By JACKIE NANCE
INLAND360.COM INTERN
Musaiique
“musaic”) features ’20s, ’30s, and ’40s jazz textures including bossa nova, swing, blues and calypso, with the occasional familiar song warp, such as Van Morrison’s “Brown-eyed Girl” with a Jamaican rhythm. Influenced by Pink Martini, Pearl Django, Diana Krall, Billy Holiday, B.B. King, Thelonius Monk and John Coltrane, Musaiique stands out, with on-the-fly instrumental solos.
Musaiique’s members, who represent at least four other bands among themselves, include Cathy Brinkerhoff (vocals), Carla Chandler (vocals, fiddle, mandolin), Brian Dyre (vocals, piano, flute), Axel Krings (guitar), Mackenzie Peterson (drums) and Jo Asker (upright bass) from the music department at the University of Idaho.
“We’ve all got different styles,” said Chandler, longtime fiddler with a heart for jazz. “When we get into solos, Brian is really into the beat-box style, Axel brings in a lot of blues … It’s a nice mix because we get all these different influences from all these different bands.”
Both Chandler and Brinkerhoff jammed in folk and bluegrass with the band Blackberry Jam until they formed Musaiique and got into the jazz groove.
“The ‘mosaic’ hint in the title really captures the influences on this band,” said Chandler. “We do covers of several songs, and soon we hope to start writing our own music.”
Dyre, steeped in jazz before joining Musaiique, has written a few of his own pieces already.
Musaiique has performed at the Spokane Folk Festival, the Dahmen Barn, Eastside Marketplace, One Word Café, the Latah County Fair and other local venues, and will appear at 9:30 a.m. this Saturday for their second time at the Farmers Market.
