By Dale Burrows
Special to The Enterprise
Fine dining on the shore of a lake isn’t a bad reason. But we went because of a man and his sax. Word had it he was packing them in.
The time was Friday night, Jan. 27. The place was Emory’s on Silver Lake.
The man is Darren Motamedy.
Motamedy plays jazz.
“To spread peace,” Motamedy of the purpose of his music. And then as if reminding himself, adding, “… around the world.” The man appeared to be thinking globally.
The sentiment is hardly an eye-opener when you think of the world today. Nor is it to be taken at face value when you remember this was a musician talking to the press for publication before his performance.
Yet, this also is a guy born in The City of Angels, of Iranian-German-Irish-French descent. A guy who went through grade school in Taiwan and finished high school in Kent. A guy who received a degree in Music Education from Central Washington University and then from the Dick Grove School of Music. A guy who knocked around with a lot of names before he found his niche.
Pretty determined, he sounds like; don’t you think?
Here also is an educated music-maker who has opened for the likes of Kenny G., Grover Washington Jr. and Tower of Power, who is playing a cruise ship next month and who has a list of international credits as long as your arm including “best albums of the year.”
H ere also is a husband and father of three who teaches band to grade-school kids in Kent.
Here then appears to be a high-minded family man who balances responsibility and ambition, a man to be taken seriously; doesn’t it seem like?
Maybe. But seeing is believing. The proof is in the pudding. The performance tells the story.
Around eight o’clock, percussionist Akim Finch began drumming on the congas although no one in the lounge paid much attention. Everyone went on talking. But, no matter, indifferent to the indifference, the congas pressed on, steadily and insistently but to no particular effect; something like a heartbeat no one cares about unless they have a stethoscope.
Then came John Raymond on guitar. The light and easy touch of fingertips on the strings added a kind of refined sensitivity to the building strength of the heartbeat; rather like a neural pathway evolving inside an awakening life form.
Then came Motamedy on his sax.
For awhile, the sax sounded in, no more than buoyed up by the still-invigorating guitar, which was supported by the already-established congas. The sax then was only warming up and getting used to things, like a kind of humming under your breath when you are relaxed and everything around is easy on the nerves and as it should be.
Talking around the lounge and in the dining room started dying out and people started paying attention and the mood around Emory’s started mellowing out and becoming receptive. Receptive to what, it would be hard to say; but to something you were waiting for and wanted to be in the presence of, for sure.
The conga beat then started asserting itself; loudening and softening, speeding up and slowing down but always steadying the composition and never varying except with it. And then the, ever-responsive, almost neurotic feelings of the strings of the guitar, began making themselves heard from.
They played and reacted, in their own nervous way to the conga beat; inside it, outside it, above it, below it, off on their own and back with it. And then, in a matter of minutes, the sax, made ready and sure of where it was and what it was doing, took charge.
As if inspired by something beyond itself and in a state, any state except one that was self-conscious, the sax busted off in its own direction and in the direction that the trio was to take and did take. The sax declared itself, then kicked back for a moment to give you time to prepare and then proceeded to perform for you.
That shiny, metal-bodied, single-reeded, conically bored woodwind, moaned the blues, agonized soul, blared Dixie, put the torch to heartbreak, chilled out progressive. It celebrated, aggravated, insinuated, incinerated and all out, whined, wailed, yelled, whispered, screamed, sighed, raged and rejoiced but never once, without reassuring you that in spite of the mix, the good, the bad and the ugly, in its own indigenously American way, everything — like the title words of one of Motamedy’s prize-winning albums — “It’s All Good.”
And as the trio got going and was really jamming, everything else started to fade and to disappear: the lights on the water outside, the warmth of the hearth inside Emory’s, the sights and sounds of waitresses coming and going, the clink of glasses, the clatter of dishes in the kitchen.
And, in the end, there was only a brand of pop jazz that could do it all for a lot of people.
And at the center of that brand of pop jazz was the grandson of a now-deceased, ex-ambassador to India, Denmark and Canada. At the center was Darren Motamedy, grandson of Ali Motamedy, who was himself a man of peace who left his grandson a legacy of life devoted to peace, worldwide.
Everyone at Emory’s last Friday night was paying attention when we left. Some were swaying back and forth. Some were putting their hands together in time with the music. Some were just plain listening. But everyone was in sync with a man who wanted to “…spread peace around the world.” With Darren Motamedy. With a man and his sax.
Motamedy is appearing at Emory’s on Friday nights in an open-ended engagement. For information, call 425-337-7772.
Dale Burrows reviews live stage performances for The Enterprise.
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