Daniel Blacksberg Trio - Perilous Architecture (NoBusiness, 2014) ****

By Martin Schray

I like trombones. It was mainly Johannes Bauer who did it for me. Watching him and Paul Rutherford in Peter Brötzmann’s März Combo and later with Jeb Bishop in Brötzmann’s other seminal larger formation, the Chicago Tentet, was absolutely spectacular. The deep tones, the physicalness the instrument demands, the sweet and sassy warmth of the sound – of all the 'typical' jazz instruments I only like the bass clarinet more.

Daniel Blacksberg belongs to the younger generation of trombonists. Spanning avant-garde jazz, modern classical music, improvised music and klezmer, he is a musician who brings the trombone into new, foreign areas. Blacksberg plays old Hasidic melodies or hardcore punk (sometimes simultaneously) in projects as different as the Psychotic Quartet, Superlith or Haitian Rail.

However, when he wants to focus on his pure free jazz roots, he turns to his own trio with Matt Engle on bass and Mike Szekely on drums and to NoBusiness, where he has already released his first trio album Bit Heads in 2009 (one of the NoBusiness heads, Danas Mikailionis, said that this was one of his favorite albums on his labels).

Large parts of the album live from the sound of the low tones of trombone and bass on the one hand which is contrasted by Mike Szekely who is very discreet with the toms and the bass drum and rather focuses on cymbals (which reminds a bit of Robert Wyatt’s drum style after he had his accident) on the other. The effect is that the music sounds like wind blowing through the tree tops of a forest with an upcoming thunderstorm above it all. 

Perfect examples of this are "Arc of Circling Bodies", the first track, which is based on a drone of two notes, a reference point to which Blacksberg returns every now and then, while  the trio bounces lightly through the composition, or "Filament and Void", a fragmented dark blues abyss, into which the band goes down willingly just to rise like a Phoenix in the most elegant way.  The cool jazz elegance of "Scapegrace" and the hardbop velocity of "Roar of Mankind" are additional highlights before "Almost Negotiable", a challenging wrestling match between bass and trombone, closes the album.

And on top of it there is the cover: It’s like a Walker Evans picture from "Let us now Praise Famous Men", a detailed account of three farming families which paints a deeply moving portrait of rural poverty in the American South of the 1930s. The title “Perilous Architecture” refers to this cover but also to the music because the structures of the compositions are dangerous as well in a way that the three are trying to explore unknown territory and they do not know where the musical journey takes them. All about Jazz New York has called Blacksberg "a virtuosic technician with abundant creativity and a drive to engage disparate and unlikely scenarios." True that.

"Perilous Architecture" is available on vinyl in a limited edition of 300 copies only. You can buy it from Instantjazz.

Listen to them here:

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No More Shapes - Creesus Crisis (Drip Audio, 2010) ***½

An unusual line-up of trombone, guitar and drums, but with nice results. J.C. Jones plays trombone (not to be confused with JC Jones the bass-player), Jay Crocker is on guitar and Eric Hamelin handles the kit. Very much anchored in the jazz tradition, these three guys take the tradition a step further, adding rock-ish and electronic elements without moving too far away from the source.

Some pieces are boppish ("Fat Kid"), bluesy ("Invisible Glasses"), emo-rock ("If Only My Chin Had Eyes") ... but whatever the formal basis, they give it a creative twist, add a nice touch of modern spices. Most of the straight-forward harmonic development is more familiar in rock-music, and may appear repetitive after a while, yet it works out nicely. "New Years (Yves)", the last track shown below is my favorite, with a great theme, and a wonderful trombone improvisation. The nice things is that the band moves as one, without pretense, carefully exploring their new sound universe. We can only hope they carve out their vision even more, possibly a little more daring, without losing their poised approach.

Nice debut!

Watch "New Years (Yves)"


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Trombones ....

Paul Rutherford - Tetralogy (Emanem, 2009) ***½

Last year Emanem released new material by the late trombonist Paul Rutherford, an artist who had been instrumental in creating and shaping the European free improv scene. The album consists of four quite distinct performances. It starts with "Elesol", three tracks for solo trombone and electronics, a kind of experiment and not really successful in my opinion. This is followed by two pieces for horn quartet, with George Lewis on trombone, Martin Mayes on French horn, and Melvyn Poore on tuba. The four men make their improvisations vary between solemn lyricism and wild intensity, with the former being the dominant one.

The second CD starts with three lengthy pieces for solo trombone, and to me these are the highlight of the album, showing the trombonist's richness of voice and experimental power. The last three pieces are a trio performance with Paul Rogers on double bass and Nigel Morris on drums. An interesting album for fans of Rutherford. The non-electronic solo performance and the brass quartet alone would have made a great record. Now, it sounds more like a collection, rather than a unified listening experience.

The Astronomical Unit - Relativity (Jazzwerkstatt, 2010) ****

Without a doubt a great fan of Rutherford, German trombonist Matthias Müller, in a cohesive trio format with Clayton Thomas on bass and Christian Marien on drums, takes the learnings of the great Brit into outer space. In four fully improvised pieces, the trio leads us on our interstellar journey, and it is quite an interesting one: it is one in which surprise and wonder reign. The notes are sparse and intense, the interaction telepathic and warm, moving quite well together, forward all the time.The sounds they create are minute, precise, full of new textures and shades of colors, unhurried, calm yet resolute. It does not have the raw energy of the duo albums of Müller and Marien, but the end result is even stronger. You will need open ears for this one, but you will not be disappointed. A truly powerful album.


Gail Brand & Mark Sanders - Instinct & The Body (Regardless, 2009) ***½

Equally adventurous, although much more direct and immediate in its expressivity is this CD by Gail Brand on trombone and Mark Sanders on drums. Both Brand and Sanders are well-known artists of the British free improv scene. Together they create this very intense, raw, violent, sensitive and subtle interplay of bouncing notes and crashing percussion, shifting between velvety and abrasive sounds. As the liner notes say : "ten years or more of laughing, crying, shouting, listening, uprooting, settling, coming and going, and improvising      it's all in the music". And that's an adequate description.

Watch Brand and Sanders on Youtube.




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Trombone, trombone, trombone ....

The trombone is a tough instrument to put in a leading role, and the small ensembles that feature a trombone are hence limited, but thanks to the relentless creativity of modern music, anything is possible, in any combination, with any kind of intent. Here is a list of interesting new albums in random order.

Daniel Blacksberg Trio - Bit Heads (NoBusiness, 2009)

This adventurous new Lithuanian label presents us with what I think is the debut album of trombonist Daniel Blacksberg as a leader, accompanied by Jon Barrios on bass and Mike Szekely on drums. His approach is cautious, free and precise, in the sense that he does go beyond the beaten path, offering new possibilities for the instrument but without going into the wilder areas that George Lewis is known for. The end result is highly listenable avant jazz, with slow and bluesy inflections, using the instrument's inherent capabilities for sadness. Promising!

David Taylor - Red Sea (Tzadik, 2009) 

Bass trombonist David Taylor has this incredible resumé which includes amongst others the New York Philharmonic, playing with Ellington, the Rolling Stones, Blood, Sweat & Tears and even appearing on the Muppett Show with Gil Evans, but also releasing albums under his own name in more modern settings. With that background, you may expect anything, and whether it's a good thing that Tzadik offered him the chance to release this album will remain a question of debate.

Taylor himself plays tenor trombone, and a wide variety of regular or custom-made trombones. Franz Hackl plas trumpets, Adam Holzman surdo, bass drum, piano; Scott Robinson a wild variety of reeds, such as contrabass clarinet, tenor rothopone and many more, and Warren Smith has this gigantic list of rhythm instruments to have fun with : giant Chinese barrel drum, bass marimba, and many more. From the list and the label, you already get the gist that this music is to be played in the lower registers, full of klezmer scales in the best Radical Jewish Series tradition, and indeed, you are right. The album is inspired by "the music of the legendary Cantor Pierre Pinchik, ... evoking the ecstasy of cantorial fervor".

If the music did not open such interesting new musical visions at moments, I would not even mention it. Taylor creates great, reverent and intense soundscapes at times, with the solemnity and Weltschmerz you may expect, although often too pompous and heavy-footed. He throws in every style he has ever played in, from the New York Philharmonic over Blood, Sweat & Tears to the Muppetts, and luckily some creative modern music moments. Great instrumental skills do not necessarily make great composers.



Superimpose - Talk Talk (Leo Records, 2009) 

This is German trombonist Matthias Müller's seventh release, and his second with Christian Marien on drums. Together they bring you deep into free improv territory, full of short and very intense interactions, exploring sounds, timbres, shades and colors, perspectives and musical depth, bouncing of notes and rhythms, extracted from context, abstracted from meaning. No doubt the least accessible album on this list, but not necessarily the less rewarding. Müller squeezes more sounds out of his trombone than most trombonists even conceive is possible, but to his credit he uses this skill not as an objective but as a means to create music. New music, taking risks, and in Marien he clearly found a great sparring partner.



Noah Rosen, Yves Robert, Didier Levallet - Silhouette (Sans Bruit, 2009)

 French trombonist Yves Robert is without a doubt one of the masters of the instrument, confident, rich, and incredibly versatile. His album "On Touch" on ECM is easy to recommend. Here he teams up with Noah Rosen on piano and Didier Levallet on bass, for a very intense musical dialogue and confrontation, recorded at the wonderful Château Vilain XIIII (sic!) in Belgium. The three musicians explore, respond, push forward, change courses, open new vistas, and often all within one piece, changing from powerful intensity to slow and prudent testing of new common grounds. Rosen's piano sets the tone, the rhythm and the music's overall fluidity, adding complexities to abstractions, and it is without a doubt the most lyrical album of the list, yet also one of the richest, most mature and most playful. A real trio achievement.

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Yves Robert - Inspirine (Chief Inspector, 2008) ****

French trombonist Yves Robert delivers a wonderfully creative and rhythmic piece of music with "Inspirine", in the not so common format of a trombone trio. Cyrille Atef plays drums on all pieces, and Bruno Chevillon plays bass and Vincent Courtois cello, yet not together. It's always a trio format, although there is some overdubbing. The pieces are composed, well-structured with room for improvisation. The compositions are delightful in their joy and musical fun. All sixteen tracks are compact and dense, packed with ideas and great in their performance. For those familiar with "In Touch", his highly succesful ECM album, despite the fact that it's the same trio (without Chevillon), there is hardly any musical relationship or ressemblance, with the ECM album offering very lengthy expansive pieces. Both albums are excellent, but here the music dances, sings, swings, funks, ... yet it can also switch to more plaintive, melancholy moments, yet keeping a great sense of melody and attention to detail. This is music that is so full of humanity, warm, honest and highly likeable, without pretense and very creative.

Listen to an extract from "Between The Bliss And Me".


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Michael Dessen Trio - Between Shadow And Space (Clean Feed, 2008) ****

I have been checking how many trombone-bass-drums trios I know, and there aren't many, but that probably says more about my knowledge than about their existence. Steve Swell has a few, so does Julian Priester, Jeb Bishop has one and there is of course BassDrumBone, with Ray Anderson, with several CDs. Now there is the Michael Dessen Trio, and one which can stand its ground in the list of the above bands. The trombonist has a great sense of music, very lyrical and structurally complex while giving the appearance of lightness and openness. The long title track "Between Shadow And Space", was inspired and originally composed to accompany a poem by Pablo Neruda, and some Pentagon texts, but those were taken out in the end. The long piece brings lots of thematic and structural variations. The second track "Chocolate Geometry", starts with a clear melodic structure, but looses all footholds for abstract improvisation, with sparse notes, electronics and brushes recreating the impression the musicians had from the paintings of Mariangeles Soto-Diaz, moving back to intense acoustic playing at the end of the track. The great thing about this CD is not only the unbelievable precision and skills of the three musicians, but also the interesting compositional power of all tracks. "Restless Years" for instance, has a fixed bass line by Christopher Tordini, over which Tyshawn Sorey plays intricate polyrhythms, with Dessen playing slow trombone tones over it. As the drum intensifies and even picks up speed, the bass remains imperturbable. On "Anthesis" the bass gets the opportunity to carry the tune, bringing a long intro, with lots of variations, the drums join somewhere halfway, offering the solid foundation for the bass to evolve even more, and only then does the trombone join, very lyrical and melodic, enjoying the openness created by the bass and adding to it, intensifying it, expanding it, taking the rhythm section along. "Granulorum" is more subdued, with slow moving soundscapes, with electronics thrown in at times, but disciplined, well-balanced, opening and ending the tune, and the last track, "Water Seeks", even deepens that approach, creating an interesting wall of overlaying sounds, a sonic tapestry that is as hypnotic as it remains ethereal. An excellent debut : fresh, creative and open.


Listen to
Between Shadow And Space
Chocolate Geometry (for MSD)
Anthesis
Water Seeks

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