This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Arts & Entertainment

Viewfinder: Israeli Jazz Musician and WSU Quartet Blow Audience Away

The saxophonist Anat Cohen performed for 450 in an inaugural jazz concert at the Berman Center Wednesday.

Jazz musician Anat Cohen brought her sound to a thrilled crowd of 450 at the in West Bloomfield on Wednesday night.

Cohen, a native of Tel Aviv, Israel, performed on saxophone and clarinet with the Wayne State University Faculty Jazz Quartet.

“It was wonderful,” said Candice Hicks of West Bloomfield, who attended with her son, DeAndre, 15, a jazz student musician. “We had great seats, and we felt very close to the show. My son said that they were great at improvising. It was something new for me.”

Find out what's happening in West Bloomfieldwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Cohen, whose concert was part of the JCC Stephen Gottlieb Music Festival and the Detroit Jazz Festival, said she performed a wide range of American classics, as well as selections from her personal catalog  going back to 2005.

Paul Barker, director of special events at the Berman Center, said that he hoped the inaugural jazz concert served as the beginning of a long relationship between the JCC and the Jazz Festival. The JCC will have a promotional booth set up for the first time at the Jazz Festival during the Labor Day holiday where Cohen will be performing.

Find out what's happening in West Bloomfieldwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“(The Berman Center) was built to bring professional, world-renowned artists like Anat to Detroit without having to go downtown. At the same time, it’s an open door to say that if you do like the show and you are interested in finding out more and you don’t have anything to do for the holiday weekend, that you can come to the Jazz Festival and get more of the same great shows,” Barker said.

Earlier Wednesday, Cohen conducted workshops for 41 area high school students as part of the Jazz Week@Wayne program, a collaborative project with Wayne State University and the Jazz Festival.

Christen Williams, 20, of Detroit is a jazz student musician at Wayne State University who was offered the chance to help set up the workshops. Williams said that to go from watching Cohen teach to watching Cohen perform in front of a packed crowd was “admirable.”

“She was so engaging,” Williams said. “The way that she communicates vocally with her ensemble is great for both someone like me who loves jazz and someone who is experiencing it for the first time because it brings another facet to the performance. It’s like, ‘If she’s congratulating her band on doing great, then they must be doing great.’ ”

Performing arts center 'a natural fit' for jazz

Cohen said although it was her first performance at the Berman Center, which opened in May, she performed "a few years ago" in West Bloomfield.

The Berman Center is a “gorgeous venue,” she said.

“It takes a very different turn, for both me, but especially the crowd, to perform in a theater as opposed to a jazz club, because you can feel everyone sitting down," she said. "It was nice, it was a great show.”

Executive director of the Jazz Festival, Terri Pontremoli, agreed. She pointed out that while the Berman Center is quite different in philosophy and structure than a typical jazz barr, such as Cliff Bell’s in Detroit, it is a good venue. “It’s not a traditional jazz club, but it’s perfect for jazz,” she said. “It’s a natural fit to want to bring an Israeli artist to a Jewish Center and the community has responded as we expected.”

Concertgoers left the center raving. Lucy Okin, of West Bloomfield who attended the concert with her husband Bernie, said that they were “blown away” by the musicianship of the quartet, composed entirely of WSU jazz professors.

“We loved the way that (the band) started with classical and worked their way up to jazz," Lucy Okin said. "Their skillfulness is incredible. We’re very lucky to have an opportunity to experience that musicianship in our backyard.”

Williams agreed. “It’s great to have a show here, both for people who know jazz and people who don’t. It’s great, not only acoustically, but for the community — to be able to bring a show which you would otherwise have to go to Detroit to see out here to the suburbs.”

The Detroit Jazz Festival runs Sept. 2-5 in Detroit. Cohen will perform with the Anat Cohen Quartet. The event is free of charge. For more information, visit its website.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?

More from West Bloomfield