The vibraphone is one of the more unique instruments to infiltrate jazz. A holy mash-up of the piano and the percussive, it's the duck-billed platypus of musical instrumentation. In terms of cool, it's unfairly lodged somewhere between the tuba and the clarinet. Its old-school practitioners now exude a breezy novelty quality, and the truly mentionable modern players can be counted on one and a half hands. One standout is New York mallet-man Joe Locke. Jazz fans in Japan can catch the vibraphonist on his current tour, featuring a pit-stop at Yokohama Jazz Promenade this weekend. On rave-ups, Locke frenziedly bangs the bars; on the ballads, he calmly coos with a restrained minimalism.
Seeing Locke live is quite the time. He puts his heart and soul into his instrument, wailing away in order to move the crowd. He's as entertaining to watch as he is to listen to. Asked about his energetic on-stage persona, Locke says it's no front.
"It's about trying to get the notes out," he says. "It's a really physical instrument. The way I play is physical, to tap into the energy the musicians are feeding me. It's not a premeditated thing. If it looks like showmanship . . . cool. But that's not what it's about."