There was a time not too long ago that if I saw a band without a drummer, it was incomplete. I used to feel that there were duos, trio, quartets, and so on, but they weren’t bands until somebody was pounding something with sticks. I say this now because 1) I’ve obviously grown up a little and 2) bands like the one backing up singer Catherine Russell can still pack a wallop with just bass, guitar, and piano. Granted, Russell’s freight-train-full-o-soul vocals don’t need much else, nor is there really any room. Her early set was a nice mix of soul and torch. It was steamy, too, as High Fidelity opted for the swampy allure of no a.c.

The juxtaposition on stage at The Eastman Theatre was easily one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra occupied stage left in slick cream-colored suits and two-toned shoes. Next to them was Odadaa! in colorful traditional garb. Yes, the music was a back and forth between the two cultures, between brass and drum, between primitive and divine. But each style blurred in deference to the other, with a sort of spiritual glue holding it togeher.

The most amazing thing to me was the musicians’ body language, especially when it spoke outside the lines. During the African drum passages, the jazz cats clapped and copped to the polyrhythmic pulse. And when Marsalis got the band to swing (and how) it was so cool to see the cats in shimmering robes sway and cut little pieces of rug. It was simply beautiful. And though Marsalis adds an unparalleled excellence and sophistication to it all, he proved that it really goes back to the beat of the drum.

Most of my favorites so far this year have been on the jazz fringe. Corey Harris is on the blues fringe, as well giving a bit of a world beat twist to his standard trio. It was like Delta in the desert. Harris picks like Lightning (Hopkins, that is) but allows the music to swirl and swell and hypnotize as he did last night in the Big Tent.