Fort Apache: A Band That Knows No Limits

As its name implies, trumpeter-percussionist Jerry Gonzalez’s Bronx-bred Fort Apache Band is an irreverent group of mavericks who explore the multicultural frontiers of urban jazz and Latin music. The six-piece Gonzalez ensemble will play the Ash Grove on the Santa Monica Pier Sept. 28 and 29.

The group has pioneered a form of music that transcends the accepted Latin jazz category, exploring a variety of musical rhythms and influences, often in the course of a single Thelonious Monk cover. Tunes spontaneously move through African, rumba and driving, straight-ahead jazz rhythms while soloists improvise with the fire of the bebop and hard-bop progenitors.

“We’re always thinking of where the music can go,” the 47-year-old Gonzalez says. “What are the possibilities? Where can we take it that no one has ever taken it before?”

The Fort Apache sound reflects its leader’s formative years in the rough-and-tumble New York borough. “There was a lot of musical activity going on when I was growing up,” says Gonzalez, who now lives in Greenwich Village. “Cats were holding drumming sessions in the parks and on rooftops and I used to chase after them like some kids would chase fire engines. My father was a singer and into jazz and he started turning me on to the music of Charlie Parker and Louis Armstrong when I was 8 or 9. It all just blew me away.”

Together with bassist and brother Andy Gonzalez, Gonzalez was active in New York’s Latin music scene while still a teenager, playing in a band led by Mongo Santamaria’s son Monguito and in the groundbreaking Conjunto Libre, which Andy formed with percussionist Manny Oquendo.

He studied at the New York College of Music and New York University, then went on to gather a wide array of experience playing with drummer Tony Williams, keyboardist Eddie Palmieri, pianist McCoy Tyner and, most notably Dizzy Gillespie. He formed the Fort Apache Band in 1980 and the core of the group--brother Andy, keyboardist Larry Willis, saxophonist Joe Ford and drummer Steve Berrios--have been together since that time. (Saxophonist John Stubblefield, who replaced Carter Jefferson after Jefferson died in 1993, is the group’s sixth member.)

Their breakthrough 1989 album “Rhumba Para Monk” (now out of print), featured Monk’s music set to a dense, percussive backdrop. Their follow-up recording, “Obatala” (Enja) added trombonist Angel “Papo” Vasquez, guitarist Edgardo Miranda and percussionists Hector “Flaco” Hernandez, Nicky Marrero and Milton Cardona. It imparted almost a big-band sound to the music of Monk, Wayne Shorter and Miles Davis, to whom Gonzalez’s trumpet playing has often been compared.

The group’s latest album, “Fire Dance” (Milestone) was recorded live earlier this year at Blues Alley in Washington, D.C., and includes a selection of originals from Willis, Ford and the band. “It’s true that we’re not the usual Latin jazz band,” Gonzalez says. “We’re constantly trying to develop our own sound, the kind of thing that Miles [Davis] did, the kind of spirit that Art Blakey’s bands had. What we do is always evolving.”

The Ash Grove date is the Fort Apache Band’s first Los Angeles appearance in six years and marks the first time the Ash Grove has booked a name jazz band since it opened in August. Information: (310) 656-8501.

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Tributes and Awards: Scheduled to coincide with what would have been the 70th birthday of John Coltrane (which is actually this coming Monday), the second annual Leimert Park Jazz Festival will take place Sunday beginning at 11 a.m. Pianist Horace Tapscott, bassist Art Davis’ quintet, vocalist Sandra Booker, pianist Rose Gales’ quartet and trumpeter Alaah’Deen and the Jazz Cartel with percussionist Juno Lewis are among those scheduled to appear.

The park is located near Crenshaw Boulevard at 43rd Place. The event, set to honor the late saxophonist as well as drummer and community activist Billy Higgins, is free. Information: (213) 960-1625.

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Higgins will also be honored when the Los Angeles Jazz Society holds its 14th annual Jazz Tribute and Awards Dinner Concert at the Biltmore Hotel’s Biltmore Bowl on Oct. 6. The drummer, who is tentatively scheduled to attend (he underwent a liver transplant last March), will be given the society’s lifetime achievement award.

Others receiving awards include saxophonist-flutist Buddy Collette, vocalist Sue Raney and new talent winners Scheila Gonzalez and Zane Musa. Saxophonists Collette and James Moody, pianists Eric Reed and Alan Broadbent and a flute ensemble scheduled to include Sam Most, Hubert Laws, James Newton and others will also perform. Information: (213) 469-6800.

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The Dizzy Gillespie tribute set for this year’s Jazz at Drew festival, to be held Oct. 6 at the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science in South-Central L.A., is being billed as the biggest gathering of Gillespie veterans and disciples since the great trumpeter’s death.

Art Farmer, Slide Hampton, Benny Golson, Paquito D’Rivera,, Jon Faddis, Al Grey, Jimmy Heath, Marcus Belgrave and James Williams are just a few of the musicians who’ll participate. Saxophonist Benny Carter will discuss his relationship with Gillespie, and an all-star big band directed by Melba Liston will close the event. Information: (213) 563-9390.

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Free Jazz: Saxophonist Joshua Redman, pushing his new Warner Bros. album “Freedom in the Groove,” will play a free concert at Borders Books and Music, 1360 Westwood Blvd., Tuesday at 7 p.m. Information: (310) 475-5344. Redman appears the following night at the House of Blues in West Hollywood.