A concert begun in darkness
It was all glitter at Blues Alley in Washington, DC when the trumpeter Terence Blanchard, who is the composer of a widely hailed opera called Fire Shut Up in My Bones that was recently performed at the Met, appeared in March with his E-Collective band as well as the Turtle Island Quartet to play several sets. Blanchard wore iridescent tennis shoes and played a miked trumpet with extra reverb that almost looked as though it was glowing in the dark. Periodically, he would tap his right foot onto an electronic device on the floor that manipulated his tones to extend them into the ether. Indeed, his audacious high notes lingered on long after he had stopped blowing. The collective is Blanchard’s foray into the world of deep funk. It definitely makes an impact.
