Mark De Clive-Lowe knows that free outdoor concerts should be about dancing and waving your hands in the air like you just don't care that a hurricane is bearing down on your hapless ass, and he programmed this show accordingly.
Behind his keyboards, the tall, dark & angular maestro banged out fuzzy chords, rippled sweet lines and dealt a series of synthesized rhythm tracks, and all bassist Antoine Katz and Katalyst drummer Greg Paul had to do was render the continuous momentum unstoppable, which they accomplished with thumping, rolling aplomb. Fronting the locomotive stood a succession of colorfully varied singers, from Sy Smith (airy like Diana Ross) to Aliyah Niambi (cool, percussively melodic modern soul) to Claire Renee (floaty lilt), each distinctively appealing. Since De Clive-Lowe wanted this to be a "past, present and future" event, he tapped the ever-current but rooted singer Dwight Trible to embody the show's obvious connections to soul summers 50 years gone with an incantatory whoop-up of Pharoah Sanders' "The Creator Has a Master Plan," bolstered by tenor saxist Teodross Avery paying tribute to Sanders and John Coltrane. The versatile Avery also teamed with alto saxist Hailey Niswanger on some tight funk riffs later on, Niswanger showing off her edgy solo chops (alto & flute) to boot. Plus Low Leaf on spiritjazzy harp. Dancers, too, at least three of 'em (wish we knew their names), with the twitchy, flexy, white-shirted dude a special standout.
As the sun set, the diverse crowd swayed along, tactfully striving to evade a shaggy senior spaceman who danced in vest, beads, tourist sombrero and a state of oblivion. Just envious of the gent, musta been.