Digging through lightness: Thomas Linger plays third Premiere Series trio sets for APA

It could be daring to say it, but I sense there's both a wink and a bit of self-revelation behind the original

Thomas Linger worked with Kenny Phelps and Nick Tucker.

tune Thomas Linger played during his second set Saturday night at the Jazz Kitchen: "Mercurial Behemoth" he called it, and it was tacked on to the sincere charm of the standard "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." 

As finalist in the 2023 American Pianists Awards, Linger was presented in a trio evening in American Pianists Association's Premiere Series. There are two more finalists to hear after the turn of the year, culminating in two evenings of finals in April. The club setting, with just bass and drums in accompaniment, tests young jazz pianists in the most likely setting for much of their careers.

Linger, a North Carolinian now living in New York City and well-launched there on his own, displayed his experience, his audience rapport, his creativity — all qualities that he blended well in the way he constructed his second set. With Ray Noble's chestnut "Cherokee," he chose his solo spot well, as capable sidemen Nick Tucker, bass, and Kenny Phelps, drums, left the stage, returning to help him cap the set with Cole Porter's "I Love You" and Thelonious Monk's "Well You Needn't."

His style incorporates a ton of filigree. In his tender version of the Porter song, he filled the bridge with harplike swirls. He had given his right hand free rein from the start in an original titled "Crystal Cave." In his free-floating solo on George Shearing's "She," he juxtaposed direct and ornamented playing, folding in greater intensity in rapport with Phelps' drums. A Nick Tucker solo kept the ballad connection alive.

Phelps' drive was so infectious in McCoy Tyner's "Inception" that I got to thinking it would be a cryin' shame if the drummer didn't get a solo on this one. And he did, and it was dynamic. Linger gave plenty of opportunity for his local sidemen to shine, and both took advantage on a fast blues called "Blues Inside Out," by George Coleman. That piece showed a more abstract take on the form, contrasted with what preceded it, the Ellington romp "Things Ain't What They Used to Be." Linger teased the audience with a long, pedaled introduction and several generic blues choruses before stating the theme sotto voce and continuing in that vein.

He showed off the vigor of his left hand with consistent bass emphasis in "Cherokee," the set's one unaccompanied piece. It was a novel approach that was also applied to  "Well You Needn't," which he harmonized differently from Monk while preserving  the essence of the piece. Phelps showed his originality, varying his tumultuous turns in exchanges with the pianist by ending with a witty few measures that evoked Monk's idiosyncratic sense of humor. He's the most musical drummer around.

I was struck by the original Linger played just before "Cherokee." I'm convinced that "Sans Au Revoir," taken at a relaxed Latin tempo, is based on "St. James Infirmary." I could be wrong, but I'm not sure I was merely reminded of that ancient standard. I think Linger used the old tune's blues structure, melodic arc and harmonic progression in the well-established manner of a contrafact, as such borrowings are known and have been common since the bebop era more than 70 years ago. (The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz lists more than two dozen contrafacts for "Cherokee" alone; "I Got Rhythm" is the all-time champ.)

I don't believe I've heard "St. James Infirmary" — live or on a recording — since I wrote about it in May 2013, when this blog was a babe. The Red Hot Whiskey Sippers, led by Rich Dole and Bill Lancton, played it at the club's outdoor "shrimp boil." In my posted review, I went on a bit about the song as a lament that oddly validates the lamenter, quoting its marvelous second verse:  

Let her go, let her go, God bless her,
Wherever she may be;
She can look this wide world over,
She'll never find a sweet man like me.

That's sort of a "sans au revoir," and French is of course a traditional tongue in New Orleans, where "St. James Infirmary" may have been born. Am I letting my imagination run away with me? Maybe, but I have to thank or blame Thomas Linger for that. He could indeed be a "mercurial behemoth." He got me into personal blog archaeology going back nearly seventeen hundred posts ago! As with most good jazz musicians, his performances promise to excavate the past and build for the future.

[Photos by Rob Ambrose]