Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2003 1:19 pm PST
Post subject: Roberta Piket at Baked Potato, 10/8/03


Roberta Piket is a progressive jazz pianist from New York visiting the west coast for a few days. She is also a close friend of one of my good New York friends, Mark Reboul (a free-improv alto sax player, an original member of 'Higher Primates', and has played with a variety of top-notch people like the ubiquitous Billy Mintz). Mark recommended that I check out Roberta when she played here, so I did. It was a good call.

Roberta has a band she calls "Alternating Current" and she brought her normal guitarist (Bruce Arnold) with her on this trip, filling out her band with some top-shelf jazz locals (Ralph Humphrey - drums, Chris Colangelo - bass). Given the challenging nature of this music, I was impressed with the playing of the local guys with what one expects was limited rehearsal time -- lots of odd meters (5, 7, 13, etc.), lots of challenging written melodies in the heads, and extended harmonies.

Roberta also ventures into free improvisation on occasion herself, and is a truly accomplished and creative pianist. Even struggling a bit in the first set with some technical issues due to borrowed equipment (she had a midi keyboard controller hooked up to a laptop computer with the synthesized sounds and a physical processing box for stuff like reverb, going through a borrowed speaker/amp, etc.), it was clear that she was in convincing command of her technique and her ideas.

This was sophisticated, engaging and enjoyable music, and I hope Roberta can make it out west more often. If you like people like Jim Carney or Steve Lockwood or Andy Milne's "Dapp Theory" (another east coast band that makes it out west on occasion), you will probably enjoy this music too.

Since Roberta is not a local creator we don't have her listed in our local Creators page, but you can find her web site here:

http://www.robertajazz.com