August 24, 2004
Contra Costa Times
The Bay Area vocal group Slammin sings everything from Miles Davis jazz standards and Sly Stone funk to reggae and techno tango. But the six-member band really shows its creative range when the singers have to wing it. Something of a Bay Area supergroup, Slammin combines the vocal pyrotechnics of Kenny Washington, Zoe Ellis, Destani Wolf and Bryan Dyer on vocal bass lines with the body-music rhythm section of Steve Hogan on beatbox and Keith Terry, the group's mastermind, on body percussion, rhythm dance and occasional vocals.
During each Slammin performance, such as Sunday afternoon's concert at the Jazzschool in downtown Berkeley, the group includes at least five spots where a singer, selected at random, must spontaneously create a piece using any personnel deemed necessary.
"The rule is you can do anything you want," said Terry during a recent conversation. "You can do a solo. You can call in anyone from the group if you want to add another part, or you can lead the audience in something." Some of the group's wildest flights take place during these impromptu audience pieces, which often end up as intricate, multilayered improvisations that transform concertgoers into an interactive chorus.
With a multigenerational cast of musicians from twentysomething to fiftysomething, Slammin brings together some of the region's most inventive singers. While the band originally featured Los Angeles-based vocalist Vicki Randle, her commitment to "The Tonight Show" made regular appearances with the band impossible.
In a collection of singular musicians, Terry is the first among equals. The Texas native moved to Berkeley in the mid-1970s to study at the Center for World Music. A founder of the innovative Jazz Tap Ensemble, he began developing his hybrid approach to body percussion and dance with the encouragement of legendary tap dancers such as Honi Coles. He has toured internationally with his Crosspulse percussion quintet, though more recently he's been working with another talent-laden ensemble, Professor Terry's Circus Band Extraordinaire. In Slammin, he's expanded his rhythmic repertoire to encompass new school grooves.
In many ways, the group is built upon the rhythm section's growing cohesion, as Dyer's deep bass lines, Terry's fluid body music and Hogan's dazzling beatboxing combine to create open but propulsive textures that leave plenty of space for the soloists. It's no coincidence that Dyer is also a trumpeter and percussionist, while Hogan, whose parents are longtime members of El Cerrito-based Gamelan Sekar Jaya, is best known for his work as a bassist in O-Maya.
"Because he's a musician, a bassist who plays a lot of different styles of music, he can beatbox in odd time signatures," Terry said. "He's got the Afro-Cuban thing down, and he just came back from a month in Ghana studying drumming. We can connect on a lot of different levels." More
Posted by acapnews at August 24, 2004 9:42 PM
