One might think that tenor saxophonist and composer James Brandon Lewis
would need to recharge his musical batteries. After all, his albums Eye of I and For Mahalia, With Love topped many critics best of 2023 jazz
lists. But Transfiguration most certainly will add to his accolades. The
album is a turbulent sea of emotions brought forth by Lewis’s compositional
dexterity and the amazing virtuosity of both he and his bandmates, Aruán
Ortiz on piano, Brad Jones on bass, and Chad Taylor on drums.
While at times feverish, Lewis’s sax playing is always tuneful and full
throated. His energetic and powerful solos, improvisations and developments
never cease to captivate the listener. And one must simply marvel at his
compositional skill. Take the opening number, “Transfiguration.” There’s an
almost Latin flavor to the composition – one that is menacing, dark and
powerful. On “Trinity of Creative Self,” the lines methodically climb to
higher and higher intensity. “Swerve” is an abstract funk. “Per 6”
generates the feeling of a car cruising at speed around curves. “Black
Apollo” uses a robotic line in an odd time meter to create a dark
foreboding. “Empirical Perception” feels like riding in a careening subway
car – being pushed and pulled as it makes its way through dark tunnels.
“Triptych” offers a driving syncopation. And last but not least, “Elan
Vital” gives the sensation of sunrise in a forest of tall trees – the light
exploding everywhere in long effervescent streams.
Of course, all of this emotional intensity is greatly aided by the
outstanding efforts of his sidemen and the moments where they step forward
and create their own unique contributions. For example, Ortiz offers up
modal bluesy abstractions on “Triptych” and “Per 6” that have distant
echoes of McCoy Tyner, and his clever fingerings throughout the album
command attention. Jones offers solid bass lines, and his work on “Per 6”
is especially noteworthy - with dynamic and challenging upper register bass
plucks that explode like fireworks. And Taylor’s rim shots, cymbal work,
and drumming never fail to emphasize the musical themes or funky bluesy
lines of the various compositions. There are even times when one can hear
the influence of Ed Blackwell’s West African drumming style in his playing.
All of this may lead to questions like “Is Lewis the new Coltrane?” or “Is
this what Coltrane would sound like if he were in jazz today?” But such
questions can be quickly dismissed. Lewis is a force in jazz that must be
appreciated in the here and now. And one should be grateful and happy to be
alive to hear it!
The sole reason why this album has not been reviewed before, is due to a simple form of humility with the question of how on earth I can do credit to it without creating a suboptimal view to potential listeners of the quality of the music they will hear. I have been mesmerised by it since the first time I listened to it, and I guess I've reached the milestone of one hundred times in the meantime.
Throughout her musical career, Swiss pianist and composer Sylvie Courvoisier has explored the possibilities of smart and adventurous music in the space that covers composed and improvised idioms, including her recent take with Cory Smythe on Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps/The Rites Of Spring, a formal acknowledgement of the classical elements that always permeated her sound.
"Chimaera" is a jump forward in my opion, and at the same time a logical though unexpected step in her career.
First, there is the line-up, interesting because of the instruments, and fascinating because of the musicians who perform on them: Wadada Leo Smith and Nate Wooley on trumpet, Christian Fennesz on electric guitar, Drew Gress on bass, and Kenny Wollesen on drums and vibraphone, and of course Courvoisier on piano. Fennesz's guitar plays a critical role in the overall sound, yet it's as brilliant as the dual trumpet front of Smith and Wooley, who each with their individual sound and approach create something fully unique, Smith out there in the skies, Wooley solidly grounded in avant-garde and blues, the first time ever these two trumpet giants performed on record. Courvoisier adds: "I really wanted to write something special for these amazing musicians that I admire and respect so much. I had this band in mind when I composed.
Second, there are the compositions. These are incredibly complex even if light-textured, with lots of changes, themes disappearing and re-emerging, with sometimes short structural themes that last only for a thirty seconds in a very long composition, like unexpected fruit on long branch. The music shifts between moments of gentle shimmering to moments of dramatic power, sometimes moving gradually into one another, sometimes juxtaposed in harsh contrast, and even if you follow the logic after so many times of listening, it's still so full of unpredictable aspects, that you keep being surprised. Courvoisier adds "This music is really influenced by the ambient world of Christian Fennesz and the spirit of Wadada, Nate, Drew and Kenny".
Third, there is the sound, obviously the result of the first two points: band and compositions, but surely conceptually there in the first place. The music is inspired by 19th Century French painter Odilon Redon, whose works of art are further described below. Redon is known for his transition from figurative to abstract art, but of course primarily for weaving mysterious dream aspects into our familiar world, of contrasting reality with illusion, or even stronger, as he described it himself:
"I have often, as an exercise and as a sustenance, painted before an object down to the smallest accidents of its visual appearance; but the day left me sad and with an unsatiated thirst. The next day I let the other source run, that of imagination, through the recollection of the forms and I was then reassured and appeased."
That is how the music sounds, like a dream from which the burdensome formal structures have been gradually stripped or subtracted only to leave the real quality of the sound intact, no longer burdened in scaffolds or structural supports, offering a sense of absolute freedom, fragility and and implicit sense of structure. Courvoisier adds "I had a pretty clear idea of the sound of the band when I wrote the music, but of course, they make it sound better than what I could imagine. So the end result is pretty much what I had in mind, even if it is developing at the rehearsal and performance, so I can’t wait to do more concerts with this band, as it will develop even more!"
The end result is multifaceted, unique, exceptional, precise and carefully crafted.
The title refers to the strange animal from Greek mythology: "The term "chimera" has come to describe any mythical or fictional creature with parts taken from various animals, to describe anything composed of disparate parts or perceived as wildly imaginative, implausible, or dazzling. In other words a chimera can be a hybrid creature"(Wikipedia). At the same time, so is the sound of the music here, as are the compositions: "composed of disparate parts or perceived as wildly imaginative, implausible, or dazzling".
The first track is called "Le Pavot Rouge", illustrated below. The twenty-one minute composition is possibly the one that will be easiest to remember. It starts with a great solo bass intro, followed by Courvoisier's jazzy theme on the piano, and the mid-tempo rhythm guitar dragging the listener in the piece, easily, gently, building up to the beautiful core theme on the horns. After exactly one third of the track, the theme starts collapsing into its base ingredients, without clear arrangements, breaking up the existing reality into a weird dream world, where delight and fear live together, where cognitive control leaves the way for creative invention with no background but with the occasional anchor point to keep the continuity of the piece. Fennesz's guitar offers a dark undertone for the bluesy piano pieces, the light-footed vibraphone and the soaring trumpets. It's hypnotic. It's infectious. It's captivating. It's perfect.
Le Pavot Rouge (1890)
The second track is called "La Joubarbe Aragnaineuse" (Sempervivum arachnoideum) also a plant whose name is slightly and creatively altered by Courvoisier, because it sounded more fun ("aragnaineuse" instead of "araigneuse" (spider-like) because, according to Courvoisier "it sounds more mysterious"). It starts with a very dark undertone of the guitar, a slow piece, with implicit compositions yet obvious structure, more volatile and ethereal than the opening track, again setting darkness and light against each other, or weight versus weightlessness. It flows, it progresses, it surprises, it shifts in gradual sonic colours.
The third track is called "Partout des prunelles flamboient", (meaning "Everywhere Eyeballs Are Ablaze" from The Temptation of Saint Anthony), inspired by the drawing below. It's a strange composition, with sudden changes and brusque moves, alternating almost quiet moments with angular themes full of high excitement and volume, possibly as if Saint Anthony has moments of burning lust and deep regret or resignation. It's fun. It's unpredictable. It's odd.
"Annâo" is again a slow piece, floating somewhere in imaginary dreamscapes, with beautifully light-touched piano sounds, implicitly following some inner logic that is hard to grasp yet sounds coherent and planned, and Nate Wooley gives one of the most moving and bluesy trumpet phrases that I've heard in a while.
The album ends with "Le Sabot de Venus" (Cypripedium calceolus) (Lady's Slipper), like "La Joubarbe Aragnaineuse", the name of a flower. Courvoisier comments: "These names are my own derivatives from plants, names that sound 'good' to me, but they also do sound like names of paintings by Odilon Redon. I like to imagine how Odilon Redon would paint these plants … and I like to imagine that the listeners imagine a painting by him that is called "La Joubarbe Aragnaineuse" or "Le Sabot de Venus". This last track is equally completely unpredictable, a kind of an imaginary sonic landscape, dream and nightmare at the same time, with slow moving sequences, and brutal moments full of harsh sounds that shock and recede, giving space back to quiet, beautiful, precise and subtle interactions. It's a place you want to be for its intense beauty, yet equally afraid of what might come next.
In sum, the whole album oscillates between solid and free forms, between material and immaterial worlds, between patterns and the unexpected, between the familiar and the imaginary, between waking and dreaming, between peace and angst. It is a fascinating album by many measures as I mentioned. The unique musical vision of Courvoisier works incredibly well in the hands of these master musicians, whose playing is wonderfully adapted to create her dreamworld. Brilliant!
Don't miss it.
Further explorations:
The black and white drawings presented above are part of a portfolio of work by Odilon Redon, called "The Temptation of Saint Anthony". The entire portfolio can be viewed here on the website of MoMa.
It is also interesting to watch one of the first live performances of the album, here at Roulette, New York on Nov 16, 2022, before the second trumpet part for Wadada Leo Smith was added and recorded the next year.
This recording sat around for a while, collecting my increasing interest, I
confess, without me getting around to engaging with it to the extent it
required. I was initially drawn to it by a 50-year fondness for Karlheinz
Stockhausen’s Opus '70 (1969), a work for an improvising quartet
using materials drawn from Beethoven. Playing with Beethoven is
the work of a well-travelled veteran, bassist, composer and bandleader
Carlos Bica, whose playing possesses a tremendous elegance, his
arco
playing often sounding more like a cello than a bass. He’s accompanied by a
collection of fine musicians, though their instruments hardly form a typical
alignment: Daniel Erdmann, plays tenor and soprano saxophones,
João Barradas, accordion, and DJ Illvibe,
turntables. Whether it’s the musicians, the instruments or the material,
composed over generally familiar Beethoven themes, everything is inspired
and worked with a kind of transcendent lyricism. Especially on tenor,
Erdmann possesses one of the great lyric tones, as compelling in its own
way as Getz or Coltrane. It’s immediately apparent on the opening “Leonore”,
composed by Carlos Bica “after” Beethoven’s “Leonore Overture No.3”.
Part of the recording’s genius is that, in a world of improvised music,
it’s almost “overcomposed”, composed to the point where methodologies
collide, fracture or, most happily, elide into new sonic worlds. Each of
the 11 tracks is both “after a Beethoven composition” and also credited to
an individual—eight to Bica alone, one to Bica and João Paulo E. da Silva,
one to João Barradas (a luminous solo) and one to DJ Illvibe, but it hardly
stops there. Beethoven/Bica’s “Tiny Change” has Illvibe inserting and
altering a hefty sample of Tom Wait’s “Small Change (Got Rained on with His
Own .38)” then altering Erdmann’s tenor as well with bubbles of pitch-
shifting entering the saxophonist’ lines. “Euch Werde Lohn In Bersern
Welten” has a recording of chanting and a great stereo duet by Erdmann and
Erdmann. Illvibe’s “Kids See Ghost Sometimes” is the turntablist’s solo
piece constructed on the ruins of “Moonlight Sonata” with an R&B vocal,
a distorted trumpet and a mangled horror movie theme adding to the
haunting.
Whether individually or collectively, the group creates its own radical
space out of a sense of reverence and/or playfulness — apart from Ill Vibe
everyone is essentially a lyrical musician (maybe him too), with Barradas a
kind of national treasure of accordion tunefulness, possibly sampled in
repeating chunks by Illvibe.
The special joy of this music is that you can put it on repeat and it will
always sound both the same and different (“Leonore” really is more
beautiful with every pass), almost like a collection of radios tuned to
random stations. Oddly, it intrudes not on the listener but on itself, the
easy listening music of chaos, something the world itself can’t stop making
and for which we have a legitimate need, as in this wondrous product that
makes classical beauty at once classic and beautiful in a fresh way.
Seven minutes of hellfire. That’s the way Smash and Grab begins, the new,
now eleventh album by Ballister, possibly the best band in the world. From
the first second Paal Nilssen-Love’s drums pound away mercilessly, Fred
Lonberg-Holm beats his cello as if it were a heavy metal guitar and Dave
Rempis performs a veritable St. Vitus’ dance on the saxophone, up and down
the scales, horizontally, vertically, right up to the pain threshold. There
is no escape, you have to go through it. It’s like being thrown overboard a
ship to keelhaul. The only difference is that this is not a punishment, but
a pure pleasure.
And then - after purgatory - there’s an abrupt stop. As if the engines were
switched off, as if everyone was looking around, having no idea what was
going on. A drumbeat here and there, the cello scratches and mumbles to
itself. The saxophone is completely gone for three minutes, then it trills
its way back into the improvisation. It sounds as if the three of them have
a hangover after the furious start and are staggering through lonely
alleys. Left alone by his rhythm section, Rempis then takes off like a
drone, soars into the air and hovers above the clouds - only to ignite the
same fire as at the beginning three floors higher. What a monster track!
What glorious pleasure! What a heavenly maelstrom! Even though Smash and
Grab is divided into three tracks, it’s obviously one set (“Smash“ and
“Even More Smashing“) plus an encore (“Grab“). “Even More Smashing“ extends
the consistent ups and downs of the first part of the improvisation.
Intensity, brutality, intimacy and subtlety alternate absolutely elegantly,
the apparent opposites are seamlessly linked. “Grab“ then summarizes the
first two pieces in a nutshell.
The album was recorded in December 2022 at the Catalytic Sound Festival in
Chicago - and it was the first concert for the band after a six-month
break. In April of the same year, they had completed a two-week tour of the
USA, their first performances together after an almost three-year break due
to the pandemic. And as is often the case, you don’t know what will happen
with freely improvised music. It can range from mediocre routine to pure
magic. Here it’s definitely the latter.
“On Smash and Grab, a punk aesthetic wraps itself into the mature
sensibility of seasoned improvisers to create one of those rare sets that
simply unfolds calmly in front of you like an origami flower“, the liner
notes claim, and there’s certainly some truth in that.
2023 was a sad year for the free jazz community. Some of the last of the
old guard have left the ship - for example Tristan Honsinger, Tony Oxley
and Peter Brötzmann. But Fred Lonberg-Holm, Paal Nilsson-Love and Dave
Rempis have captured and breathed their souls. There’s no need to worry
about the new torchbearers. They know what they’re doing. After Fire!’s
Testament, Smash and Grab is the second album released early in the year
that is guaranteed to end up in the Top 5.
Smash and Grab is available on vinyl (in a limited edition), as a CD and as
a download.
On the one hand, Fire! (as always Mats Gustafsson, Johan Berthling and
Andreas Werliin) are absolutely predictable. That’s not meant in a negative
way at all, it’s a bit like drinking a spectacular wine you know, but you
haven’t had it for three years - and now you’re looking forward to tasting
it again. Anticipation is the greatest joy, we all know that. Also, because
on the other hand, Fire! albums are never the same.
On Testament, their eighth album, the trio concentrates on the essentials
for the first time: saxophone, bass, drums. No flutes (which Gustafsson has
recently discovered for himself in his other projects), no electronics
(actually an integral part of Fire!), no guests and no other bric-a-brac.
The album was recorded live in the studio on analog tape at Steve Albini’s
studio (of Nirvana/Shellac/Stooges etc. fame) with the master himself at
the controls. It’s a bit as if what belongs together has come together
here.
Fire! have always been about finding the essence by getting to the core of
the music. On Testament, it becomes clearer than ever before how strongly
the trio literally refers back to the roots of ancient jazz and blues
structures. Field hollers, call-and-response, an interplay - in this case
of three instruments - that have a kind of conversation with each other and
thus create a certain density and tension. This is particularly evident in
the opener “Work Songs For A Scattered Past“ (but also in the following
three pieces). Johan Berthling’s bass is the basis, Werliin's drums support
him more stoically than usual, and Gustafsson lets his dark lines buzz over
this base. Intensity, tempo and sound are then varied, Gustafsson pivots on
Berthling’s bass motif to give Werliin room for excursions. In its
simplicity, this is simply great art and almost tears your heart out.
This approach is further refined in the second piece, even more minimalist,
three notes on the bass, the drums almost like a metronome. Gustafsson
plays long, lonely lines, interspersed with an interlude of short outbursts
that seem as if a guest musician has snuck in. A highlight of the album is
“Running Bison. Breathing Entity. Sleeping Reality“. The bass is as light
as a feather, the drums almost free of tom, bass drum or snare, even the
saxophone floats free of suffering or longing. It’s the continuation of
Fire!’s masterpiece
She Sleeps She Sleeps, especially when the obligatory outburst comes in the middle of the track
and the bass then returns with even more verve. You might even want to jump
from your sofa and dance - just to realize that the last track, “One
Testament. One Aim. One More To Go. Again“, is different. All three
instruments spin freely, there is no longer a gravitational center, it
seems as if one is drifting completely free through the orbit. The piece is
a throwback to the band’s other mainstay, namely krautrock/progrock - and
here Can in particular (coincidentally, the review was written the day
after Damo Suzuki’s death). Like Can, Fire!’s music also oscillates between
demonstrative boredom and ecstatic outbursts, you think you know what’s
going to happen - just to find out that your expectations won’t be
fulfilled.
It’s only February, but are we talking about an album of the year? Hell
yeah. 100%.
Testament is available as an LP (in a limited edition on clear vinyl), as a CD and as a download.
He spoke about music in its pre-cultural state, when song had been a howl
across several pitches, [when] musical performances must have had a quality
something like free recitation; improvisation. But if one closely examined
music, and in particular its most recently achieved stage of development,
one noticed the secret desire to return to those conditions.
There’s no way that I plan on sustaining that kind of wandering
description, here getting to fifteen minutes, on this writing round, into a
78-minute recording filled with moments both monumental and startling,
arising throughout three long duets that range from 34 to 15 minutes in
length and which sustain the impression of the primal, perhaps emphasized
by “Tap Root” and the other titles, “Digging” and “Lament for Old Bones”
(around the 25-minute mark, Butcher’s soprano is alternating between the
simplest bamboo flute and a penny-whistle). This is both dialogue and
ritual, the two often overlapping each other in an invocation of music’s
higher powers (Near the conclusion of “Digging”, there’s a muffled and
extended soprano saxophone cry so strange as to suggest the intrusion of a
primordial ancestor: “Lament for Old Bones” has a late passage that
suggests an animal yipping). It’s a great drum performance by Prevost,
while Butcher’s saxophone performance may be as powerful, as expansive, as
any I’ve heard, one that seems to reach through the most expressionist
moments of free jazz to the roots of human culture by means of
extraordinarily developed technique. “Unearthed”, indeed. Prepare
to be amazed.
One of the most imaginative, dynamic artists, Darius Jones followed his
first solo alto album (2021’s
Raw Demoon Alchemy (A Lone Operation)
) with, arguably, the most impressive work of his career, thus far. His
latest,
fluXkit Vancouver (
its
suite but sacred),
commissioned by the Vancouver-based Western Front and released this fall in
a collaborative venture between Northern Spy Records and We Jazz Records,
debuts a new musical language, designed by Jones, that features, “extended
technique moments to be unique to each individual player.” As with his
albums in the Man’ish Boybook of music, the intersection
of aural, visual, and physical is foregrounded on
fluXkit Vancouver,
bringing players and listeners together into a collaborative receiving
space, where making the sounds that form the music intersects with
experiencing the performance.
The group features a new recording lineup for Jones, with the great Gerald
Cleaver on drums, and a nontraditional string quartet with Joshua and Jesse
Zubot on violins, Peggy Lee on cello, and James Meger on double bass.
Incepted in 2019, fluXkit Vancouver draws directly on Jones’s
personal experience with the city. Jones had to restart workshops with the
group after cancelling performances in 2020, and that break allowed the
music to, in his words, “gestate.” In addition to the 25 visual directions
created for this music, the gestation period seems to have provided the
players with time to ruminate on all the ways they could perform the
music—or, perhaps, in the parlance of a Fluxkit, assemble (as well as
disassemble and reassemble) the components contained within.
FluXkit Vancouveropens with a short, invocation from Jones,
answered by Cleaver and Meger, who, throughout the album, straddles the
roles of rhythm section and string quartet. As conceptually brilliant as the
material is, Jones has rarely played with such clarity and depth of feeling.
He sounds more exposed than even on Raw Demoon Alchemy, partly
because of the way this music relies heavily on his subsequent direction
and sublimation to the ensemble. It’s a dazzling performance, with superb
leaps and references to traditional jazz, which he plays against
occasionally spiky, modernist violin lines. The Zubot brothers, well versed
in chamber, symphony, and jazz motifs, play brilliantly together with Lee
and Meger, the collective sonic environment is warm, bold, and inviting.
Lyrically circular motifs, like aural curlicues, recur throughout,
syntactical guideposts in the hour-long suite. And throughout, Cleaver’s
pulsing swing showcasing, as always, his brilliance on the drum kit. Late
in the final piece, “Damon and Pythias,” Lee moves forward with a cello
line that could have come straight from Charles Ives or William Grant Still,
over which Jones solos in the middle-to-lower range of the alto sax. The
combination of folk and modern techniques is emphasized by the gradual
addition of Meger and the Zubots, with the final minutes harkening back to
the opening, a gorgeous and contemplative recessional. This will
undoubtedly remain a high water mark for Jones as an emotionally rich,
sweeping epic.
In 2012 trumpeter Kris Tiner and percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani released "Ritual Inscription", with Jeremy Drake on guitar. That's a long time ago. We find Tiner and Nakatani back on this excellent album "The Magic Room", literally the 'vacant top floor of a historic Woolworth's building in downtown Bakersfield', and more figuratively, the space where this magical duet is taking place. Tiner is a brilliant trumpet player, known for his collaborations with Jeff Kaiser and Vinny Golia, but also with his Empty Cage Quartet and the Tin/Bag duo. Like Tiner, Tatsuya Nakatani can also be described as a creative master of his instrument, someone who not only refined the art of percussion to a different level, but who also created his own instruments to generate the sounds he likes to hear.
Both artists use the size of the room to get the full resonance and space their music requires. Nakatani uses an astonishing array of small percussion next to his drum kit to create a relentless and intense foundation and even lyrical support and guidance for Tiner's melancholy tones. The album is one of intense calm and precision, using the power of their instruments and musical vision focused on the perfection of the delivery, the clarity of the sound, the emotional depth, the quality of the listening. When you hear the beauty of their intimate co-creation, it's the result of the long experience of both musicians to perform in duo settings over the past years, as if their musical voice can only come properly to the fore when starting from a very direct human interaction.
Tiner's tone is unusually warm, welcoming and deeply felt. Remarkably, also Nakatani's percussion skills allows for heart-piercing moments of emotional distress, by using his kobo-bow, a bow specifically designed by him to give a different level of power than when using a bow produced for strings. The great third performer on this album is the space of the room, and both musicians use it not only for purposes of resonance, but also as its presence of silence, the space between the sounds, the emptyness that provides depth and perspective.
Last year, they also released another duo album, called "Dagny", in Japan, but I could not get a copy to compare it, but you can listen to it on Youtube. The sound on this one is of a totally different nature.
Living in the periphery of Europe, it makes me really happy that a label
from Thessaloniki, Greece releases such a musical statement. Tyshawn Sorey
and Adam Rudolph are accomplished percussionists, two of the musicians that
everything new under their name attracts my full attention. Being,
especially, a fan of Sorey’s journeys into the black tradition (into music
I should just say?), there is no doubt that he is one of the most important
musicians of his generation.
But this is a collective work of the highest order. This collaboration of
sorts was recorded live in concert in NYC as 2021 was ending, and is one
continuous small scale journey into spontaneous compositions. The final
result, cut into two 180gr vinyl sides, is worth the repeated listening
that today’s hectic normality denies.
Apart from Rudolph’s overtone flute, both musicians utilize various
percussion instruments. Bypassing the constant threat that this
instrumentation can bring –a boring linear rhythmology- their playing comes
to the listener’s ears as an inseparable entity. They play in unison and
they both admit it willingly.
I really can’t be sure, since I have no images of the live setting, if
the music was dialectical, like two friends exchanging ideas (reminder:
John Stevens’ description of his duo playing with Trevor Watts on Face to
Face), but, certainly, the music flows like one entity linking every second
of sound with the next one.
Like Adam Rudolph comments on the label’s bandcamp page, they approached
the music and their interaction with open hearts. And a willingness to
interact, speak through the non-verbal language that music is, I dare to
add, communicating their truth, ideas and sentiments. Even though there
seem to be distinct sections within the recording, it is, or at least it
feels like, one continuous piece. Archaisms I is one of the best records
for 2023.
Saxophonist Jack Wright and drummer/percussionist Ben Bennett have been
collaborating for around a decade now. By talking to them and, mainly, by
listening to their music, what is crystal clear is that both improvisers
share common ideas and feelings about the music they create. Their shared
language is totally evident in any recording by them-as a duo or even with
other like minded artists like Zach Darrup for the trio Never which was
reviewed here.
On Augur, their latest effort as duo, again on Palliative Records, this sax
and drums duo forms another, different and inspiring entity than the usual
free jazz blowouts that have, by now, formed a tradition inside the jazz
tradition. Their shared language, mentioned before, is in the form of
attentive listening and then playing. Their dedication in following each
other’s ideas and gestures has created a fruitful trajectory of three long
tracks. Each one seems to start humbly and, certainly, not loudly, building
up slowly, using their weapons as improvisers: open to any new idea, those
two players are nervously ready (but so relaxed at the same time) to
respond to anything new.
Jack Wright has managed through the years to avoid following his idiolect as
a player, producing something new each time. A very difficult task and
goal. Bennett, coming from a much younger generation but also equally
dedicated, seems (I’m quite certain about that) to be following the same
path. It is not easy to reinvent yourself or even try to.
Theire is no point, I believe, in writing individually about the two
players. They play in unison with an interaction that reveals a lot of
playing together (in and out of any kind of a stage), but also a lot of
talking and thinking about the music. Their music requires a lot of careful
listening and provides many questions for the listener. I cannot think of a
bigger compliment than this, it certainly is a five star recording for
2023.
International Anthem wasn’t a favorite at its beginnings. Gradually it
delivered, to us listeners, with a fierce grace to quote the full of
empathy album title, the music of today. Totally out of genres, labels and
tagging. It seems to me that International Anthem has become a hub for a
wide open roster of musicians who embody anything that comes from the black
tradition but definitely travels to the future.
One of them is the Englishman Alabaster DePlume, named Gus Fairbairn in
the world outside music. Even though he, obviously, comes from a different
tradition than those playing jazz based musics in the States, you can never
tell, when listening to the album, that he is not from there. But this
isn’t the point, it never was.
There’s no easy way to describe the music in Come With Fierce Grace. This
could be pop music, as all the tracks end before the six minute mark and
many of them clock around three minutes. They feel (and I mean it as this
album is all about sentiment) like small vignettes, passages that
incorporate anything that could be called modern music.
DePlume is a spoken-word artist, writer and saxophonist. All those
different (or not so different after all) fields conjure a new language,
his language. Some are based on the voice, like the threnody of Naked Like
Water with Donna Thompson, others use the melody lines of the sax as an
instrumental journey for the heart of the sentiment. Soul (like on Did you
know with the voice of Momoko Gill), jazz, blues and small ballads create
the core of an eclectic, totally new experience –but also as old as the
black tradition where partially is based on.
I really love this album and it will make it on my top ten list for 2023.
DePlume (along with Celine Voccia if you are asking…) is the biggest
musical discovery for me this difficult year and I truly thank him for the
music.
The title says it all: "Beauty Is Enough", an astonishing solo trumpet performance by Ambrose Akinmusire, who is usually more active in what we could call 'modern creative' jazz, and member of several bands that we reviewed over the years, but never as a leader.
On this album, he strips away any reference to any musical genre, or using his incredible eclectic knowledge of music, ranging from classical to free improvisation, to bring us sixteen relatively short pieces, in which he creates a fascinating musical universe of crystal clarity and deep emotion. Austerity and masterful discipline on his instrument are merged with feelings and compositional complexity. There are moments when his sound is closer to classical than to jazz, with a purity of sound that is uncanny in its resonance in the open space. In stark contrast to classical musical are acoustically distorted and fractured sounds, bended notes, expressive and exploratory moments. It sometimes sounds like a merging of Bach and Lester Bowie. Bach also comes to mind in his use of structural repetitions, that get slightly altered each time. For most pieces he manages to introduce thematic patterns acting as a foundation for this improvised flights of sound, as if he is accompanying himself without overdub.
I have listened to it for months now. I have put the album away, and listened to a lot of other music in between, but then you need to hear it again. It is calming, soothing, comforting, it shines, it brightens the room, the space, the day, it jubilates and moans, it energises, it baffles by its incredible virtuosity. It is majestic, solemn, magnificent, yet equally sensitive, personal, intimate, lightfooted and playful. And not one after the other. All these things together, at the same time, and as you notice, there are not enough adjectives to describe my enthusiasm. At the same time it is also authentic, unassuming, humble in its approach.
Akinmusire was already known to be an excellent trumpet player, but he has outdone himself, propelled himself into a different league altogether.
He does not seem to want to prove anything. It is not self-centered or designed to break boundaries. It just says: listen to this. This music. Beauty is enough.
Cologne-based pianist/ composer Simon Nabatov enjoys a broad musical
practice, rooted in a combination of fluency and openness, whether
venturing into Latin American music, the repertoire of Herbie Nichols,
setting texts of early Russian modernist poetry or, as is the case here on
Verbs, expanding his trio with bassist Stefan Schönegg and drummer Dominik
Mahnig to a quintet with Leonhard Huhn on alto saxophone and clarinet and
Philip Zoubek on synthesizers in a quest for committed and complex
movement. The cues here are a series of titles, each of them a call to a
significant action, all essential acts with which we might fight, dream or
struggle toward achievement, meaning or grace. The music, thus concerned
with existential acts, is, inevitably and necessarily, largely improvised.
The verbs of the track titles – “Pray”, “Race”, “Reveal”, “Breathe”,
“Converge”, “Evolve”, “Float” – are keys to the moods of the pieces, all
collectively improvised, but for “Breathe”: “Pray” is longing meditation,
“Race” dynamic, hyperkinetic movement, “Reveal” sunlit romance. The
significance of the titles is direct, they are prods to mood, but the
character of the improvisations is spectacular. Each musician is a
virtuoso listener, garnering, anticipating material from his co-workers,
and responding as a virtuoso of empathy and stimuli. Whether it’s slow,
medium or up-tempo, each piece is a weave of voices entering with germane
asides, supportive nods or fresh textural elements, coming and going in a
shifting, contrapuntal choir. The longest track, “Converge”, approaching
12 minutes, is filled with a dark power, initially marked by diverse
percussion and increasingly driven by an engine-room roar of synthesizer.
The composed “Breathe”, oddly enough, is perhaps the most manic and
slightly comic: an explosion of tight-knit bits of electronics, piano and
drums, all given to a certain tendency to whiz-bang, a sudden redirecting
shock, often comic, that finds companions in the fluttering piano of
“Evolve” and the rhythmic knotting of the concluding “Float”. Every
individual voice in the quintet is a crucial creative component, whether
coming in and out of focus or shining at length in one piece or another,
whether it’s Zoubek and Mahnig on “Converge”, Schönegg on “Race” or Huhn
on “Float”. Nabatov is consistently brilliant here, whether playing piano
or assembling a band, every track testifying to the necessary energy of
verbs.
The risk of getting to know musicians too well, is that you come to appreciate their music differently, possibly with less distance and with less sense of criticism. I've watched both Luis Vicente (trumpet) and Marcelo Dos Reis (guitar) perform several times in various ensembles and talked to them about their music, their tours, their concerts.
I do not believe that this will hamper my judgment in saying that this record is exceptionally good. In the liner notes, Marcelo Dos Reis explains their long journey together in many ensembles - of which Chamber 4 is one of my favorites - and performed hundreds of concerts.
This album showcases the result of a few days of residency in Coimbra, Portugal, resulting in new material, as well as spontaneous recordings. The result is a very intense, intimate and creative album, on which Dos Reis' singular guitar style - rhythmic, arpeggio-ed, with extended techniques - is perfectly matched with Vicente's deep and sad sound, exemplified in the gentle "Cornelia", in the video below.
Other tracks are more adventurous and boundary-shifting, but always in a friendly and inventive way. This is something you have not heard before, yet it works, and it works well. The duo truly find their voice, with the guitar creating the more contextual setting of the piece, its repetitive nature, its hypnotic progress and the level of raw directness, while the trumpet adds the perfect counterbalance, with disciplined and lyrical phrasing, even in the more brutal moments of the music. Some pieces, such as "The Grey Car", are almost experimental, with an intro in which Vicente conjures up unheard sounds out of his trumpet, multiphonic with superpressured lips, gradually accompanied by fragmented bits of muted guitar strings, the tension is such that you - as the listener - keep being impressed by their mutual understanding and control.
My favourite track is the one that bookends the album, "Climbing Up The Mountain", built around a single drone-like tone that serves as the backbone for the piece, and that thanks to its length also evolves into different sonic universes.
Guitar and trumpet duos are relatively rare. We have reviewed only eighteen in the last sixteen years (Mazurek/Parker, Wooley/Morris, Tiner/Bagetta, Susana Santos Silva/Frith, Sei Miguel/Gomes, Robertson/Solborg, ...), and somehow the combination usually works, even if probably not an easy one.
Both musicians on this album demonstrate their deep understanding of each other's musical power and artistic possibilities, resulting in improvisational power that is stunning, delivering something that is their very own personal sound, and the magic that was already present in several of their albums is even more strongly present here, from the first note to the last.
Technical skills combined with solid interplay, fascinating musical ideas and explorations, a strong esthetic unity and deep feelings ... what more do you want?
For twelve years now, Matana Roberts has been pursuing her ambitious Coin Coin project. In twelve chapters she wants to combine art, music and
theater concepts to a representation of African-American history, for which
she researches the lives of seven generations of her family. That has been
the plan from the beginning. The stories of the first two albums were
located in Louisiana and Mississippi, the third part was rather personal,
then the narrative moved to Memphis. The new album, In The Garden, is now
again not assigned to any particular place. But it’s a family history again
and as the previous albums it tells us a lot about the history of the United
States at the same time: “The Coin Coin project is a musical monument to
human experience. The root is American, but such experiences and emotions
have no identity except that they are human. I focus on human emotions and
experiences, but yes: it’s also a kind of musical map of the U.S,“ Roberts
said in an interview.
What’s new on In The Garden is the fact that the 16 tracks don’t flow into
each other; they’re clearly separated. While the previous album was more of
a stream of consciousness, In The Garden is a multi-part narrative.
Roberts tells the story of one of her direct ancestors (her
great-great-grandmother), who died as a result of complications from an
illegal abortion. From the first encounter with the father of the
protagonist’s children, through the course of the toxic relationship, the
gradual estrangement, the protagonist’s loneliness, her desperate attempts
to regain control of her destiny, to her unfortunate death, Roberts unfolds
a typical story of black women at the beginning of the 20th century. In the
process, the story develops an immense dramatic and narrative force,
reminiscent of the female characters of Thomas Hardy (Tess of the
d'Urbervilles) or Colson Whitehead (Underground Railroad). The inevitability
of the protagonist’s fate and the social circumstances that ultimately
drive her to her death are heartbreaking. Then again, Roberts also builds a
monument to this character, showing her as a self-confident, modern woman.
Each of the story parts ends with the same words: “Well, they didn’t know I
was electric, alive, spirited, fire and free. My spirits overshadowing, my
dreams too bombastic, my eyes too sparkling, my laughter too true. My name
is your name, our name is their name. We are named, we remember - they
forget.“
What is more, the fate of the woman is reflected in the music. “We said“,
the opener, starts with indistinct chatter, as if we were hearing voices
from Hades. In the background, the reeds drone ominously, preparing us for
the tragedy of the story - a musical moment quite reminiscent of the Art
Ensemble of Chicago. What follows are narrative passages that are
repeatedly mirrored or counteracted by purely instrumental pieces. On the
one hand, the tracks on which Roberts speaks are underpinned by repetitive
string motifs (Mazz Swift on violin), restrained drums that groove lightly
(Mike Pride and Ryan Sawyer) and blues-soaked horns (e.g. in “unbeknownst“
or “a(way) is not an option“). On the other hand, the same horns (the
great Darius Jones on alto sax, Stuart Bogie on bass clarinet, Matt Lavelle
on alto clarinet and Roberts herself) are more prominent in the instrumental
pieces. On “predestined confessions“ they wrestle, entwine, fight and vie
with each other. The almost idyllic scene in “but i never heard a song so
long before“(which is dominated by a lullaby), and the gospel-like “the
promise“ are followed by a lament which reminds me of the great musical
moments of the 1960s, of Coltrane, of Shepp, of Ayler. It becomes clear
that there will be no happy ending for the protagonist. The superimposed
exclamations that mark the transition to the afterlife are underlaid with
wild, screeching saxophone notes. For the finale, we are back to the
beginning: brass band sounds, returning home from the cemetery after the
burial in the tradition of a jazz funeral, only that this band consists of
the little instruments of the Art Ensemble.
It is obvious to see the topic of this album as applied to the social
reality in the U.S. today, as a commentary on the recent Supreme Court
decision on Roe vs Wade. In an accompanying text, Roberts opposes the
criminalization of abortion and displays the consequences, especially for
black women. She attacks the restrictive abortion policies of ultra
right-wing forces, whose child protection argument she exposes as
hypocritical based on their love for guns.
If it comes to the music: free jazz is not enough for Matana Roberts, her
installations include various forms of noise, gospel, blues and post-rock
(In The Garden is produced by TV On The Radio’s Kyp Malone). Her art takes
us to territories where no one has been. In its uniqueness Coin Coin is
still the most fascinating project in the jazz world.
Note: Originally, jaimie branch was also scheduled to play on the album,
which was unfortunately prevented by the trumpeter’s untimely death in
August 2022. She is mentioned in the liner notes, the instrument she
contributes is called “courage“.
Coin Coin Chapter Five: In the Garden is available on vinyl (as a double
10’ inch), on CD and as a download.
You can listen to the album and buy it from Ms Roberts’ Bandcamp site.
From reviewing an essential Matthew Shipp Trio recording of the 1990s (Circular Temple), I now consider
The Intrinsic Nature of Matthew Shipp,
which—sorry, I can’t help myself—will be considered essential also,
before too long.
It’s intrinsic in a number of ways. All of Shipp’s defining “moves” are
here. His penchant for the middle register, his way of putting repetition
and substantive anarchy in juxtaposition to one another, his
breathtaking—and I mean that literally, sometimes my breath interrupts when
he does this—use of the sustain pedal. Also, on display is Shipp’s
seemingly unlimited melodic creative gift.
The album is minimal not only because it is Shipp playing solo, but because
he seems to be playing in an intentionally pared down mode. Both the right
and left hand spin melody lines telling some startling stories, and there
is less of (though there are some) the sort of clustery abandon that Shipp
can be so good at. Clusters sometimes occur over time, though, like a
melody played over a long sustain, becomes a harmony. Shipp’s control of
the vertical and the horizontal is out of this world.
It’s a quieter album than some of Shipp’s, but only in density and dynamic,
the ideas draw as much attention to themselves as any sonic boom or train
wreck might. But the quiet does create a sense of intimacy that’s very
seducing. Even when I listen while doing something else—typing this review,
for instance—the music often invites me to stare off into space and
consider. Wait, I was talking about intimacy. That sounds like
introspection. I think maybe the two are essential to each other.
I could be overthinking this. I am prone to reacting strongly to
non-musical cues on recordings—titles, images, etc—and there is a
track
on the album called “The Intrinsic Nature of Shipp,” which, very likely,
the recording was felicitously named for. And, honestly, who can say what
Shipp was thinking when he named the tune that?
But when you tell me something is “intrinsic”—i.e., belonging naturally or
essential—then I’m going to start wondering. Is a solo performance more
intrinsic than a trio performance? Do the relationships of the trio make it
non-intrinsic? Are our relationships intrinsic to ourselves?
That’s me crossing completely from the line of useful (fingers crossed)
critique to me-just-having-a-good-time-writing-about-music.
Whatever the philosophers say, the experience of this album is fantastic
and entrancing, and, yes, intimate, in the sense you feel like he’s in
conversation directly with you, the listener. (Another relationship!)
Kairos documents the second collaboration between Japanese-born,
Ireland-based pianist Izumi Kimura and American, Switzerland-based master
drummer, percussionist and vocalist, Gerry Hemingway, following
Illuminated Silence recorded with master double bass player Barry Guy
(Fundacja SÅ‚uchaj!, 2019. Kimura continued to work with Guy and recorded
two albums for the same label in a quartet with Polish Artur Majewski
and Spanish drummer Ramón López). The album was recorded in Kimura’s
adopted hometown, Dublin, and in Hemingway’s adopted hometown, Luzern,
in May and August 2022.
The title of the album, Kairos, the ancient Greek word for time,
captures the unique and highly personal conception of Kimura and
Hemingway of rhythm and time. And this conception is enhanced by the
poetic description of American writer and poet Andrew Levy: “Our wish to
expire resplendent with desire, the discovery of which we can not put
off. To be part of unstoppable drift in time and thus operative
imaginative trees becoming stars becoming space”.
Kimura and Hemingway can slow down time, almost into a stasis in the
minimalist and contemplative opening piece “Dendrochronology”, and focus
on suspense and the delicate, resonating timbres of the piano with the
marimba and vibraphone, or the prepared piano and the drum set on the
following, playful “Water Thief”. “Cloud Echoes” offers a dramatic,
emotional story that enjoys a minimalist percussive pulse while the
title piece focuses on a totally free and intuitive interplay, cementing
the gifted and imaginative improvising skills of both musicians. Kimura
and Hemingway do not just drift in time but shape and sculpt time in
their imaginative, constantly shifting manners.
Hemingway’s “Day Into Night” frees time from any pattern and suggests
open and sparse, echoing contours of elusive time, or an enigmatic and
Sisyphean attempt to find an operative rhythmic pattern that maybe never
achieved. Kimura’s brief “Chronostrata” articulates a powerful and
intense, free jazz melody, and is the only piece that radiates
relatively familiar dynamics. The most surprising piece here is
“Rivertide”, an arrangement of the Bahaman-based, Pindar family's
recording of "Take Me Over the Tide" matched with the Methodist hymn "At
the River" as arranged by Charles Ives. Hemingway plays harmonica and
sings beautifully and with great passion like a preacher, with Kimura,
intensifies faithfully the gospel vibe.
Many wonderful and enchanting things happen when you let yourself drift
in such an unstoppable tide. Or as Andrew Levy wrote in his poem:
‘...The thief of time sheltered by your body from all harm. / From
memory from shadows this kind of pain. The ground is green, the ground
is whatever color you wish it to be. / an orange-lined triggerfish. The
smallest, discrete, Non-decomposable bell”.
We find him back now in the company of Rodrigo Pinheiro, one of my favourite pianists of the last years, whose RED Trio and other colloborations cannot be recommended enough, and with Vasco Furtado on drums, also one of the in-demand Portuguese drummers of the moment.
"Linea" is an incredibly strong album, one that you can listen hundreds of time without getting bored (I'm not yet there, but close enough I think). The playing of all three musicians is beyond excellent, but I think the biggest challenge and success is Pinheiro's piano-playing, who manages - as the only harmonic instrument - to provide the solid foundation for the trumpet and the drums to excel in their art by moving all in the same direction without any guardrails and in total freedom. The trio journeys through very contrasting territories: highly energetic and dynamic, quiet and meditative, even tender moments, agitated and persistent, intense and gentle.
João Almeida truly shines in this environment. His brilliant technique and musical ideas come to full fruition here, as is his versatility to move between completely free playing and developing repetitive phrases that sometimes slowly develop into themes that can evaporate as fast as they arise. Furtado's playing amplifies the incredible intensity of the music, by accentuating, driving forward without clear rhythmic patterns yet with strong pulse.
The music is fresh and passionate, full of variation and creativity.
I don't think I'll ever tire of listening to it. I'm sure you won't either.
Celine Voccia, a French pianist currently living and working in Berlin,
couples her classical training with free jazz edge through energetic and
engaging improvisation. In the past half year or so, Voccia's discography has expanded rewardingly for the free jazz and improvisational music fan. Here are some thoughts on a few recent recording...
A generous entanglement of twisting saxophone and piano melodies forms
Wild Knots, a duo recording from the Voccia and one of Berlin's leading
saxophonists, Silke Eberhard. Between the two, the comparisons to other musicians
- from Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy and Stan Getz to Cecil Taylor
and Olivier Messiaen seem to cover the free jazz and avant-garde
composer spectrum. However, it is no hyperbole, from Eberhard, one hears an unfettered
voice that can be airy and melodic as well as sharp and incisive, and Voccia
is as likely to pluck the strings from inside the piano as she is to lay down
a poignant or unnerving chord fragment.
Wild Knots opens with the aptly titled 'Enthusiasm,' which from the opening
moments of Eberhardt's ebullient melodic acrobatics and Voccia's split second
reactions, the rapport is obvious. The musical conversation ebbs and flows,
their musical ideas so fluid and sympathetic that one could imagine them
just as well reading from a wildly notated composition. The follow up, 'Indecision,' begins
with a bit of high register piano work and questioning swirls of notes from
the saxophone. The tune, while never really settling, stabilizes into
minimalist interactions between Voccia extracting
vibrations from within the piano and Eberhard extending her playing to the clicking of her keys and
barely-there notes. As the albums continues it is at turns contemplative
and excited. For example, track five, 'Renaissance,' begins austerely with a set of spacious chords and an arc of
notes from the sax, then it catches subtly catches first until it is a blaze of
staccato stabs at the keys and excited melodic snippets, until coming to a sudden
end. The follow-up, 'Meloncholy,' has a yearning feel, Voccia's tonal clusters
are both dissonant and tender, while Eberhard finds a lovely, expressive
elongated tones to match. The final track 'For Uli' is a neat summary of all
that has come before, where towards the end the two work up to a pinnacle that
is as fraught with tension as it is energetic.
Wild Knots is a lovely and dynamic album. It is full of spontaneous
melodies that could just as well been thoughtfully composed and an overall
inspiring listen.
With Berlin mainstays bassist Jan Roder and drummer Michael Griener,
Voccia has found a pair of sympathetic colleagues who are able to
effortlessly support her expansive musical ideas. It is also sort of no
surprise, the versatile bassist and drummer are anchors of the Berlin free
jazz scene, playing with both the legends, including Alexander von
Schlippenbach and the late Ernst Ludwig Petrowsky, as well as current stalwarts
like Silke Eberhard, Rudi Mahall, Axel Dörner, and many more. Voccia fits
right in with playful atonalness, charismatic drive and startling flexibility.
This trio recording from the tail end of 2022 is a trove of inspired playing
and complex listening, however, it also 'goes down' easy. Alto saxophonist
Anna Kaluza's cool, edgy lines give Voccia a lot to work with and around,
while bassist Matthias Bauer's big, enveloping sound provides ample support
for sonic exploration.
The tracks are titled 'Part 1' through 'Part 9,' ranging from three to nine
minutes, each one with its own unique character. 'Part 1' begins with a bird
call from Kaluza, followed by Voccia placing some perfectly formed chords in
between the following melodic snippets. Bauer drops some resonant notes as the
track builds up in intensity. Half-way through the five minute track, the approach
has solidified as Kaluza's packed lines are punctuated with similar bleats to
the opening moments as Voccia and Bauer ratchet up the energy. In 'Part 2,'
Kaluza is again leading the way with some wide intervallic leaps and extended
melodic ideas, while Bauer is moving quickly over the finger board in an
abstract walk. Voccia's accompaniment is precise and effective as she and Kaluza thrust and parry.
As attractive the propulsive motion of the first two tracks is, the
exploratory nature of 'Part 3' is truly beguiling. Bauer draws out harmonics and
textures from his strings and Kaluza is aflutter throughout her instrument's
range. Voccia seems to not be there at all, until you realize that after the
tinkle of tones at the start of the track, she's playing the insides of the
piano filling in space with light percussive clatter. Voccia returns in full
on the next track, playing a deliberate and harmonically rich solo
introduction for several minutes before the others jump in.
While each track is worth examination, it could also be simply said, ACM is a
fantastic work of both group and individual improvisation.
