sax proves to be the perfect foil for Milton’s liquid velvet voice. Shorter is at his most lyrical here, reminding me quite a bit of his playing on Odyssey of Iska. And yet he can be passionate too, as when he blows a hurricane on Lilia.

A funny thing: as good as Native Dancer is, the following year’s Milton, in which Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock were guests on a Milton Nascimento date, is even better.