Grammy-winning jazz bassist/composer Linda May Han Oh was set to make her Tucson debut on the closing night of the 2024 HSL Properties Tucson Jazz Festival on Saturday, Jan. 20.
But when her concert at Hotel Congress’s Century Room quickly sold out, a second show was added.
That one also sold out.
Ten minutes into her early set, it was easy to see why Tucson jazz fans were so excited to have the Boston-area-based, Malaysian-born/Austrailian-raised bass player on a Tucson stage.
Oh and her quintet — husband-pianist Fabian Almazan, alto saxophonist Greg Ward, drummer Mark Whitfield Jr. and vocalist Sara Serpa — were arguably one of the most original ensembles on this year’s lineup.
Oh performed several tracks off her latest album, last summer’s critically-acclaimed “The Glass Hours,” ethereal and progressive works that tackle social issues from the environment to the fragility of life itself.
The music unfolds in layers, with prolonged sax solos that give way to improvisation from Almazan on the piano, tucked into a corner of the Century Room’s small stage, and drummer Whitfield, sitting in Ward’s shadow.
When it was Oh’s turn, some in the room had to squint to see her, especially if you were sitting off to the piano-side of the small room, because Oh was at the back end of the stage. But there was no trouble hearing her as she created a deeply resonating lyrical sound with a fearless tenacity and unmatched passion.
Serpa’s wordless vocals were mesmerizing and almost beatbox in style as she matched Ward’s extended sax solos on “The Imperative.” Oh told the audience she had composed the song during the pandemic “when I was very pregnant and very tired.” The song had a sense of urgent impatience about it.
Oh, who teaches at Berklee College of Music in Boston and has toured with jazz giants, including Pat Metheny, spent most of her 75-minute set playing the standup bass. On the finale, “The Glass Hours,” she picked up a bass guitar and lent wordless vocals to Serpa’s.
The quintet’s concert was one of five events on Saturday to close out the 10th annual Tucson Jazz Festival and despite having to compete with a bustling entertainment lineup downtown on Saturday, two of the five festival events were sold out.
As the audience for Oh’s late show stood outside the Century Room on the corner of East Congress Street and North Fifth Avenue, house music thumped and bumped from the rooftop of The Playground nightclub across the street and the sound of catcalls from the audience filling the Congress Plaza echoed as the Bees Knees sang about “All That Jazz” to open Hotel Congress’s annual Dillinger Days.
At the Rialto Theatre catercorner to Hotel Congress, the Cali metal band Mac Sabbath, taking its costume cues from old McDonaldland TV commercials, helped Tucson’s Generation Cool store celebrate its 10th anniversary.
