François Carrier, Michel Lambert, John Edwards, Steve Beresford - Overground to the Vortex (Not Two Records, 2013) ****

By Philip Coombs

Stage Managers Note:
Due to exceptional luck, tonights performance of 'Overground to the Vortex', will have the following cast.

Saxophone........................................................................... François Carrier
Drums.................................................................................... Michel Lambert
Bass........................................................................................ John Edwards
Piano.................................................................................... Steve Beresford

Plot Synopsis:
"Underground to the Vortex" is a classic love story. The Anna Karenina of free jazz. Drums meets Sax, they fall in love and stay together for years and have multiple children. (Many of which have been reviewed on this very site.)  Sax goes away to England on a grant to get away from Canada for awhile and see what's new. While there Sax meets Bass and they start playing together. Drums hears about this and decides to fly to England to see if it's real. The three of them play a show, which was thankfully recorded, and all seemed well until the arrival of Piano.

Act One Scene One 'Mile End'.
When François Carrier plays the role of Sax, it always has a joyful and lyrical voice, and this track is no exception. Here John Edward's Bass keeps up with him so well that you may find yourself looking at the liner notes wondering who the second horn player is. But then something amazing happens. Michel Lambert's Drums burst onto the scene strutting all of the assertiveness he can muster giving Bass no option but to switch focus and soon laments with the bow on the stresses of making a decision and ultimately, whether intended or not, brings Sax and Drums closer together.

Act One Scene Two 'Bow Road'.
They have all settled in and are very comfortable in each others presence. This comfort allows them to take some time and experiment with rhythms and repetitive phrasings. There is a great moment about halfway through the scene where Sax cries over a wonderful Bass and Drums moment where they lock into s very straight pulse and give the track a real lift.

Intermission
According to the notes, Carrier breaks character and performs a magic trick for the attendees. Just the kind of guy he is.

Act Two Scene One 'Archway'.
Steve Beresford's Piano enters stage left. It is sultry and inviting and it calls out everyone's dance card and they all accept. As long a history as  Canadian Sax and Drums have, the relationship between British Bass and Piano cannot be overlooked or denied. They were both an important part of the greatly acclaimed Foxes Fox and also have a extensive live history together. This scene rarely gets split between these nationalistic duos but when they do, they reverberate with ideas. Soon they become a quartet. They live and let breathe, diving in and out of each others way. Adding delicate touches. Blasting new paths.

Act Two Scene Two 'Barking Side'
Sax has a vision for the ending of "Overground to the Vortex" and it is made quite aware may different ways. Sax starts alone and sets the tone early. Everyone jumps in my never venture too far away from the central idea. Even when the foggy wind storm of improvisation reaches its peak, Sax grounds everything with a well placed rhythmic phrase that becomes everyone's lighthouse. Sax returns to ideas that have been hinted to earlier and when the last note rings out, you will feel that everything is complete and not one other note was needed. Everyone gets along, everyone wins.

Curtain.


Can be purchased from instantjazz.com.

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Shofar: Ha-Huncvot (Kilogramm, 2013) ****

By Martin Schray

The Shoah is the most monstrous atrocity people did to people. The fact that the Nazis systematically, industrially and brutally killed six million Jews is something which goes beyond any imagination. Although the Nazis have luckily failed  in exterminating the Jews as a people, their attempt to annihilate their rich culture was more successful. Especially in Germany and Eastern Europe Jewish religion, literature, music, cuisine, art architecture, etc. was suddenly gone after 1945.

More than 50 years later Mikołaj Trzaska (alto saxophone and bass clarinet), Raphael Rogiński  (guitar) and Macio Moretti (drums) started their project Shofar, which tries to resurge at least Jewish musical culture in these places. Based on the work of ethnomusicologist Moshe Beregovski (who has collected recordings in Ukraine, Poland and Moldavia), their approach is looking for a common denominator of old Hasidic tunes like nigunim (stylized improvisations based on thematic passages used to reflect the mystical joy of intense prayer), Klezmer dances like freylekhs (which is short for the Yiddish “freylekhs shtikele” and comes from the German “fröhliches Stückchen“ meaning “ delightful/happy piece”), contemporary free jazz and DIY/alternative rock.

Obviously, this is not far away from everything John Zorn is involved in (“Ha-Huncvot” would have been a great Tzadik release indeed), the music also reminds of Dave Douglas’ Tiny Bell Trio or Jacob Garchik’s beautiful collection “The Heavens”.

The album itself is structured around three “Traditional Hasidic Melodies“, all of them marvelous melancholic pieces, albeit they are different in detail. The first one is a shy and delicate tune in which Rogiński sounds like a minimalist Bill Frisell seeking Trzaska’s alto for unison dances. The second and third melody pick up the unison interaction of guitar and bass clarinet/alto but while the second one is very somber as if it was announcing something terrible, the third one with its rising intensity in the second part seems to get back joy almost defiantly.

The other pieces are wilder and sometimes they display an almost excessive kind of humor. “You + Cookie = Happiness” is a shredded joyride between Gustafsson-like alto howls, Minutemen/No Wave guitars and intimate guitar/drums conversations. Another example is “To think more positively about Germans” (you can also ask Paolo how this works), a track with a latent tension, you literally wait until it bursts (which does not happen). Highlights are the bookending tracks “I see through my nose” with its elegant and cheerful duel between alto and dubbed guitar and the fidgety and nervous “Dinner with the giant” which cuts off  the album as abruptly as Jewish culture was ended in Eastern Europe.

A very beautiful and recommendable album.


Buy from the label: http://www.kilogram.pl/sklep/?sLang=en

Listen to them here:

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Of Wind and String

Neil Metcalfe (Flute), Guillaume Vittard (Double Bass), Daniel Thompson (Guitar) - Garden of Water and Light (FMR, 2013) ****

Daniel Thompson (Guitar), Alex Ward (Clarinet), Benedict Taylor (Viola) - Compost (CRAM, 2013) ****

By Colin Green

These are concerts given by two acoustic trios consisting of wind and string instruments, with guitar, recorded at St. Leonard’s Church in East London in the autumn and spring of 2011. The common denominator is guitarist Daniel Thompson, who plays a large-bodied guitar, without amplification. Astonishingly, these concerts were the first time either trio had played together, a tribute to their improvisatory skills.

The music of the trio of flute, bass and guitar – as well as the title – is inspired by traditional Japanese music, a sound-world recognisable from the works of Toru Takemitsu, such as “Towards the Sea”. The titular, “Garden of Water and Light” is divided into two parts: “Water” and “Light”. In the first, after limpid phrases on the flute, over scumbled notes on guitar and bass, the musical lines lengthen, brief phrases are exchanged and the music takes on a clearer definition, like one of those micro-origami sculptures that unfold in water. This is music full of delicate textures that spring from the acoustic properties of the instruments: flute over bowed harmonics on the bass, with scraped guitar strings; an endless melody on the flute, against a counterpoint of irregularly placed guitar chords. The first part closes with an energetic dialogue between flamenco-like guitar and bass, with sharp interjections from the flute.

In contrast, “Light” begins in a more sombre mood: with a low resonant hum on the bowed bass, notes picked out by Thompson in bare profile, and a cold, disconnected flute.  It is an aesthetic evoked by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki in his classic essay: “In Praise of Shadows”: “…in the still dimmer light of the candlestand, as I gazed at the trays and bowls standing in the shadows cast by that flickering point of flame, I discovered in the gloss of the laquerware a depth and richness like that of a still, dark pond, a beauty I had not before seen.”

The contemplative mood continues in “Vimeth”, with sounds that seem to capture silences. The music eventually centres on a narrow range of intervals and repeated chords on the guitar, and is slowly reduced to a drawn out, rolled figure from Viltard, as if in slow-motion. The piece is ushered to a close by the spare phrases of Metcalfe’s flute.

On “Compost”, the trio of clarinet, viola and guitar produce a more hard-edged music, which requires sustained attention for its nuances to become apparent. In “Red, Pink and White Grapefruit”, the ear must adjust to the scale in which events unfold: a patchwork of long notes and bubbling trills on the clarinet, resonant scrapes on the viola, small glissandi, a rapid accelerando highlighted by a rise in volume. It is music of atomised phrases, where the shifts range from the rapid to the subtle. Gradually, the gestures are extended, as Alex Ward reveals his immense technical abilities (he took part in Derek Bailey’s Company Week of 1988, at the age of 14). He bristles with new ideas, to which Thompson and Taylor respond with enthusiasm. At times, in the higher registers, it sounds like Ward is singing.

Again, the natural properties of the instruments – their particular timbre, resonance, attack and decay – have much to do with the raw material of the music, and how it’s developed. Clarinet and viola occupy a similar range of pitches in the middle register, which Ward and Taylor exploit in some close interplay, and notes that bleed into each other. Taylor weaves around the other instruments, with portamento slides and glassy harmonics. Thompson’s guitar is spikier, more finely etched in this performance, but he remains alert to every subtle change in dynamics or tempo, often employing percussive techniques on the strings and body of the guitar. There is a lovely passage in which his quite notes and slow trills are complimented by a soft halo from clarinet and viola. 
 
“The Shade Without the Tree”, the closing performance, continues in a similar vein, with the apparently simple opening material found, on closer inspection, to be teeming with potential, as the music bursts in new directions, changes mood and continues to surprise and delight.

London’s churches are known for their sympathetic acoustics – heard to advantage in both these performances – but the downside of recording at such venues in a metropolitan area can be heard on “Compost”: the sound of one of the emergency services passing by! And on a personal note: I would have preferred the applause at the end of each piece on “Compost” to have been edited out – it always seems to break the spell – but I recognise that opinion on this subject is divided.

“Garden of Water and Light” can be purchased direct from the FMR website; “Compost”, the first release on the CRAM label (founded in 2011 by Benedict Taylor) is available on CD, and as a digital download from Bandcamp.

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Scoolptures - Please Drive By Carefully (Leo, 2013) ****

By Stef

One of the most innovative new sounds in Europe comes from the Italian electronic jazz band "Scoolptures", whose "Materiale Umano" offered a great listening experience and their sophomore "White Sickness" ranked second in our 2011 Happy New Ears Award.

Now the quartet is back with a double CD, which according to the label "molds the sound into a pulsating, urban, tense or ecstatic conglomerate, densely fluid and dynamic, a sound equivalent of Banksy"

The band are Nicola Negrini on doublebass, ubass, metallophone and live electronics, Achille Succi on alto sax, bass clarinet and shakuhachi, Philippe "Pipon" Garcia on drums, prepared guitar and live electronics, and Antonio Della Marina on sinewaves and live electronics.

They combine the beauty of acoustic sounds, the warm bass, the shimmering vibrations of the bass clarinet, the natural lightness of the shakuhachi with the sparse and ominous darkness of the electronics. A great combination of the frailty of human emotions and the menace of urban life, by itself not a new concept, but the way this quartet makes it work is by a subtle minimalism, in which all unnecessary elements are omitted, deleted, erased, and what remains are sparse threads of sounds with sudden outbursts or beautiful phrases or interesting sonic changes.

The interesting thing about the band's musical approach is that it remains relatively accessible, possibly because of the inherent lyricism of Succi's soloing. Like Banksy, what you hear is vaguely familiar and recognisable, but the context in which it appears, the contrast of the sonic backdrops force you to listen differently, resulting in nice suprises and musical enjoyment. At moments I wished they had pushed things even a little bit further into even more unconventional zones, yet the end result is highly recommendable.

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Rodrigo Amado Motion Trio + Jeb Bishop – The Flame Alphabet (Not Two, 2012) ****½

By Tom Burris

Rodrigo Amado's Searching for Adam (Clean Feed, 2010) was one of the most played albums on my iPod for about a year.  Rodrigo's sax duets with Taylor Ho Bynum (trumpet) rewarded repeated listenings and suited just about any environment.  I was much more familiar with Ho Bynum's work at the time, and I wasn't sure if he and Amado were a good match – but it sure was fascinating stuff – and obviously I couldn't get enough of it.  Which means it worked, of course.

When Amado was first heard with his current sparring partner, Jeb Bishop (trombone), earlier last year on the fiery Burning Live At Jazz Ao Centro disc, it sounded like a (sound) barrier had been broken.  That performance was a wild showcase that often threatened to spin completely out of control.  Naturally, its follow-up studio date, The Flame Alphabet, presents a thoughtful and often spacious approach to organizing chaos.  Like Ho Bynum before him, Bishop often seems at odds with Amado's playing, and the proceedings often sound like he and Amado are playing entirely different pieces of music at opposite ends of the room - the separation of Amado in one channel and Bishop in the other emphasizes this effect – and as before, this is precisely why it works.  Different roads, same destination.

The album opens with exactly this demonstration on “Burning Mountain,” as opaque lines played by Amado and Bishop spill from their parallel boxes.  Drummer Gabriel Ferrandini and cellist Miguel Mira, who plucks the strings throughout the entire record like a bassist, provide tentative support before all four lunge into the serious business of fanning the fire-music flames into the open sky.  Amado and Bishop continue shrieking in forked tongues until the blaze is gradually (and just barely) extinguished by the rhythm section.

When Bishop leads the group on the title track, it sounds like he's taking them down European side streets that should be too small for this giant vehicle to traverse.  By the time they've arrived at the other end to meet Amado, it's evening and the engine is ticking and knocking.  So they let it sit for the night, while everyone eats, drinks, converses, and eventually hits the sack.

The next morning (“First Light”), Bishop grabs the plunger, while Ferrandini grabs some clothes hangers and wire cutters, and together they fumble around in an attempt to fix the toilet.  Eventually they succeed and the day begins.  The coffee starts to kick in; the car is well-rested and working fine, as demonstrated by Amado and Mira's front-seat driving and navigational abilities in a fast and purposeful duet.  Ferrandini and Bishop jump in periodically to supercharge the engine and when it finally kicks in for good, what a ride! 

“Into the Valley” is the real highlight of the disc.  It sounds like there are some very large animals and blood-drunk mosquitoes (courtesy of Bishop's trumpet-like dive-bombs) in that spacious valley.  Eventually the whole thing gets very intense with everyone riding a free groove that would probably sound like total chaos if you were dropped into the middle of it – but with the careful and gradual construction of the piece, it is positively hypnotic.  Absolutely stunning.

Amado, Bishop and Mira ease into “The Healing” with a series of long whole notes.  Enter Ferrandini and it becomes a (slightly) more lyrical piece of music, as the players each try to locate puzzle pieces to insert into the right spots – only to discover they've been chewed up by a litter of pups.  Instead of a completed, pretty picture you get art.  Hallelujah! 

The Flame Alphabet is still available on vinyl.  Highly recommended.


Can be purchased from instantjazz.com.

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Axel Dörner and Mark Sanders – Stonecipher (Fataka, 2013) ***½

By Dan Sorrells

Trying to unpack Stonecipher feels as arcane as scrutinizing the lines in marble, or reading the fine constellation of flecks in a slab of granite. It’s an album that makes its transcendence and beauty obvious enough, but without revealing anything of why this should be so; faced with only the sounds, we have incomplete information about how it came to be, and therefore, like some mysteriously-veined marble obelisk, must accept it for what it is, towering before us.

We know that Stonecipher is the duo of Axel Dörner and Mark Sanders, working with trumpet, electronics, and percussion. Dörner has by now completely obscured his methodology, and it’s probably no longer accurate to call him a trumpet player. His concern over the years has steadily narrowed to the very being of sound itself, while his tools for exploring this have at the same time expanded. He deftly weds trumpet technique with live electronics, leaving the listener feeling sure of neither, aware only that they’ve entered a realm where causality and sound no longer have the comfortable relationship they’re used to.

An impressive variety of “distances” are conjured in Stonecipher, as though everything is arranged toward fostering the perception of certain depths of field. The long “Stonecipher I” is very unsettling, a shifting tangle of noise that wields its power by being unpredictable, like driving a dark wooded road, headlights barely cutting through the fog. In many respects, it more calls to mind Francisco López’s processed field recordings than the real-time improvising of two musicians. Sanders blends in the best way he can: with radiating cymbals and rolls of toms, blunting attacks and stretching out sounds to create an expanse as far-flung as Dörner’s.

“Stonecipher II” has some more obvious moments of trumpet playing, but there’s still so much electronic manipulation that it’s hard to even imagine at what points the mouthpiece might be touched to Dörner’s lips. In a way, one of the underlying truths to this album, and to a lot of improvisatory practices these days, is that it really doesn’t matter. Like reading the grains of a stone, isolating or identifying each speck of sand and sediment detracts from the bigger reality: that this thing before you, this work, is something far greater and so, so far removed from the processes and materials that created it. As John Dewey notes in Art as Experience, the art isn’t the object or the method, it’s what the result of those things “does with and in experience.” That’s fundamentally where Stonecipher operates: outside of players and instruments and fact sheets and back stories. Just the work, the art, suspending itself in the listener’s ken as something big and noteworthy and peculiar.

In short: music worth paying attention to.


Can be purchased from instantjazz.com.

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Modern Jazz Round Up

The following are some modern jazz recordings that have been in rotation in my iTunes collection recently. I'm viewing this as a indulgence on my part, a quick dip into a different side of the collection. I decided not to star-rate these albums as they tend to be more mainstream than the recordings typically reviewed on the blog.

By Paul Acquaro

Rob Oswanski - December's Moon (Palmetto, 2013)

The opening song on keyboardists' Ron Oswanski's December's Moon, 'White Meadow', is a fusion delight -- soaring melody, searing guitar, with a perfect portion of organ. Guitarist John Abercrombie, who plays on about half of the tracks on the album, delivers a great performance.

The passion and pulse of the first song turns a little towards the sentimental on the follow up 'Solo pie Unida'. Oswanski turns to accordion, which makes for an atypical sound, but the combination with the soprano sax is a bit on the gentle side for me. The kinetic 'Ukranian Polka' doesn't come a moment to soon. The eastern European folk flavored tune features the accordion and Jay Azzolina's twisty guitar lines, and the sax solo is unexpectedly knotty. Abercrombie contributes another excellent solo on 'Mercury Retrograde.' The group on the album is rounded out by bassist John Patitucci, drummer Clarence Penn, saxophonist Tim Ries, drummer Ian Froman.

The Hutchinson Andrew Trio - Prarie Modern (Chronograph Records, 2013)

The Hutchinson Andrew Trio is a group from western Canada who's album Prairie Modern has a sound that suggests vast horizons and open vistas. Bassist Andrew leads the group through a set of songs with harmonic and rhythmic structures that are accessible, engaging, and enjoyable to follow. Guest saxophonist Donny McCaslin delivers the good on almost half of the tracks, his playing is substantive and adds a certain energy. 

The first tune takes its time to develop. It's easy to digest and I was almost ready to file it into the "that's nice" pile when suddenly McCaslin turned up the intensity and threw wrench in my categorization plans. The following tune, "The Fog," has a buoyant and an off-kilter melody, afloat in solid rhythm and harmony. Things really get cooking during "The Realm Part II".

Barry Romberg's Random Access - Crab People ( Romhog, 2013)

Drummer Barry Romberg, also from Canada, has a large discography, though this recording is my first introduction. At first glance, the double CD of Crab People (named after the characters in an episode of South Park) seems a bit like a college rock group circa 1993.  However, since it is the music that we concentrate on around here, I am happy to report that within, it's a fun, passionate and engaging take on early fusion. Half of the tracks are entirely improvised, but you'd almost never know as they have a nearly composed feel. For me, the most joyful part is getting to hear guest guitarist Ben Monder providing choice volume swells and some arpeggiated brilliance. 

The suite "End of an Era" and the tune "6 to the 5 to the 7 to the 9" features atmospheric comping from the organ, textural guitar playing, complex rhythmic drive from Romberg and some excellent sax work. Also with mentioning is the soaring and eviscerating Rypdal-like solo on "1967 pt 2."

Christopher Alpiar Quartet - The Jazz Expression - (Behip, 2013)

Saxophonist Christopher Alpiar's playing on this recording is steeped in the type of spiritual/expressive Jazz of late 60's pioneered by John Coltrane and Pharaoh Sanders. Alpiar is a strong player who confidently wears his heart on his sleeve on Jazz Expression. This truly is an expressive album, an homage to its influences. Highlights include the first tune, "Welcome (Peace for the Earth)", which takes almost no time to swell in passion and tension. Alpiar digs deep and pulls out some exciting lines. On tried and true ground, but certainly quite enjoyable.

Alex Wyatt - There's Always Something (Nowt, 2012) 

New York Drummer Alex Wyatt has pulled together a nicely composed album on There's Always Something. The title track moves a long over an easy groove, and a flowing accessible melody. Guitarist Greg Ruggiero provides a gentle but insistent solo that is a real highlight of the piece. Overall, Wyatt's compositions contain rich contemporary harmonies and themes that exposes his musical knowledge and open ears. The second song, 'Clockwork', like the other tracks, is a tight and clever composition. Rhythmically engaging, a deceptive simplicity disappears upon closer listen. The rest of the group here is Chris Tordini on bass, Danny Fox on piano, and saxophonists Kyle Wilson and Masahiro Yamamoto, on tenor and alto.

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Colla Parte - A Cast Of Shadows (Self-Released, 2013) ***½

By Paolo Casertano

Colla Parte is, according to the musical terminology, the instruction for accompanists to follow the lead of a solo performer. The trio features double bassist Daniel Barbiero, flutist Perry Conticchio and vibraphonist/percussionist Rich O’Meara and it is here on its second release after the convincing debut “Field/Figures” in 2011. The reference environment whence the group’s name comes from, to be found mainly in classical music, gives us some valid clues to Colla Parte’s compositional conception. The personal jazz and experimental heritages of the members, as much as their different improvising attitudes, are melded and linked from a binding classical background. The use of shared structures as counterpoint and the constant turnover of the leading voices gives to this small ensemble the chance to build a rich musical environment that is pretty well balanced between chamber music, highly lyrical peaks and incisive interplays, and at the same time not miss freedom and spontaneity in an organized contest.

The strongly cinematic atmosphere of the opening track lies on a substratum of double bass low and bowed waves together with distant “electronic” vibraphone touches provided by O’Meara (it reminds me of someone who is walking and whistling), over which Conticchio’s sax moves warmly, providing melodic phrasings or scattered inlays. The tone of Conticchio, who has a 35-year career including performances with Don Cherry and Anthony Braxton, is warm and enveloping, while Barbiero and O’Meara are at ease switching between the polyphonic scenario springing from their bowing and mallet percussions in the second track to the thin and fitting frame they provide in the third episode working on pizzicato, drums and cymbals. Obviously, following the evolution of their titles (Antumbra/Penubra/Umbra – which are the Latin names given to three distinct parts of a shadow), this opening triptych is not just a manifesto of the band’s purpose to explore contrasts of lights and shadows, but also a prelude to the central composition of this work, the self-titled (and logically consequent) 35 minute “A Cast Of Shadow”. Growing in humus sprinkled with ethnic metallic and wooden percussions and austere bass bowing, the ethereal presence of the flute is soon replaced by the sax, establishing a thick dialogue made up of short phrases with the constant presence of the double bass (even when it goes pizzicato). Barbiero, as in his former solo work, unsheathes his contemporary and avant-garde vision, and supplies a non invasive but fundamental trestle during the whole development of the piece. This long suite deserves deep listening and concentration, the musicians never choose eruptions and easy climaxes, and they always maintain control over their outputs. The last third of “Cast of Shadow” is rhythmically more challenging and traditional jazz oriented, but the main and most interesting aspect of Colla Parte’s music keep on being the capacity for alternating musical registers and genres with no fractures but rather with the creation of an harmonized, coherent and original musical universe.

The chilling coda drives us out from this intense listening experience.

Colla Parte live:

Conticchio and Barbiero web pages for other sound clips and to buy the record.

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The Convergence Quartet - Slow And Steady (No Business, 2013) *****

By Stef

"Assemble/Melancholy", the first track, does just that. Four instruments have bits and pieces to say, somewhat fragmentary, with already some ingredients of storytelling, and gradually a kind of boppish rhythm emerges, and so the four instruments start getting aligned in the same direction, somewhat melancholy.

The joy is offered to you by Taylor Ho Bynum on cornet, Alexander Hawkins on piano, Dominic Lash on bass and Harris Eisenstadt on drums, four stellar musicians who've been playing together for a number of years now. And the music on this album is sheer joy, offering the listener shifting perspectives on music and its basic material - sound - to create some form of coherence (convergence?) that in its extremes range from Keith Jarrett to Anthony Braxton and beyond, from melodic lyricism to abstract free improvisation.

Simon H. Fell captures it well in the liner notes of the quartet's first CD, "Live In Oxford" : "The several compositional strategies seem to range from the inscrutable to being perhaps too easily scrutable, and the resulting music includes moments of the sublime, the awkward and the deeply puzzling. At the end of the record, you may even be tempted to ask yourself ‘what was that all about?’" True, this recipe is not new, but the quartet applies it to perfection, playing with the compositions, tossing them around, slowing down rhythms, accelerating, adding shades and seemingly losing threads while at the same time keeping a good ear to the total sound and the direction it all takes.

I will not review each track, but the variety and wealth of material you get is absolutely phenomenal, with twists and turns, from slow to fast-paced moments, rhythmic intricacies and great adventurous escapades. And it sounds great, and rich.

The title piece "Slow And Steady" is an Eisenstadt composition with one of the most beautiful themes I've heard in a while - it also features on "Canada Day III" - with odd-metered accompaniment of the rhythm section. A great and sad closing for a fantastic album, one that you will want to listen to many times, as I've been doing for the past month.


Can be purchased from instantjazz.com.

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Melodic Art-tet (NoBusiness, 2013) ***½

By Colin Green

Charles Brackeen - flute, soprano and tenor saxophones
Ahmed Abdullah - trumpet
William Parker - bass
Roger Blank - drums
Tony Waters (Ramadan Mumeen) – percussion

The New York free jazz scene of the 1970s, commonly known as “the Loft Era”, was a time during which musicians seem to have rehearsed more often than they secured gigs, and recordings with major labels were practically non-existent. Before various European labels such as Soul Note/Black Saint began to record this music – from the late 1970s – the only recordings were releases on small independent labels, of which many of the master tapes have long since been lost, or dissolved; hence very few re-releases on CD. The harsh economics and politics of this time, as well as the music, are considered in Valerie Kilmer’s “As Serious as your Life – the Story of the New Jazz” (Quartet Books, 1977), and many of the issues remained after the end of the Loft Era, as seen in Ebba Jahn’s film: “Rising Tones Cross”, from 1984. 

In the last few years, Danas Mikailionis of Lithuiania’s NoBusiness Records, has made it his business to redress this chronic under representation, in important releases of music from the 1970s and 1980s, such as “The Group – Live”; “Billy Bang’s Survival Ensemble - Black Man’s Blues / New York Collage”; “Commitment: the Complete Recordings – 1981/1983”; “Muntu Recordings”; and the glorious 6 CD set: “William Parker “Centering. Unreleased Early Recordings 1976-1987”.

The latest addition is a session by the Melodic Art-tet broadcast by Columbia University’s WKCR in October, 1974. The quartet: (on this occasion joined by Tony Waters on percussion) was a relatively stable unit for some four years, although the young Parker had joined in the year of this recording, towards the end of its existence.

The dominant influences at this time were John Coltrane and Albert Ayler (both of whom had passed away relatively recently); and Ornette Coleman (who had not yet gone Harmolodic). Although some musicians had sought to push the “Fire Music” of late Coltrane to an even greater intensity, this was not the only way. As the name suggests, the quartet was more concerned with working out, patiently and carefully, the melodic, harmonic and rhythmic implications of that pioneering body of work, from within the Jazz Tradition. As drummer Roger Blank put it to Wilmer: “I respect what the older musicians have done. I still maintain that in the beauty and glory of all these five or six people coming together on a bandstand, they still have to have a pulse. They still have to breath and relate to that. Like in some parts of the so-called “new music”, in a sense it’s like a monkey throwing paint on the canvas. But it’s an incubator. We have to be able to distinguish between what’s got the pulse and what just palpitates.”

And Blank clearly has the pulse in the opening “Before Heaven and Earth and the World”, with it’s Aylerish marching band theme, supported by his tattoos and springing rhythms, over which Brackeen – who composed all the numbers bar one – is full of smears and splits notes, as he takes the tune apart.  The most obvious lineage is from Coleman’s Atlantic quartet. Blank studied with Ed Blackwell and much of Parker’s work here is clearly indebted to Charlie Haden. Even at this early age, his long-range harmonic patterns and counter-rhythms, which compliment rather than just echo the contours of the theme, are already apparent. Ayler is suggested in Brakeen’s irascible tenor, and some of his and Abdullah’s solos, where they jump between contrasting registers, intermittently quoting fragments of the tune back at themselves.

Of course, comparisons can be facile, even limiting, and jazz is not the only inspiration: “Face of the Deep”, with Parker’s high arco, Brakeen’s mizmar sounding soprano, and Blank’s tom-tom patterns, has a Moroccan tinge to it, and in “My Divine” African rhythms predominate, as the band settle into a blues groove; “With Cheer” is a Caribbean-like tune. In these post-modernist times, we are used to music that seeks a synthesis of influences and cultures – it is perhaps, something of a cliché – but in 1974 this was still newly explored territory. The Art-et deftly integrates these inspirations into its own sound, so that we hear appreciative allusions, rather than citations.

And most importantly, there’s a real joy in the music making, full of telling details. “Redemption/Consecration” opens with Abdullah’s sweet gospel phrases over Brakeen’s warbling soprano and Parker’s languid bowing. There follows a skittish duet between soprano and bass, before the main theme returns, with an urgent and tense trumpet solo; the theme is repeated, dirge-like, avoiding clean unison phrases, before Brakeen takes off on tenor over Parker’s shifting walking bass, followed by a solo from trumpet until the fade out.  

There are times when things meander a little, with an air of uncertainly as to where to go next, or if it’s time to segue into the next tune, but that’s the price to be paid when improvising in this way. Experiments are sometimes inconclusive, but they form part of the process of understanding where the music can be taken; what works and what doesn’t. Freed from the constraints of fixed choruses, other boundaries need to be pushed and measured. The quartet is not aiming for the conclusive, however – particularly in a performance never intended for release – but something that on occasions might be out of reach; which is why this music retains its vitality.  

Can be purchased from instantjazz.com.

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