- courtesy of the artists
- Cellular Chaos
Rockford native Weasel Walter has always had an uncomfortable relationship with the free jazz that first propelled him onto local stages with the earliest version of his band the Flying Luttenbachers, which included its namesake Hal Russell (ne Hal Luttenbacher) on drums. The multi-instrumentalist’s searing interest in musical extremes of various stripes has always trumped his passion for any single approach, so over the decades in Chicago, Oakland, and New York, his projects have snapped violently between in-your-face takes on free jazz, post-no wave atonal rock, and metal. In recent years he’s been devoting his energy to the quartet Cellular Chaos, which arrives in town for a show Sunday night at Township. The current lineup of the band includes a couple of excellent musicians known more for their jazz bona fides than their skill at making loud, ugly, grinding art-rock, but that’s exactly what they do under Walter’s aegis.
The brilliant trumpeter Kenny Wheeler died yesterday at the age of 84 at a nursing home in London, where the Canadian native had lived for the last six decades. Few jazz musicians shared his generosity of spirit and nonchalant range; over his lengthy career he moved easily from working in free-improvisation circles to embracing jazz tradition, always comporting himself with dignity and playing with compassion and restraint. Few have worked with such a diverse cast of collaborators—Wheeler’s included John Dankworth, Bill Russo, John Stevens’s Spontaneous Music Ensemble, Stan Tracey, Evan Parker, Tubby Hayes, Mike Westbrook, Tony Oxley, Anthony Braxton, Globe Unity Orchestra, and Dave Holland, among countless others. In recent years he showcased his more lyric side on an extended series of gorgeous recordings for the Italian CAM label, but he continued to occasionally work in freely improvised settings.
