Live Review: Dee Dee Bridgewater & Irvin Mayfield With The New Orleans Jazz Orchestra

What American band will start without a patriotic salute? And so it is that the 19 members of the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra (NOJO) — including its very first female member — kick off the Closing Night party of 2015 Melbourne International Jazz Festival with a jazzy, instrumental version of the USA’s national anthem.  

Under the leadership of its founder and artistic director, Irvin Mayfield, the NOJO is a tight, cohesive, infectious entity. Like most jazz ensembles, the brass and horn sections are prominent and its range carefully selected. The rhythm section is strongly represented by the grand piano and guitar just on the periphery. The subterranean tremors of the double bass anchors the troupe, allowing double Grammy winner Mayfield to blast off with his showy, exuberant jazz trumpeting.

“Dee Dee ain’t gonna come out with that kinda of applause!” he initially jokes as we give a typically reserved Australian reception. Despite being diminutive in stature, he and the orchestra are instantly overshadowed as soon as Dee Dee Bridgewater totters onstage in sky high stilettoes. Brandishing a clean-shaven head, dripping jewellery, wing-tipped sunglasses, and a tight purple dress, the ebullient, indomitable Bridgewater — who performed at MIJF three years ago in her own capacity — is all unrestrained sass. Purring and stalking the stage, she plays the part of sexy kitten (or ‘cat’ in jazz-speak) to the hilt. Sidling up to Mayfield and arching her hips beside him, she reduces Mayfield and the orchestra to blushes and coy giggles. Their onstage chemistry is adorable to watch. 

They open with a Harry Connick Jnr number, One Fine Thing, and follow with covers of songs made famous by other legendary jazz figures.     

From forging through the warpath-pounding Big Chief to the smouldering, homesick ballad Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans — originally performed by Louis Armstrong and Billie Holiday — Bridgewater and the NOJO faithfully capture the nostalgic, once-revered spirit of the Old South. We feel its magic dust sprinkle over us in the long, sonorous saxophones and blues-tinged notes.
Midway through the evening, Bridgewater and Mayfield attempt to work up a ruse, passing off one of NOJO’s trumpeters as “one of Melbourne’s own — Leon ‘Chocolate’ Brown”, who pretends to be an innocent passerby they had tempted from a local street corner with $50 and cigarettes to perform jazz onstage after just two hours of coaching. We half-believe them until his rendition of I’ve Got The World On A String appears far too polished and on point. Although set up as a light entertainment device to lead into another track, the ‘act’ runs out of steam long before they hit the closing notes.  

The tuba player has a better turn upfront, and his deep bass growls — which could rival those of Armstrong’s — performs a rollicking version of the country-pop-infused You’ve Got A Friend In Me. Another orchestra member springs a Happy Birthday solo on Bridgewater, who proudly declares with fingers held aloft that she is 65 years young. It’s a deft set-up for her to lead into a soulful, poignant rendition of Louis Armstrong’s What A Wonderful World.

In the time-honoured manner of New Orleans bands, the orchestra then picks themselves up and with Mayfield leading the way, slowly sets off in a processional line down off the stage and tours just briefly around the front half of Hamer Hall to the delighted rhythmic claps of the audience and Bridgewater’s tearing vocals onstage as she exuberantly belts out Do What You Want. We couldn’t have asked for a more memorable finish to the festival.