Steve Turre

Turre's eponymous album brings together his many sides: strong trombonist, ambitious composer-arranger-bandleader and master of coaxing music from conch shells. Here he works with a full palette of brass, percussion and strings to produce a program sprinkled with stirring, nearly symphonic moments (Turre's "The Emperor") that's only infrequently cluttered or over-produced.

The Miscellaneous Instruments category in Down Beat's annual polls has always been a kind of catchall grouping. This year, typically, it encompassed Toots Thielemans' harmonica (which won), Bela Fleck's banjo, Howard Johnson's tuba and Erik Friedlander's cello. But it's unlikely that there has ever been a more unusual entry than Steve Turre's conch shells.

In 1968, Steve Turre was playing trombone in San Francisco with the great reed player Rahsaan Roland Kirk when Kirk suddenly blew a note on a sea shell. It changed Turre's life. "Roland would bang on a gong, and that would sound like chaos, then he'd blow on the shell and it would be peaceful, the sound of tranquillity," Turre recalls.

8pm Dance You can think of it as Dance Kaleidoscope in toe shoes, but BalletFest 2000 wants to be more than just another affirmation of Southland diversity. Over three nights--with related screenings and other satellite events--this new performance series showcases California's home-grown classical ensembles to emphasize the creativity and excellence that star-obsessed local audiences often ignore. On Thursday, Inland Pacific Ballet and Pasadena Dance Theatre share the program.

* * * 1/2 Steve Turre, "Right There," Antilles. The trombonist's appearance in various settings--with violinist John Blake and briefly with the trumpet and tenor sax of Wynton Marsalis and Benny Golson--lifts this venture above the small-group norm. Ellington's "Echoes of Harlem," a duo cut by Turre (with plunger-mute) and cello (playing double stops), is remarkably self-sufficient. The album's only weak spot is an anticlimactic final track, a 1950s-type mambo by an entirely different band.

The Miscellaneous Instruments category in Down Beat's annual polls has always been a kind of catchall grouping. This year, typically, it encompassed Toots Thielemans' harmonica (which won), Bela Fleck's banjo, Howard Johnson's tuba and Erik Friedlander's cello. But it's unlikely that there has ever been a more unusual entry than Steve Turre's conch shells.

8pm Dance You can think of it as Dance Kaleidoscope in toe shoes, but BalletFest 2000 wants to be more than just another affirmation of Southland diversity. Over three nights--with related screenings and other satellite events--this new performance series showcases California's home-grown classical ensembles to emphasize the creativity and excellence that star-obsessed local audiences often ignore. On Thursday, Inland Pacific Ballet and Pasadena Dance Theatre share the program.

Want to see a man play jazz on a seashell? Check out Steve Turre at Catalina Bar & Grill this week, where the veteran trombonist is demonstrating the amazing possibilities of conch shell jazz improvisation. At the start of his set Tuesday night, Turre's music promised, and delivered, some straight-ahead, energetic jazz.

Turre's eponymous album brings together his many sides: strong trombonist, ambitious composer-arranger-bandleader and master of coaxing music from conch shells. Here he works with a full palette of brass, percussion and strings to produce a program sprinkled with stirring, nearly symphonic moments (Turre's "The Emperor") that's only infrequently cluttered or over-produced.

Want to see a man play jazz on a seashell? Check out Steve Turre at Catalina Bar & Grill this week, where the veteran trombonist is demonstrating the amazing possibilities of conch shell jazz improvisation. At the start of his set Tuesday night, Turre's music promised, and delivered, some straight-ahead, energetic jazz.

In 1968, Steve Turre was playing trombone in San Francisco with the great reed player Rahsaan Roland Kirk when Kirk suddenly blew a note on a sea shell. It changed Turre's life. "Roland would bang on a gong, and that would sound like chaos, then he'd blow on the shell and it would be peaceful, the sound of tranquillity," Turre recalls.

* * * 1/2 Steve Turre, "Right There," Antilles. The trombonist's appearance in various settings--with violinist John Blake and briefly with the trumpet and tenor sax of Wynton Marsalis and Benny Golson--lifts this venture above the small-group norm. Ellington's "Echoes of Harlem," a duo cut by Turre (with plunger-mute) and cello (playing double stops), is remarkably self-sufficient. The album's only weak spot is an anticlimactic final track, a 1950s-type mambo by an entirely different band.

McCOY TYNER BIG BAND "Journey" Verve * * * The piano dynamo's follow-up to his Grammy-winning album "Turning Point" shows that, bit by bit, his large ensemble is gaining a recognizable personality. This mark is due mainly to a constant crew of fine musicians (saxman Billy Harper, trombonist Steve Turre and trumpeter Eddie Henderson, among them) and a repertoire that is built around Tyner originals (there are three here) and tunes in musical moods the pianist embraces.