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Happy Apple, An Appreciation

Happy Apple  (Dave King, drums, Michael Lewis, sax, Eric Fratzke, electric bass) tried to excuse missed cues and miscues with the explanation that they were just getting started on new pieces for a recording.  

They’ll have to come up with some other explanation for their sound as this listener had a near-perfect jazz experience at Emel Sherzad’s Khyber Pass in St. Paul this week.  

The edge of King’s big cymbal was ten feet from my ears and I left my ear plugs at home.  I prepared to stuff them with wads of napkin as he often fiercely dominates his bigger ensembles like The Bad Plus and Halloween Alaska.  The wads were soon discarded.

King launched the opening piece, Black and Blue Magic, with quiet, swirling brushes that filled the room with a delicate and urgent soundstage and Fratzke soon joined with soft strumming.  Lewis, always pacing fore and aft, coaxed bare flutters from his reed, eventually building tempo and volume to a sound of imploring progress.   I scrawled “magical” in my notes, well before the title was announced.

Vermillion Nocturne was the second tune and one that King afterwards joked about having  missed a cue in.  There was fusion-esque bass  and a very busy drum kit for this colorful composition.  Lewis’ tremendous expenditure of lung power delivered not just volume but occult tones from his tenor sax.  I’ll take their word for the missed cue, but on this and other up tempo tunes, the trio came to perfectly coordinated conclusions after a series of solo improvisations, most often by King and Lewis.  

Lewis’ sax on Hanging Tree gave a lovely, plaintive, but somehow sweeter than plaintive sound that glanced off the cymbals as King sat still for a brief moment.

And was the 5th piece called Antonym Requiem? If so, the celebratory tune was aptly named.

Fratzke’s piece Vanity Plate (a debate was had on automobile plate vs. commemorative gift from the Franklin Mint) started with him thrumming and moving the tune towards a level of satisfaction that might have been a conclusion when Lewis intervened and doubled the tempo and volume.  King’s face is forever intensely animated, whether wailing fiercely on the whole kit, just jingling a bell-ball in hand or soloing on cymbals. He projects superhuman confidence in his joyful command of the stage.  Either join in or get out of the way of the fun!

The penultimate Broad Side of the Silent Bar, started with a bass riff that might have led into a tune by say, Creedence Clearwater Revival, or The Beatles.  Lewis’ sax voiced a soulful interlude with King returning with an insistent brush-only contribution.  Fratzke lead the rest of the tune with a rock-influenced melody to which Lewis added a quiet and deeply expressive sax.  

The encore (unnamed) returned to the intense and quiet style of ...Magic, the opener.  

Sitting in the small room, with only the bass amped and each musician on view no more than 15 feet away intensified the pleasure of hearing and watching the performance of inventive original compositions.  Happy Apple performed tunes seldom going more than 10 minutes - short compared to the 20 or 40 minute pieces often heard by Khyber Pass habitués.  Fusion-influenced, yes, but in subtle ways.  Dissonance deployed tactically, but not the main point of any composition.  And fun titles!  A great group for aficionados and also for introducing more casual jazz fans to the scene here in Minnesota.
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