2024 Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, TN – March 23, 2024

Click here to find all of Recliner Notes’ coverage of 2024 Big Ears Festival.

The rain let up at some point on Friday night, so attendees of 2024 Big Ears Festival were spared a second day of soaked clothes and dampened spirits. Because your humble narrator “overran his coverage” for my first day at this year’s Big Ears, my second day got off to a slower start than expected. Fortification was more than necessary and secured thanks to greasy diner food for a late breakfast and then some ramen as an early lunch. I took in nine different performances on Saturday; the same number as the day before, but my pace was much more sustainable allowing me to accomplish my goal of being upright and engaged for the last performance of the night. Listeners heard lots of piano on Saturday as it was featured in performances throughout the day. No Thurston Moore sightings on this day, but I may have seen Geoff Dyer, a favorite writer who has been known to frequent experimental musical festivals in the past. Let’s just say it was him. On to my observational timeline for Saturday at Big Ears!

David Virelles
Old City PAC
Saturday, March 23, 2024
2:30 PM – 3:45 PM
Virelles had no backing band, performing by himself at the piano in the intimate setting at Old City PAC. After I arrived a tad late and using the bathroom before sitting, Virelles was playing so achingly soft, it felt disrespectful flushing the toilet and even opening and closing the bathroom door. I didn’t want to risk making even the slightest noise without disturbing the performance. All of those thoughts abated after sitting and being treated to a set of improvisatory-laden solo piano. Virelles moved from loud waves of atonal sounds to the-quietest-of-quiet modes. Gorgeous stuff indeed! 

Sons of Chipotle
Tennessee Theatre
Saturday, March 23, 2024
3:30 PM – 4:45 PM
This pairing consists of the Finnish cellist Anssi Karttunen and John Paul Jones, the bass player for a certain mega-popular rock and roll band of the 1970s. Appearing a few times at 2024 Big Ears, Jones played piano and mandolin for this performance with Karttunen. The two members of Sons of Chipotle sent manipulated sounds over the heads of the audience at the Tennessee Theatre like soundings from an underwater sonar. Other times, the distorted ripples could have been mistaken for a previously unheard alien language. I also have “haunted dreams???” written in my notes. So, I guess  I got scared at one point. Regardless, this was an engaging and fascinating presentation. Plus, I GOT TO SEE A MEMBER OF LED ZEPPELIN PERFORM IN-PERSON.

Myra Melford’s Fire & Water
Bijou Theatre
Saturday, Mar 23
4:00 PM – 5:15 PM
I had not planned on taking in this performance, but as I listened more and more, I couldn’t allow myself to leave due to the strength of the performers. In addition to Medford on piano leading the affair, the rest of the band included Ingrid Laubrock (tenor and soprano saxophones), Mary Halvorson (electric guitar), Tomeka Reid (cello), and Lesley Mok (drums). Missing Reid’s performance the day before meant I needed to take this opportunity to see her once during 2024 Big Ears. She is a commanding and incredible performer, summoning bluesy and jazzy sounds that I didn’t think a cello was able to produce. This was also my first chance to witness Halvorson’s play in person. Neither Reid, Halvorson, nor the rest of the lineup disappointed. At times, the pieces sounded death marches; other times, they were strange, off-kilter grooves. Each piece presented had a composed melody line, off of which each performer would solo or play as a duet with another player. This framework allowed for impressive playing by everyone onstage, especially Halvorson with her drunken-sounding guitar echo. 

Horse Lords
Mill & Mine
Saturday, March 23, 2024
5:30 PM – 6:30 PM
I only have skull where a face should be because Horse Lords ripped it off. Now we’re talking! The monster riffs produced by the band throughout their performance proved that precision bombast was the goal. They showed John Paul Jones that the spirit of Led Zeppelin never went anywhere as each song sounded like layers upon layers of forgotten Zeppelin riffs piled on top of one another until they reached an exploding point. Perhaps you’re aware of the hokey joke, “Why don’t they make the entire plane out of the black box?” Horse Lords proved that you could make the entire plane out of a sick riff. Does this metaphor even work? Who cares! Horse Lords rule!

Digable Planets
Knoxville Civic Auditorium
Saturday, March 23, 2024
6:45 PM – 8:00 PM
In my notes for Digable Planets, I wrote “classic hip-hop.” But this seems disingenuous in retrospect because Digable Planet played with an actual band consisting of drums, bass, keyboards, guitar, and saxophone, so it’s hardly the classic hip-hop template of DJ and MC. Regardless, the funk was fabulous, and the vibe was right throughout their performance. The ease of each DJ was on display, especially Mary Ann Vieira also known as “Ladybug Mecca. To witness her smooth, unruffled stylings in person was worth the price of admission — or, at the very least, my hard-earned media pass.

Christian McBride with Rhiannon Giddens and Francesco Turrisi
Tennessee Theatre
Saturday, March 23, 2024
8:00 PM – 9:30 PM
This trio presented a cabaret-style set with McBride on standup bass, Turrisi on piano, and Giddens singing and playing a bit of the banjo. Songs from the 1920s or inspired by the ‘20s were the focus, beginning with a raunchy song, laden with barely-innuendo lyrics. Another song offering showcased the “Spanish tinge” to use Jelly Roll Morton’s descriptor. Problems with Giddens’ vocal mic allowed the opportunity for a McBride-Turrisi duet that resulted in more than one dropping of jaws in response to their technical expertise. Other standout renditions by the trio included “Underneath the Harlem Moon,” the New Orleans funeral classic “St. James Infirmary,” and the doom-laden “Brown Baby,” which sounded like an early Nick Cave, if one squinted hard enough. 

Herbie Hancock
Knoxville Civic Auditorium
Saturday, March 23, 2024
9:00 PM – 11:00 PM
In addition to hearing the 83-year Hancock’s world-class playing, the treat of this performance was the unexpected presence of Terence Blanchard on trumpet! The band moved through an array of approaches from classic bop to neo-funk grooves to exploratory jazz. Hancock’s solos were inventive and triumphant as he still knows how to turn tunes inside-out. The highlight of the evening was Blanchard’s arrangement of the Wayne Shorter tune “Footprints” made famous by Miles Davis’ second great quintet for which Hancock was a member. Blanchard played the shit out of this solo with his trumpet sounding as if it was refracted through a prism; this mixing of metaphors is necessary when trying to describe a Terence Blanchard trumpet solo. What a treat to hear him play with Herbie Hancock and the rest of that band. 

Bonnie “Prince” Billy
Tennessee Theatre
Saturday, March 23, 2024
10:30 PM – 11:45 PM
Bonnie “Prince” Billy has made clear in the past that he does not enjoy playing solo, frequently commenting that collaboration is his favorite approach for making music. The 2024 Big Ears lineup did not list any collaborators before the weekend, so it was left a mystery as to who would join him for Big Ears Saturday. Billy opened the show joined by vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Thomas Deakin as the two played an extended, improvised introduction to the Palace classic “New Partner.” Billy welcomed other guests to the stage, including singer-songwriter Joan Shelley, multi-instrumentalist Nathan Salsburg, Joshua Abrams of the Natural Information Society on bass, and gorgeous, yearning violin played by Sarah Callaway. Various configurations of this lineup moved through different songs from Billy’s catalog as well as a few favorite cover tunes, including one by Phil Ochs. The focus of the set were selections from the Drag City 2023 release Keeping Secrets Will Destroy You, playing renditions of “Bananas,” “Queens of Sorrow,” and “Willow, Pine and Oak.” Another highlight of the evening also of that album was “Trees of Hell,” which sounded like a forgotten Irish revolution ballad, or a spooky death mask of a song written by Yeats for Maud Gonne. Speaking of spooky, Billy and Deakin performed a lovely duet of the now-classic buddy lament “I See a Darkness.” Billy was chatty and generous with the Tennessee Theatre audience, inviting everyone to sing along frequently during the evening. Seeing him perform from the vantage point of the third row allowed me to see his quirks and passion for performance. More than once, Billy kicked the chair he was sitting on out from under, in order to stand and deliver the song while still crouching to sing directly into the mic. It was an endearing touch to a lively, warm, and beautiful performance on a Saturday evening.

Son Rompe Pera
Mill & Mine
Saturday, March 23, 2024
11:59 PM – 1:15 AM
I closed out my Big Ears Saturday with Mexican punk music courtesy of Son Rompe Pera. The marimba was center-stage and centered in Son Rompe Pera’s music, which was fiery and joy-filling. The band raged on and on into the early morning of Big Ears Sunday. The crowd didn’t want them to end, so to help close it down, one of the band members picked up and put the large marimba table itself on his shoulder and carried it off the stage. What a way to close out this day of music!

Image of Sons of Chipotle is shared courtesy of Joel Berk. If you don’t know Joel’s music which her performs as ragenap, check out his Bandcamp page.