f

G it t i r cit in'

Gro o ve

SUZANNE CHESSLER

Special to the Jewish News

C hemistry ignites Jeff Lorber's
life.
There's the chemistry of
music that sets his career in
motion.
There's the pure science of chem-
istry that could have been his career
but has become his hobby instead.
And there's the chemistry of med-
ical research he supports and hopes
will provide a cure for the genetic dis-
ease that runs in his family and has
marked him.
Lorber — a kevboardist who pro-
duced introductory albums for Kenny
G., Karvn White and Dave Koz — is
one of the performers at Jazzfest in
Birmingham, where the free, summer
concert series in Shain Park offers
more national artists in its seventh
year than in any previous year.
Jazzfest, which runs July 22-24, also
features entertainment at 13
Birmingham restaurants.
"There are so many different things
involved in the chemistry of music,"
says Lorber, 46, also a composer who
has appeared in Michigan many times.
"I love when the melody, rhythm, form
and arrangement blend together in
some [special] way, but there's also the
sentimental part of bringing back mem-
ories and experiences and the identifica-
tion with a personal era in life."
When he performs as part of a
quartet, Lorber will feature a survey of
different songs from various stages of
his career, from the early fusion num-
bers to new material, the sum filling
12 albums, including Galaxian and
Worth. Waiting For. The show will be
up-tempo, funky and improvisational.
. .We'll play a few songs off the latest
album, Midnight," says Lorber, who

7/16
1999

36 Detroit Jewish News

Birmingham's seventh annual
Jazzfest features a diverse lineup
of jazz artists for every taste.
Meet one of them.

helped get sax star Kenny G.'s career off
the ground by hiring him for his own
band, Jeff Lorber Fusion, a group blend-
ing funk, R&B, rock and electric jazz.
"Midnight is unusual because I was
between record deals while I was
working on it, and I did it on my own
without interference or input from a
record company. I tried to come up
with some really interesting melodies
and rhythm ideas. It's a pure expres-
sion of what I was feeling at the time,
and I used a lot of live musicians. A
lot of jazz these days is done with
drum machines and sequencers.
Lorber, who's been in the music
business for almost 25 years, shows his
range on the new album. "Perugia,"
inspired by a jazz festival at an Italian
town with the same name, is a simple
melody with a framework for impro-
vising. "Watching the Sun Set" is a
ballad with a title that evokes the wist-
ful feeling of the music.
Brought up in a Conservative
Jewish home, Lorber began earning
money as a band musician performing
at weddings, bar mitzvahs and school
parties in Philadelphia. He enrolled at
the Berklee School of Music in Boston
but soon became concerned about his
ability to earn a living if he continued.
"I decided to pursue something a
little bit more solid, and I transferred
to Boston University as a chemistry
major," Lorber recalls. "I ended up
moving to the Pacific Northwest and
continued to pursue a chemistry
degree, but at the same time, I started
to play a lot with different musicians,
did a demo and got a record deal.
"We started getting a lot of success
with music, and I stopped going to
school and did music full time. I'm.
still interested in science, and I've kept
up by studying various topics in scien-
tific areas.

"

Jeff Loam,- polo' rms
7p.m. Saturday, July 24.