What does Mozart have to do with jazz? Nothing, really. That didn't stop the Mainly Mozart Festival from commissioning trumpeter Guy Barker to write an extended work for jazz ensemble, and it's a good thing they did. Barker's Amadeus Jazz Suite, which this reviewer heard at the Neurosciences Institute on Sunday, April 30, was witty, wacky, sexy, swinging, and thoroughly enjoyable.

Rather than incorporate music by Mozart, Barker decided instead to write original jazz works inspired by Mozart's operatic heroes and villains. This was a wise move, as most jazz arrangements of the classics suck. Successful examples are rare; Gil Evans's Sketches of Spain or Duke Ellington's Nutcracker update come to mind. The Swing Era was littered with crappy jazz bastardizations of classics by Bizet, Rachmaninoff, and Brahms. Even Mozart got the jazz mistreatment, courtesy of Raymond Scott in "In an 18th-Century Drawing Room." In Barker's imagination, the manipulative Don Alfonso from Cosi fan Tutte ("a nasty, cynical old sod" as Barker put it) was portrayed by a low-down, dirty piece full of snarling brass and wailing saxes. Dorabella's flighty drama fits were captured in 7/4 time, and featured an explosive, aggressive piano solo by Roger Kellaway.

Some of Barker's comprehensions of some Mozart characters were bizarre. Susanna tries to seduce Count Almaviva? (She spends the whole opera avoiding the Count's advances!). Zerlina is a sadomasochist? That's simply reading too much into her aria, "Beat me, beat me"--a plea by a woman to her husband to forgive her from almost being seduced by Don Giovanni (she's not a slut, she's complying with the "right of the Lord" to sleep with a peasant's wife before the poor husband could). Has Barker actually seen Don Giovanni or Le Nozze di Figaro? Never mind; once you got past the faulty character analysis in his spoken introductions, Barker's music put a smile on your face.

Guy Barker isn't so well known in the U.S. This isn't surprising. American jazz musicians aren't known at all in this country, so what chance does a British trumpeter have? His solos and playing revealed him to be a facile musician and competent improviser, yet I was much more impressed with his compositional abilities. It's not surprising to learn that he spent time in Carla Bley's band, because her influence was audible in the whole tone and diminished scales, the ambitious formal schemes, the odd meters, and the tongue extended firmly in cheek. This type of jazz writing has always been more prevalent in Europe, but it's rarely heard in San Diego, either live or on our beloved KSDS. Barker may have made his mark early on as a performer, but I think his composition skills are more special.

Barker brought two out-of-town collaborators with him, Rosario Giuliani on saxophone and Roger Kellaway on piano. Giuliani has a rich tone and is a suave improviser; he carried a lot of the melodic duty for the evening, performing admirably. But for this listener, the most enjoyable, inventive soloist of the evening was Kellaway. His comping was nothing special, at times even a little plodding. But his solos were whirlwinds of inspiration, stretching the musical material as far as he could, at times boldly clashing with the group's harmonies, but always turning it around to bring the solo back home.

However, with San Diego's own Jim Plank and Bob Magnusson on drums and bass respectively, the group always had a swinging underpinning. Plank's extended solo in the final number was a rarity and a pleasure in that he actually kept the rhythm going and developed it in a meaningful way. With the exception of clarinetist/saxophonist Terry Harrington, whom I believe hails from L.A., everyone else was from San Diego: Bard Steinwehe on trumpet, Scott Kyle on trombone, and John Rekevics on bari sax. All of these gentlemen held their own, playing Barker's written parts as if they'd been practicing them for months instead of a few days, and blowing idiomatic solos when called upon.

One could ask, "What did any of this really have to do with Mozart? Any jazz musician could have written charts inspired by operatic characters." True enough: why not commission someone more visible who'd draw a bigger crowd, or some crazy jazz composer/performer like Uri Caine to take Mozart and put him through his postmodern sensibility?

Perhaps in the future, Mainly Mozart will do just that. But for this year, they had Barker and his ensemble deliver a completely satisfying night of jazz that featured a terrific mix of local and out-of-town talent--and that's something to be proud of.

For a copy of the program, click here.