Kurt Vonnegut Remembered at Birdland

The iconic American satirist Kurt Vonnegut might seem an unusual inspiration for a jazz suite but composer/ pianist Jason Yeager brought the Slaughterhouse Five author live in a musical homage at Birdland this week. Originally performed in tandem with Vonnegut’s centennial year at the Kurt Vonnegut Museum & Library in Indianapolis in November, the show featured Yeager’s quintet—multi-reedist Patrick Laslie, trumpeter Alphonso Horne, trombonist Mike Fahie, vibraphonist Yuhan Su, bassist Danny Weller, drummer Jay Sawyer, and two guests, Miguel Zenon on alto sax and Yeager’s partner, singer Julie Benko, currently wowing audiences as Fanny Brice on Broadway in Funny Girl.

Entitled “Unstuck in Time: The Kurt Vonnegut Suite,” Yeager’s playlist followed his new CD by the same title, the “unstuck in time” metaphor working well to describe the medium of jazz. As Yeager aptly put it, Vonnegut loved jazz, and the American songbook in particular. Punctuating Yeager’s improvisations on his work, Benko sang the standards “I’ll Be Seeing You,” and “Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered.” A charming presence, she helped her flustered spouse light a Kurt Vonnegut candle, with a prayer from their rabbi who was seated nearby.

It was that kind of a night, intimate with great music. “Now It’s the Women’s Turn,” an homage to Bluebeard, “Unk’s Fate,” referencing a character in Sirens of Titan, “Kilgore’s Creed,” for the protagonist of Timequake, and “Blues for Billy Pilgrim” honoring Slaughterhouse Five. Fans will immediately see the connections to their Vonnegut favorites.

And so it goes. Yeager said he was turned on to Vonnegut’s work, just finding the books on his dad’s shelf. Although you could probably write an entire Broadway musical on my favorite, Cat’s Cradle, that novel was represented by “Bokonon.” The music made for a good evening; everyone who attended at Birdland was joined in the same “karass,” a Vonnegut-imagined, shared belief system. He was there in spirit.