Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis

Did music really used to be less complicated, or does it just seem that way? Maybe it's just that life used to be less complicated, and music is simply a mirror of its times. Or something like that. Whatever the case, Two Men With the Blues was recorded live at...

By Chris Gray

July 17, 2008

Audio By Carbonatix

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Did music really used to be less complicated, or does it just seem that way? Maybe it's just that life used to be less complicated, and music is simply a mirror of its times. Or something like that. Whatever the case, Two Men With the Blues was recorded live at Rose Hall in New York's Lincoln Center over two nights in January 2007, but it feels like an artifact from another age. Sometime before music splintered into microgenres, the distance between jazz, R&B, and even country could be easily traveled by a skillful ensemble like this one. Whether on a timeless ballad like "Stardust" or "Georgia on My Mind," big-bellied blues like "Caldonia" or Nelson's own "Night Life," or fleet-footed foxtrot "That's All," the chemistry between Nelson (with longtime harmonica sideman Mickey Raphael in tow) and Marsalis' four-man combo is both obvious and contagious. These songs have all been done a thousand times before, but few things make the modern world melt away better than listening to Nelson scratching away at his acoustic guitar or Marsalis' tastefully swinging trumpetwork. With apologies to Elvis Costello (though he would surely agree), Nelson and Marsalis are both consummate men out of time.

Chris Gray has been Music Editor for the Houston Press since 2008. He is the proud father of a Beatles-loving toddler named Oliver.

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