Like most musicians I know, jazzers, too, love to boast about whom they’ve shared a stage with.

For the modest ones, the dropped name here or there is just fodder for the bio, extra padding for the label’s zip sheet. For the braggarts, though, it can devolve into the worst kind of pissing contest. And yet for those musicians on the outskirts of the mainstream — say, for example, free improvisers from Chicago — neither instance is really the case.
 

Rempis/Rosaly Duo

In a genre such as contemporary jazz, one with regretfully too few household names, casually mentioning one of them is more than a thing of pride. It’s a point of reference. And in a genre in a city where everybody knows your name anyway, singling out one or two can be the ultimate indicator of camaraderie, taste and respect.

Two of the most called upon players on Chicago’s free music scene, to wit, it seems Dave Rempis and Frank Rosaly have played with almost everyone in area code 312.

Rempis got to town first, and since 1998, he’s been the “other” saxophone colossus in the Vandermark Five. Along with an impressive CV of ad hoc collaborations that includes stints with Hamid Drake and Kevin Drumm, Rempis is also a founding member of the noted Chicago collective Umbrella Music. And in a sign that the name Dave Rempis is at least on the radar of traditional jazz purists, he’s been named Talent Deserving Wider Recognition in both the alto and baritone sax categories in Downbeat’s International Critics’ Poll.

Percussionist Frank Rosaly arrived a little later, in 2001, spending the next decade behind the drums for luminaries such as Peter Brötzmann, Roscoe Mitchell and Nels Cline. Navigating an intentionally fine line between the improvised and the through-composed, Rosaly’s got his own quintet now and spends much of the year on the road in various musical incarnations. 

And like most of the heavy hitters in the Windy City, both Rempis and Rosaly have come through Columbia before. Local aficionados will no doubt remember Rempis from his incredible live shows at Hunter-Gatherer with Triage and his own Rempis Percussion Quartet. Likewise, Rosaly’s been heard here with Rob Mazurek’s Mandarin Movie, Keefe Jackson’s Fast Citizens and The Chicago-Luzern Exchange.

Asked why he keeps coming back for more, Rempis explains, “I feel that there’s this honest-to-goodness scene that’s developing in Columbia for the type of music I play.
“In the bigger cities, there’s so much going on all the time that people tend to take it for granted. And that’s simply not the case here. Pretty much every audience we’ve had is more anxious and more excited than the last.”

And while Rempis and Rosaly have played together as a legitimate duo off and on since 2004, Rempis seems excited about the show.

“Frank and I come from these larger free groups where, at any given time, you can have five, six, seven or more improvisations all happening at once,” he says. “This tour has been especially fresh and rewarding for us because it’s been just drums and saxophone the whole time. Funny enough, in cutting down the instrumentation, it’s opened up more possibilities.”

Nowhere are these expanded possibilities more present and more obvious than on Rempis and Rosaly’s newest disc Cyrillic. From extended drones to hyper-kinetic frenzies and everywhere in between, it perfectly encapsulates what Dave Rempis and Frank Rosaly are doing on stage every night up and down the East Coast. 

And after tonight’s show at 701, you’ll never forget their names again.

The 701 Center for Contemporary Art is at 701 Whaley St. Doors open at 8:30 p.m. Tickets are $8 ($5 for students and center members). Call 779-4571 or visit 701cca.org for more information.