Julian Lage Comes to Pittsburgh, Sept. 6

Labor Day Weekend has always been a time when I think back to where I was on that same day in years gone by. Sitting around the house all day as a kid, watching the Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon (no idea why, except that maybe I bought into the hype); times when I felt a sense of renewal with a new school year and, later, usually a new apartment; a sense of regret in high school that, once again, summer came and went and I didn't have a band together yet, or one that could make it all the way through a song that had a change in it.

Among the good memories, there's the Detroit Jazz Festival, which takes place every Labor Day weekend. JazzTimes sent me there to cover it a few times. The most exciting trip was the first time I was flown to the Motor City, in 2009, right when the magazine had come back to life after a few dark months where it looked like the lights weren't going to come on again. I had only traveled for an article once before, and never to an event like this, where strangers seemed excited to meet me - and all this freaking music was mine for the taking. I was leaving my wife and two-year old son for several days, and they were okay with it!

I believe it was the last day of the 2009 festival (which would have been Labor Day) that Gary Burton was playing at one of the bigger stages. (My original article was written on two or three computers back and is long gone, as is my article for the website, so I have no notes from which to refer.) The vibraphonist had Julian Lage playing guitar with him. Lage was clearly much younger than the rest of the band, only 21 at the time. But he was playing with technique and imagination well beyond his years. His ideas seemed really advanced. (Only later did I find out that he was a child prodigy who was the subject of a documentary [Jules at Eight] and played at the Grammys when he was 12.) Despite all that, he lacked any sense of a cocksure young jazz guy who might be stone-faced serious about what he did. To the contrary, when introduced to him, Lage had more of a "gosh, thanks" attitude that made him even more likeable. 

A lot of time has passed since that day, with a lot of music flowing out from Mr. Lage. Through legendary jazz guitarist Jim Hall, Lage met Nels Cline, the iconoclastic guitarist who has been a longstanding member of Wilco in addition to releasing numerous albums that draw on uninhibited improvisation, compositions that draw on jazz and rock and a strong sense of tradition. The combination of these two players might seem odd on paper, but on disc (Room), they brought out the best in each other. 

When Lage came here to Pittsburgh in 2016, we spoke in advance of the show about musicians have a strong, identifiable voice. "It reminds me of Nels, and also of someone like Roy Haynes who plays with everybody. People who tend to play well with a lot of people, they kind of always do the same thing, in a certain way," he said. "And that’s what’s reliable. If you play with five different bands and play five different ways, you really diffuse your sound. But if you more or less have a similar take on proportions – tension/release, ballads, drama, humor – if you stay true to those principles but adjust the touch of your instrument and also the decision of the people you're playing with. I think you can have your cake and eat it too. 

"When the context changes, it’ll shine a different light on you. But if you also change, then the spotlight doesn’t really know where to look." 

Following 2022's View With A Room (his second album as a leader on Blue Note Records),  Lage released the EP The Layers earlier this year. In addition to his regular rhythm section of Jorge Roeder (bass) and Dave "Bad Plus" King (drums) (who I caught at the Village Vanguard with Lage in 2020), the six tracks include veteran guitarist Bill Frisell as a frontline partner. The tracks are by turns tranquil ("This World"), dreamy and ambient with these two very distinct guitars echoing off one another ("Missing Voices") and sweet with unexpected chromatic changes adding an edge to the theme (the title track).

This week's show in town will be a solo performance but rest assured that Lage excels just as well by himself as he does in the company of his peers.

Julian Lage comes to Carnegie Lecture Hall in Oakland as part of the Andy Warhol Museum's Sound Series. Songwriter Elijah Wolf opens the show. Wednesday, September 6. 8 pm. Click here for more details.