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	Related Links Juliana Hatfield's official Web site Matt Ashare reviews Juliana Hatfield's In Exile Deo. Ted Drozdowski reviews Juliana Hatfield with Some Girls. Vineyard Vibes' official Web site Bill Frisell official Web site Jon Garelick reviews Bill Frisell live. Ed Hazell reviews the Bill Frisell trio live

The Vineyard Vibes event of which Hatfield was a part (she’s a Berklee graduate with a songwriting degree) mixes performances by Berklee faculty, students, and alumni that the college hopes will interest the parents of future students as well as possible donors. So it was painful to watch her bite the hand that was feeding her and almost self-destruct on stage. She followed Keefe’s Unbusted, who played punk pop that occasionally soared (especially when Keefe and bassist Ben Smith sang harmonies on the choruses) and was always tight and well played. The local contingent of teenage girls shrieked happily.

But it was a small crowd to begin with. At approximately 500 capacity, the roadhouse-style Hot Tin Roof is the biggest club venue on the island, and the Saturday-night show was booked as all-ages — which in Vineyard terms means no alcohol served. At all. Hatfield, with bassist Ed Valauskas and drummer Pete Caldes (who are both on the album), followed up the Unbusted with a couple of Hatfield’s prettier tunes, "Daniel" and "Sellout," the latter with some of Valauskas’s fancier McCartney-esque grace notes. But the band couldn’t get traction with the thinning crowd, even as Hatfield moved into rockers and unleashed more hell-for-leather vocals. She slowed the momentum down by chatting with the few fans in front of the stage and tossing offhand insults at her benefactors. When she said, "This is how they taught me to play guitar at Berklee," and then went into a wrong-note soliloquy as Caldes and Valauskas tried to play along, one wanted to stand and shout (for the benefit of the Berklee administrators present): "It’s a joke! She’s just kidding!"

After a particularly ardent vocal performance near midnight, she offered a perfunctory "Good night" and walked off. She’ll be in Boston at the Paradise a week from Saturday.

Hatfield’s show was, it seems, the only Vineyard Vibes down note. The night before, Berklee faculty member Eguie Castrillo had packed the Hot Tin Roof with his 18-piece orchestra paying tribute to Tito Puente, Tito Rodriguez, Machito, and the other "Mambo Kings" of post-WW2 New York. The band included four dancers who worked amid the audience, the two male dancers also occasionally joining vocalist Manolo Mairena on stage for propulsive montuno call-and-response. The night included a spirited saxophone "chase" section (kudos especially to baritone Bob Bowlby and alto Pat Loomis), and for the final, obligatory "Oyé como va," Berklee president Roger Brown joined Castrillo at the timables. Thursday night, Phil Wilson led his Rainbow Band of Berklee students at the Martha’s Vineyard Performing Arts Center, and on Sunday, the Berklee Reverence Gospel Ensemble was scheduled to play a sold-out show at the Old Whaling Church in Edgartown.

Vineyard Vibes is the brainchild of Barry Rosenthal of BR Creative, who does Berklee’s advertising and also happens to have a house on the Vineyard. Here was a way, said Berklee VP of enrollment Steve Lipman, to "take Berklee on the road," to an affluent vacation community and "spread the gospel." The hook would be the emphasis on Berklee faculty, students, and alums rather than "imported" talent. With the event growing over the years from one night to four, and alumni stars like Joe Lovano, John Scofield, and Bruce Cockburn added to the mix, the Berklee road show seems to have legs.

Bill Frisell, who comes to Scullers next Thursday, is one of my favorite musicians and also one I’m easily frustrated by. For one thing, he’s too damn prolific. Nonesuch alone lists 20 Frisell albums — who can keep up? And then there’s the music. When I’m away from him, I tend to generalize. There’s not enough rhythm in his music, there aren’t enough hooks in the abstract writing and improvising, there’s not enough rockist guitar volume and distortion, and can’t he play anything faster than a medium tempo? Where are those fancy, steaming 16th-note runs and double-times that make jazz fans’ blood boil? Where’s the swing?

Then along comes something like Unspeakable — one of last year’s best jazz albums — or the new double CD East/West, which looks as if it might be one of this year’s. All the Frisell touchstones are here: the orchestral textures and the mix of guitar voices, the rainbow harmonies, the uncanny feel for melody, the wide-ranging repertoire, and, yes, even some jazz swing. Each CD is drawn from a live trio session, both with drummer Kenny Wolleson, "West" from the club Yoshi’s in Oakland with bassist Viktor Krauss, "East" from the Village Vanguard in New York with Tony Scherr on bass and guitar.

Frisell does take his own sweet time. On "I Heard It Through the Grapevine," he and the band massage that Motown hit’s signature bass figure for a good two minutes before Frisell breaks out with the melody. The rest of the song slips by almost before you’ve had a chance to notice it. "Blues for Los Angeles" is anchored by a two-note Krauss bass vamp, and it should be required listening for every jam band. At the simplest level, it’s a rock tune, but Wolleson’s little triplets against the four, Krauss’s syncopated fills, and Frisell’s continual teasing deference of gratification as he plays with various melodies over Krauss, settles on one, shifts the dynamics from a whisper to a shout, then joins Krauss in big dirty trembling low notes on the vamp all sustain a dreamy tension before the sweetest of release. Did I say the guy had no hooks?

There’s no obvious stylistic difference between the two CDs. Frisell brings out all his effects — guitar sampling for ghostly backing choruses ("Shenandoah"), backwards guitar ("Blues for Los Angeles"), and his great variety of voices, so that he can sound like a different instrument entirely as he moves from improv back to the refrain. There’s even swing rhythm — walking bass with brushes — on "The Days of Wine and Roses" that would do his old mentor Jim Hall proud. Frisell and Scherr play the Patsy Cline hit "Crazy" and Johnny Cash's "Tennessee Flat Top Box" as acoustic-guitar breakdowns. "The Vanguard" is great free jazz. What’s more remarkable still is that Frisell makes this stylistic variety all of a piece, a single musical vision, self-contained. When he plays the opening of "People," there are some laughs from the audience. Frisell pauses, then starts again. The audience hushes for one of those perfectly phrased melodies. If you want to know exactly how perfectly phrased, try singing along with him: "are the luckiest people in the . . . world."

Juliana Hatfield + the Gentlemen + Furvis | Paradise Rock Club, 967 Comm Ave, Boston | Aug 20 | 617.562.8800

Bill Frisell | Scullers, DoubleTree Guest Suites Hotel, 400 Soldiers Field Road @ Mass Pike, Boston | Aug 18 | 617.562.4111