In the wrong hands, fusion homogenizes and declaws its sources, often turning rock's energetic power and jazz's technical brilliance into a tedious muddle. But it doesn't have to be that way. Restless pianist Chick Corea and fleet-fingered guitarist John McLaughlin played on the first jazz fusion albums, Miles Davis' In a Silent Way (1969) and Bitches Brew (1970), and went on to form seminal fusion bands in Corea's Return to Forever and McLaughlin's Mahavishnu Orchestra. And, their careers have been filled with adventurous musical explorations.
It took the friends nearly 40 years to work together in a new project. The Five Peace Band, which includes saxophonist Kenny Garrett (another Davis alum, from Davis' later years), drummer Brian Blade and Philadelphia-bred bassist Christian McBride, isn't trying to resurrect the past, however. Corea isn't even sure that he'd call it "fusion."
"It's interesting," he says on the phone from his home in Florida. "Amongst the musicians, there's not much talk of styles, so the word isn't mentioned much, except lightly, like oh, we're jazz musicians, we're fusion musicians, we're world musicians, we're rock musicians. We're just musicians. All that goes junior to the fact that when we get on stage and play together, the territories that we cover speak for themselves. This particular band, I don't know how I would label it at all. You're welcome to listen to the music and give it a new name, man. I don't know."
That invitation is typical of Corea, who seems above all interested in creative challenges.
"I'm real comfortable at the optimum creative place when I know that I can learn from my partners, and this is true with every musician in this band. It's been a feast of learning," he says enthusiastically.
Although the band's repertoire, some of which can be heard on the new Five Peace Band Live, includes "In a Silent Way / It's About That Time," it focuses on recent or new McLaughlin and Corea compositions, and they get stretched in different ways for each performance.
"In terms of the traditions, certainly there's a combining of a lot of different streams of music within what we do," Corea says. "But actually, everyone then makes an attempt to mix them up in different ways, and that happens nightly, too. So, one night the beat may be heavier, for instance, and it may sound more like rock-and-roll, then another night, the other areas are explored, and it may sound like something else."
On Sunday, the band plays an afternoon and an evening show at the Keswick. It's hard to know exactly what each will sound like - call it what you will - and that's exciting.