Today, the 99th anniversary of John Coltrane’s arrival on Earth, seems like a good time to remind ourselves that music, for all the wondrous sophistication of its scales and structures, is about the people who make it.
That point was reinforced eloquently by DUO, the new independent release by trumpeter Garrett Folger and bassist Aidan Plank, which will be celebrated by a release show Sunday at Negative Space Gallery.
Recordings by trumpet and bass duos are rare (there seem to be only a half-dozen or so). Yet novelty didn’t inspire the collaboration as much as affinity did.
“We play together all the time and we really enjoy playing with each other,” Folger said by phone on his way to a gig in Michigan. “So we just wanted to document that, just the two of us.”
That joy in teamwork is heard in the question-and-answer volleying of the opening “Shadows and Shapes” and is the animating idea behind the playful banter of “Speak To Each Other.”
Folger traces the musical partnership with Plank to his earliest days in northeast Ohio. “When I moved here, he was one of the first musicians that I got to know when I was in college, him and Anthony Fuoco, both of whom I’ve recorded with. I would hear him playing around with everybody and got to know him.”
Fuoco introduced the young trumpeter to the music of the late Kenny Wheeler, whose style Folger’s can recall. His tone is warm and round, amber colored but with an autumnal melancholy that evokes leafless trees and somber skies.
The trumpeter, who grew up in Buffalo, New York, a scant hour down the QEW from Wheeler’s birthplace in Toronto, considered the notion. “I think that does stick with you,” he said. ”I think there’s something about the Rust Belt.”
One thing about the Rust Belt is its inventory of spaces that have been turned into galleries, performance and event venues. Negative Space in Asia Town, the site of Sunday’s release concert, is one of them.
“It’s a wonderful gallery. It’s got very high ceilings, so there’s a lot of reverberation, and hard walls. With what we’re trying to do musically, it’s going to work very well,” Folger said. “I want more people–and new people–to see different spaces in Cleveland that I’m familiar with, but I think a lot of jazz musicians might not know about.”
A lot of jazz fans in northeast Ohio might not know about the small but accomplished scene of players who take their cues more from the experimental and atmospheric style of music found on, say, the German ECM Records label than from the hard-hitting, mainstream style most often heard here.
Folger and Plank are key players in that scene, as are Fuoco and drummer Carmen Castaldi, who has made several recordings on ECM. Speaking of his duo partner, Folger acknowledged the stylistic commonality.
“We come at a lot of things from similar angles and different angles too, but I think there’s always something interesting when we get together.”
DUO is available now at this link.
Garrett Folger and Aidan Plank DUO album release, Sunday, Sept., 28, 7 p.m., Negative Space, Asian Town Center, 3820 Superior Ave., Cleveland. Tickets: $20 at door.
Trading Fours
There’s never a bad time to get out and commune in the same room with creative musicians. Below are four musical events of interest in the coming week that you might want to check out.
Filament
Wed., Sept. 24, 7 p.m.
BOP STOP, 2920 Detroit Ave., Cleveland. (tickets)
New Ghosts head hauntcho Matt Laferty was reluctant to book a band that he had never heard of. Then he listened to their music and was won over. “it has this sort of effervescent sound,” he said. The New York-based trio of Alex Carter (saxophone), Tobe Tsuchiya (piano) and Danilo Randjic-Coleman (bass) bubbles up at BOP STOP with the quartet of Dan Wenninger (saxophone), Mike Sopko (guitar), Max Hyde-Perry (bass) and Alex Washington (drums) leading off.
BEATrio
Thu., Sept. 25, 8 p.m.
Cain Park, 14591 Superior Ave., Cleveland Heights. (tickets)
A trio of banjo, harp and drums sounds like a curiosity at best, but when the players are Bela Fleck, Edmar Castañeda and Antonio Sanchez, it begins to look more like a dream team. Their debut recording is legit, great fun and swings like mad.
“Totally Trumpet”: Cleveland Jazz Orchestra and Terell Stafford
Saturday, Sept. 25, 7:30 p.m.
Maltz Performing Arts Center, 1855 Ansel Road, (tickets)
The CJO has some pretty distinguished history with trumpet players (you do remember a kid from Warren named Sean Jones, right?) and for their first subscription concert of the 2026-26 season, they’ve engaged another one. Stafford is a worthy successor to the Philly trumpet lineage that stretches back to Clifford Brown and Lee Morgan. Expect him to bring the fire.
Life’s Notes
Saturday, Sept. 25, 8 p.m.
BOP STOP, 2920 Detroit Ave., Cleveland. (tickets)
Did somebody mention fire? Check out the lineup of this new project by Nathan-Paul Davis: Chris Anderson, Chris Coles, Howard Alexander, Kip Reed, Zaire Darden and that guy again, Garrett Folger. I asked the trumpeter what we might expect. His response: “You know, Nathan, he just oozes sound and I think we all want to follow him.” That’s good enough for me.
For the most complete listing of jazz and jazz-adjacent events., look to Jim Szabo’s essential, weekly Northeast Ohio jazz calendar.
NOTE: This article was written by a real human being. No artificial intelligence or generative language models were used in its creation.
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