Rempis/Abrams/Ra - Perihelion (Aerophonic, 2016) ****½

By Lee Rice Epstein

Perihelion is the new album from the trio of Dave Rempis on alto, tenor, and baritone saxophone; Joshua Abrams on bass and clarinet; and Avreeayl Ra on drums and wooden flute. It’s their follow-up to Aphelion, reviewed here by Tom Burris. Yes, it’s a massive double-album of free jazz, but it’s also achingly gorgeous, fierce as hell, and contains some of Rempis’s finest playing on record. In addition to the usual trio, Perihelion adds guest Jim Baker, keyboard and electronics, on the entire second disc. It sounds hyperbolic, but I needed this album in my life, partly as a document of the Chicago scene I never properly took advantage of while living there for 6 years. Living there, first with one newborn, then another, it was impossible to get out to shows. Weird how 6 years flew by, and suddenly we were leaving town knowing we never properly settled in. And now, here comes Perihelion.

The album consists of two live performances. The first is from August 2015, recorded at Elastic Arts. The second is from January 2016, recorded at The Owl. The main difference between the two is the addition of Baker, but both are just super fantastic.

Abrams kicks off “Enceladus” with a brief solo. Rempis joins in a bluesy, soulful mood, carving the suggestion of a melody out of his solo. By the time Ra joins, there’s a shape to the track, and Rempis and Abrams start to turn up the heat. Once the trio is about 5 minutes into “Enceladus,” everyone’s moving, and the pace doesn’t really let up for another 40 minutes. That’s not to say the tempo stays at that speed, but it’s the pace of ideas that doesn’t let up. Abrams is adept at using space and silence to craft evocative lines. There are more shades here than, say, early Ballister albums (although truthfully that band has evolved into something of an oddball cousin to this trio). Rempis really has reached some next-level phase of playing. On disc two, “Cassini Division” and “Pan and Daphnis,” his opening runs combine a full-throated baritone growl with a lyricism that deepens the whole band’s contributions. About 5 minutes into “Cassini Division,” Baker and Abrams perform a fluid duet, accompanied by Ra shading in the space with light cymbal work. Rempis comes back with another soul-infused line that echoes some of Baker’s runs. As on Aphelion, this group plays with almost telepathic interplay. Rempis and Abrams chase each other through a sing-song duet that gradually builds, with Baker joining on high, ringing chords. The album closes with the relatively short “Pan and Daphnis.” Each player gradually slowing their play into long, quiet tones that seem almost like a molasses-slow replay of the track’s early skittering improvisation. Some albums just connect with you in a way you didn’t anticipate, and this was certainly one. Whatever the reason, the band itself or the timing of hearing this, it was just what I needed.

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Dave Rempis & the Aerophonic Download Series

By Paul Acquaro

This year, Chicago-based saxophonist Dave Rempis began a download-only series on his Aerophonic label. While I'm passionately dedicated to the physical medium, the digital releases of side projects, live shows, and the like, is not something I'm complaining about!

Rempis/Johnson/Ochs - Neutral Nation (Aerophonic, 2016) ****

In Spring 2015, Dave Rempis - alto/baritone saxophones, Darren Johnston - trumpet, and Larry Ochs - sopranino/tenor saxophones took the work they began on 2014's Spectral on the road. Neutral Nation documents the tour with a show recorded at the venue Hallwell's in Buffalo, NY. The sound is quite good, capturing the smallest nuances to the full onslaught of reeds and brass.

There is nothing traditional about the work of this trio, the lack of rhythm and harmonic support leaves a big space for their ideas to grow. And grow they do as evidenced by the two long tracks presented here. As 'Pierce Arrow' starts, the intensity of listening and reacting that this trio engages in becomes obvious - snippets will often connect, though sometimes not, friendly dissonances and passionate musical arguments arise, all connecting with a larger musical purpose.

A companion piece to Spectral, Neutral Nation is an excellent reminder of the magic of live playing and pure improvisation, taking their previously recorded concept one step further.

Rempis/Morris/Reid/Baker - Nettles (Aerophonic, 2016) ****

Nettles is a collaboration between Chicagoans Dave Rempis (sax), Tomeka Reid (cello), Jim Baker (piano) and lone New Englander Joe Morris (guitar) and was, according to the Aerophonic website, born from an effort by Morris to become better acquainted with the thriving Chicago scene. A series of concerts organized by Ken Vandermark in the summer of 2013 made this possible, and Nettles is from a show at Elastic Arts from August that year.

The result of this meeting was an ad-hoc group that is quite finely attuned, listening and adjusting to each other, and improvising music that is both fragile and robust. The first track, "White Dead", clocking in at 24 minutes, begins with a series of short airy puffs from Rempis, followed by reserved entrances from Baker, Morris and Reid. The playing grows stronger: a fast run from Morris, a trill from Rempis, scrapes of the string and plucks from Reid, and increasingly longer melodic snippets from Baker. Then it suddenly drops off and the musicians begin to re-establish themselves, first in a lovely ballad between Reid and Baker, then a passage where Morris joins, his melody augmented by the piano and sustained tones from the cello. When Rempis re-enters, it’s a lithe melody that comes to the fore, and again Baker’s piano work is an integral partner. The intensity comes not from volume, but from the intricate combination of tempos, configurations, and evolving motifs.

At times introspective and at other times outgoing, Nettles runs circles around the MBTI. From "White Dead" to the closing "Spotted Dead", this is a captivating recording.

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J@K@L with Michael Attias – Static Adieu (1980 Records, 2016) ****

By Tom Burris

Keefe Jackson (reeds), Julian Kirshner (drums), and Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello, tenor guitar) released a cassette last year called If Honor And Wisdom And Happiness Are Not For Me, Let Them Be For Others. The group has continued working together and is now referring to itself as J@K@L (Jackson@Kirshner@Lonberg-Holm). They have just released a second cassette of a live recording with special guest Michael Attias (alto sax), recorded in Chicago at the Owl in March of this year.

The first side of the cassette (a single track called “Oblivion and Forgetting Always Win in the End” - a title you can trust!) opens with the trio (Attias doesn't appear until Side B) charging out of the gate representing said shared Oblivion. By the 3-minute mark, however, they have gelled into something spectacular, speaking in tongues in praise of something pleasingly unholy. Fred is the guardian of all things electronic and skronk here, running his instruments through multiple effects; and his first challenger is Keefe Jackson's tenor sax. (Here's where the community spirit unravels and the battle commences.) Fred wins, so Keefe grabs his sopranino and immediately the intensity level goes up for the entire band. Fred is eventually driven back to his cello by an honest-to-God SPIT SOLO from Keefe. Jackson is not a good sportsman. He gloats over his victory by playing like a mountain man from Joujouka, bucking and squealing like a possessed Bou Jeloud, while Fred tries to drown him own with cello distortion & Kirshner runs referee. Final assessment: the listener wins.

Side B (@BYG Actuel, since this entire side struck me as an homage to vintage sides of this label) features Mr. Attias and Mr. Jackson frequently blurring the line between soloist/support/collaborative roles, keeping Fred and Julian on their toes throughout. On a section of the title track, Lonberg-Holm manages to play bass, lead, and alien wallpaper sounds simultaneously. Kirshner also takes a sublime drum break, followed by Sonny Sharrock's Monkey–Pockie–Boo band. (The follow-up track, “Acuities,” sounds more like Alan Silva's Luna Surface band. See? Total label tribute thing.) After hearing the first side, I figured the band would use Attias to really up the ante and push it over the cliff (like Dave Burrell's Echo), but nah – Attias' brilliant art of conversation brings about the best of all possible outcomes: communication.

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Trio Red Space - Fields of Flat (Relay Digital, 2016) ****

By Lee Rice Epstein

Fields of Flat is the debut from Trio Red Space, a new trio led by drummer Tim Daisy, featuring Mars Williams on soprano and tenor saxophones and Jeb Bishop on trombone. It’s a brisk album, with 5 tracks clocking in at 29 minutes total, but each song is packed so tightly it hardly matters.

All three are veterans of free jazz, and the album is rich with swirling ideas anchored by Daisy’s compositions. I’ve long admired Daisy’s ability to compose these melodies and counter-melodies that seem to blend a martial, folkish feel with uptempo swing. That’s evident on every track, beginning with “Pro Flowers.” Opening with a Williams solo, the trio come together on the snappy melody before spinning apart in a winding loop of improvisation and restatements of the theme.

In a sense, the album has the feel of the classic Ornette Coleman quartet, reduced even further by eliminating the bass. Bishop is outstanding, as always, leading off “Mind, Space” with a solo that previews the song’s languid explorations. There’s a fleeting theme that bubbles up to the surface throughout, but “Mind, Space” feels more like a reflective mood piece.“Coal Dust” kicks off on a strong martial theme from Bishop, with Daisy doubling on snare and cymbals and Williams soloing hard over top. The trio shifts abruptly into an open improv section, with some excellent playing from Bishop. Towards the end, the theme returns, first with Bishop and Williams doubling over Daisy’s solo, then with all three in unison.

“Fields of Flat” opens with Daisy on radios. Gradually, Williams and Bishop enter with long tones, creating something of a staticky call and response. It’s the shortest track, but taking the album as a whole, it fits nicely in the overall ebb and flow, leading directly to a Daisy solo that starts the album closer, “Onwards.” Daisy’s musicality on the drums makes him one of the best, especially in improvised settings. And his playing on “Onwards” is both powerful and lyrical. He really leans into a heavy swing during Williams and Bishop’s dueling themes, then crashes his way through the improvisations. It’s a thrilling, rumbling closer, with Williams’s saxophone screaming nearly to the end. In the very final 20 seconds, the band quickly drops to near-silence, finishing the album with a brief, gentle fade to close.

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Ken Vandermark's Made to Break Live - Systems vs. Artifacts Extravaganza

Made to Break at the Stone, NYC, January 2016.
Photo by Peter Gannushkin.

By Eyal Hareuveni

Ken Vandermark’s Made to Break quartet is one of his most radical and experimental ensembles ever. Made to Break was founded in 2011 and is a kind of a sound lab that enables Vandermark to play with elements inspired by Ethiopian music - as distilled from his playing with the Dutch group The Ex and the late Ethiopian sax player Gétatchèw Mèkurya, ideas drawn of New Music, as explored by iconoclast composers as John Cage and Morton Feldman. And, obviously, mixing these elements with his inclusive, forward-thinking perspective of modern jazz and free improvised music.

The unique instrumentation of the quartet - Vandermark on tenor and baritone saxes and clarinet; Austrian Christof Kurzmann, who began to collaborate with Vandermark on his project, El Infierno Musical (El Infierno Musical. A Tribute To Alejandra Pizarnik, Mikroton, 2011), on the ppooll audio software; fellow Chicagoan drummer Tim Daisy, who collaborates steadily with Vandermark since the days of the seminal Vandermark 5 and later with the many other outfits, including the Resonance Ensemble and Audio One groups; and the newest addition to the quartet, Dutch electric bass player Jasper Stadhouders, who joined the quartet in April 2014 (replacing original bass player Devin Hoff who played on the quartet first three releases) - as well as the singular personalities of all four musicians and their diverse approaches, offer Vandermark almost infinite opportunities to explore new textures with each composition and every performance.

The accumulative, diverse experiences of these four musicians guarantees the constant, risk-taking evolution of its sonic envelope. Kurzmann played alto saxophone and clarinet before he switched to electronics, focusing on exploring a highly personal and expressive approach of playing electronics. Stadhouders is also a guitarist, known from the explosive free jazz trio Cactus Truck or the more eclectic pan-European quintet Spinifex, and Daisy often blends contemporary perspectives in his composed, electro-acoustic works. With such resourceful musicians, Vandermark can construct and reconstruct his compositions with changing elements of melody, sound and groove-based rhythms as an ever-evolving works-in-progress on every performance of the quartet.

The following three live albums, released on Vandermark's 'Systems vs. Artifacts' imprint of his Audiographic label, document the versatile spirit of this quartet and its rich language during its November 2014 European tour.

Made to Break - Before the Code: Live (Audiographic Records, 2016) ****½

The first live recording is from one of Vandermark’s favorite European clubs, Klub Dragon in Poznan, Poland, captured on from November 5, 2014, the second date of Made to Break at the club and about a week before the quartet recorded its fourth album, Before the Code (Trost, 2015). This recording features the same sequence of compositions prepared for the recording session but in radical alternate realizations.

The opening piece, “Dial The Number” (dedicated to the Belgian-French director Agnès Varda), already establishes the integral role of Kurzmann within the multifaceted, driving rhythmic sensibility of the quartet. His commanding and inventive use of an electronics-based language charges Made to Break's interplay with a built-in dimension of tension, surprise, and danger. He interferes, expands, and challenges ideas about melody, linear structure, sonic cohesion, and pulse. Kurzmann's contribution intensifies the ongoing, powerful commotion to steer the collective, rhythmic groove to more abstract searches. The more lyrical “Off-Picture No. 119” (dedicated to the Copenhagen-based, British-American director Joshua Oppenheimer), combined with the dramatic progression of “Windows Breaking Hammer” (dedicated to German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder), stresses both the immediate manner that Vandermark, Stadhouders and Daisy can adapt and incorporate any of Kurzmann's ideas, as the anarchist, twisted-accordion sounds or the Sun Ra-tinged wild, atmospheric flights, into their strong, groove-based ride. Made to Break finishes this intense set with the short, sketchy encore “Dragon Improvisation”.

Made to Break - N N N (Audiographic Records, 2016) *****

The second live installment was recorded at the Martinschlössl in Vienna, Austria on November 13, 2014, right after the Made to Break finished the recording session of Before the Code (Trost, 2015) at the Amman Studios. The quartet sounds energetic, buzzing with adrenaline and excitement from the successful recording, playing expansive and powerful interpretations of old compositions in entirely different combinations than those explored before.

The opening, 35-minutes of “Before and After” (dedicated to American photographer Lee Miller) features Vandermark and Kurzmann, with an imaginative reeds-tinged sound, exchanging solos. Their different languages often blend into one dense and rich sonic unity, resonating and deepening each other articulations even in the most abstract, searching and lyrical segments, as if both were engaged in a kind of fast, busy talk. “Off-Picture No. 119” is interpreted this time in a loose rhythmic approach that highlights the clever and dynamic interplay of Stadhouders and Daisy.

The slow-cooking “For and Against” (dedicated to American minimalist artist Carl Andre) is introduced by a brilliant, extended solo bass of Stadhouders that cements the piece rhythmic spirit, later joined by Daisy, Kurzmann, and Vandermark, that keeps intensifying Stadhouder's leading role. A short free-improvised piece introduces Made to Break closing piece, the 30-minutes explosive and most radical “That Life” (dedicated to German dada sound poet Kurt Schwitters). Vandermark plays in a his most fiery, free jazz mode, colliding again and again with the subversive, otherworldly blows and noises of Kurzmann, both enjoy the massive yet playful rhythmic drive of Stadhouders and Daisy.
    

Made to Break - Dispatch to the Sea (Audiographic Records, 2016) ****½

The third live installment was recorded on the eleventh stop of this packed tour at Het Stadsmagazijn in Antwerp, Belgium on November 18, 2014, four days before the tour ended. On this later date the quartet incorporates elements from compositions written for Cherchez la femme (Trost, 2014) to newer pièces.

The opening piece, “Waiting Waiting” (dedicated to Belgian director Chantal Akerman), settles immediately on a muscular funky pulse, but soon is spiraled to distant sonic universes with Kurzmann wild electronics. Stadhouders cements the throbbing pulse of this piece with his fat bass lines throughout its many shifts and extended solo parts. The following 29-minutes of “A Cacophony Of Words” (dedicated to American novelist William Gaddis) highlights the unique interplay between Vandermark and Kurzmann. Surprisingly, their interaction is quite physical given that Kurzmann plays only on a laptop, often a confrontational one, sometimes Kurzmann even takes the subversive role of  deconstructing the loose architecture of this piece and suggesting a futuristic one. This set is concluded with “Off-Picture No. 119”, that was already featured in both previous live installments. This time the interpretation emphasizes the flexible rhythmic sensibility of all four musicians, as a tight, collective and as resourceful soloists.  

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Sounds from Chicago

Over the past year (or more) Chicago has been coming to me. Let's arbitrarily pick a date to begin: January 2016 kicked off with saxophonist Ken Vandermark's week long residency at the Stone. It was a brilliant one, with performances by many of his collaborations, including Made to Break and the duos with Paal Nilssen-Love and Nate Wooley. This was followed by the residency of ex-Chicagoan Matana Roberts, who played at least one set with current Chicagoan Tomeka Reid. Then there were sets by Jason Stein at Downtown Music Gallery, Rye in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and Madison Square Garden, of course.

I had my mind-boggled at a Revolution Arts show featuring Dave Rempis and then there was Tim Daisy on the ground at IBeam last Fall. Just last week Ken Vandermark and The Few were playing in Williamsburg, and I am positive that there are a whole bunch of other shows I am forgetting, and then, all the ones I wasn't aware of.

So, this week the Free Jazz Blog would like to bring a little Chicago to you: a week of reviews connected by the people and spirit that permeates the musicians from the Jewel of the Midwest.

We kick off this week with Eyal Hareuveni's review of three new Made to Break albums, released on Ken Vandermark's new download imprint "Systems vs. Artifacts" at Audiographic records.

- Paul

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Naftule's Dream - Blood (Naftule's Dream Recordings, 2016) ***

By Lee Rice Epstein


It’s been about 15 years since Naftule’s Dream’s last studio album, and that’s been long enough, if not too long. The band was an early contributor to Zorn’s Radical Jewish Culture Series on Tzadik, and they’ve always played an impressively lean take on modern klezmer, keeping to a small lineup that zips through genres a la Naked City. The current band is Glenn Dickson (clarinet), Michael McLaughlin (accordion), Andrew Stern (guitar), Gary Bohan (trumpet, cornet, and flugelhorn), Jim Gray (tuba), and Eric Rosenthal (drums).

Blood opens with an insistent ride against a patient, almost half-tempo melody. The title, “Sitting in Some Train Watching the Tuscan Landscape Go Speeding Backward,” sets the mood exactly; it’s a relaxed throat-clearing, the gentlest of reminders before the band returns in full force. “Aby Kirly the War Hero” showcases a classic klezmer style, with Bohan singing the lead on cornet, over a hot, swinging rhythm section. “Calabria” opens with Gray’s loping tuba groove backed by subtle effects from Stern and the gentlest of pulses from Rosenthal. Gradually, McLaughlin’s asynchronous accordion solo gets layered over these simmering ambient textures, creating a tense, urgent mood.

“Boss Shabbos” is the likely standout. Setting swing against klezmer against free improv, each section shaded with technical beauty, this is exactly what made Naftule’s Dream such a natural fit for Tzadik. After a swinging opening, the band opens up the middle section for a McLaughlin and Bohan duet, blending melancholic accordion and a lovely cornet solo, both of which melt into a final, jagged free section that slowly fades away. “Turkisher” features some of Dickson’s finest playing on the album. He takes a long solo early in the song, leaping through octaves and runs. He’s followed by a brief, but welcome, drum solo, with Rosenthal eventually leading the band into a rough-edged, rousing finale. “In Search of Her Lullaby,” the gentle closer, serves as the counterpart to “Sitting In a Train…” The two create a kind of curtain-opening, curtain-closing effect.

Blood is certainly a welcome return. I just hope it’s not another 15 years before we get the next album.

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Porta Palace Collective - Neuroplastic Groove (Rudi Records, 2016) ****

By Derek Stone

In 2014, Porta Palace Collective released their exhilarating, inventive debut. Their newest, Neuroplastic Groove, expands both the number of players and their breadth-of-vision, resulting in a dynamic release that is sure to garner new fans. The central quintet of the Porta Palace Collective consists of Johnny Lapio on trumpet, Giuseppe Ricupero on tenor saxophone, Lino Mei on the Fender Rhodes, Gianmaria Ferrario on double bass, and Lilly Santon doing vocal work. Here, the Collective is filled out with the extraordinary Satoko Fujii on piano, Giancarlo Schiaffini on trombone, Jimmy Weinstein working the drums, and Natsuki Tamura on trumpet and, well, toys. As you can see, it’s a big group, and there are a lot of opportunities for things to get cluttered and overly-complex, but the Collective (under the direction of Schiaffini) toe the line perfectly between composition and all-out improvisation.

Take “Fantasy,” which starts as a drunken rush of big-band theatrics, but quickly unspools into a hectic, multi-layered dash, led by Ferrario’s precise bass. Each instrument seems to come at you from a different, unexpected angle, and it gives you the feeling of making your way through a loquacious crowd of strangers, all of whom are chatting in a language you can’t quite understand. It’s inexplicably comical, but nonetheless exciting. “Micro Texture and Low Cluster” stays true to its title, delivering a blend of acerbic trumpet-work, rasping murmurs from the reeds, and rumbling bass-work. Overlaid atop this tonal mass is Fujii’s relatively straightforward piano and Weinstein’s rolling percussion, which both work to tie the textures together and give them shape. Lilly Santon is a delightful addition to the group: she illustrates her range on “Leaders” - moving from operatic arias to scat to spoken-word to hushed undertones that, frankly, make my hairs stand up, she injects the Collective with a dose of theatricality. On that same piece, by the way, you can finally hear the sound of Tamura’s squeeze toys. I won’t say that they’re my new favorite instrument in jazz, but the fact that Tamura makes them fit at all is a testament to his ability.

The final composition, “Come Se Fosse Autunno,” pulls all of the best elements of the Porta Palace Collective together into one package. You’ve got Lino Mei’s funky, kaleidoscopic Fender Rhodes, the vocals, the excellent blend of bar-room blues with manic free-form explorations, and even a percussion solo! On the whole, Neuroplastic Groove is a synthesis of various musical traditions and styles, but it never devolves into mere facsimile; in fact, as the title of the album suggests, the Porta Palace Collective have produced a collection of music showing that jazz, just like the human brain itself, can always form new connections, new pathways to parts of the musical spectrum that might have been assumed too distant to access. A great recording, and highly recommended!

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Jean-Marc Foussat w/Joao Camoes and Marialuisa Capurso

João Camões & Jean-Marc Foussat - À La Face Du Ciel ‎(Shhpuma, 2016) ****
Marialuisa Capurso & Jean-Marc Foussat – En Respirant (Fou, 2016) ***½

By Dan Sorrells

Playing in a duo with electronics shaman Jean-Marc Foussat must be like discovering what instrument your partner plays the moment the curtain rises—and perhaps more disturbingly, discovering minute to minute that it’s a number of instruments you’ve ever encountered before. Two recent duo recordings are as much about how traditional instruments respond to the frenetic, protean realm of electronics and synthesizers as about the power Foussat wields with such devices. À La Face Du Ciel pairs Foussat with Portuguese violist João Camões, while En Respirant is a duet with Italian singer and fellow electronicist Marialuisa Capurso.

It’s tempting to view Foussat as the dominant force on À La Face Du Ciel, with Camões playing defense. This may be misleading however, if only because discerning when Foussat is being pro- or reactive is far from straightforward, and the unflappable Camões sounds as self-possessed in responding as he does when he takes the lead. Earlier this year, I reviewed Bien Mental, the trio of Foussat, Camões, and Claude Parle. There, Parle’s sweeping accordion drones were the cohesive, binding element. Here, that role falls to Camões, as it is often difficult to follow everything Foussat is doing in detail. There’s an arc to each of the two pieces that’s drawn by the familiar timbre of Camões’ viola, an earthy, grounding force in a music that is otherwise extraterrestrial, interstellar.

“Suite Pour La Trosième Oreille” gets off to an abrasive start, and it’s unclear whether Camões is amplifying his viola, Foussat is manipulating it, or a mixture of the two. What’s immediately apparent is how near-sounding the recording is. Listening through headphones lends the impression of a concert from within—less that you’re in an aural space than your skull is the space. (“Do you hear that sound?” Daniel Higgs once asked. “Your resonating skull sound—the sweetly humming skull tone.”) It’s a fitting illusion for music that’s linear but constantly shifting, like the endless turns and warps of thought itself.

As always, I’m amazed at the sheer variety of effects Foussat produces. “Suite Pour La Trosième Oreille” eventually shifts into the rasp and buzz of a robotic cicada swarm. “Mécanique Verte” is oceanic, with Camões’ plinking pizzicato notes splashing in Foussat’s watery sampling. But what Foussat tosses into the mix never sounds like some jumbled grab-bag; it truly seems he has an encyclopedic knowledge of every strange timbre available to him, and chooses exactly the sound he intends for each moment. Camões often counters with lyrical, punctuated remarks, poking holes in Foussat’s enveloping sound. Still, in one rather disconcerting moment towards the end of the record, it sounds like Camões simply evaporates into computer bleeps and bloops, finally succumbing to the digital onslaught.

En Respirant is more programmatic, briskly changing ideas and approaches. The music here is about subverting—even destroying—some of our most strongly-held aural associations by playing with the human voice, which by the very wiring of our brains we can never fail to address. Both Foussat and Capurso use their voices as fuel for their electronics, distorting them beyond all recognition but periodically revealing flashes of the human source. Paradoxically, this allows some of the most conventional moments to be the most powerful – towards the end of “Osmosis,” after a thorough deconstruction of anything resembling humanity, the sound drops away to Foussat’s electronic shimmer, and Capurso enters with a simple, hymnal melody, vocal loops slowly breaking away and diverging in a haunting canon.

“Purple Future” playfully contrasts Capurso’s voicings with those of seagulls, something that sounds ridiculous, but feels logical in the psychedelic swirl the two have conjured. The track moves from trippy to soothing to rather menacing while preserving many of the same elements. By adding and subtracting sounds, the context of others is rebuilt on the fly: nighttime insects change in a moment from summertime soundtrack to rapidly encroaching swarm.

Both À La Face Du Ciel and En Respirant document fascinating strategies for dealing with the “problem” of Foussat: Camões, by using virtuosity and ingenuity to confront him on the viola’s terms; Capurso, by blending into the electronic wash and addressing his challenges from the inside out.

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Thomas Borgmann Trio: One for Cisco (NoBusiness, 2016) ****

By Martin Schray

Saxophonist Thomas Borgmann is a German free jazz veteran, though rather underrated. He’s been on the scene since the early Eighties, and played in a number of bands, such as Boom Box (with Akira Ando and Willi Kellers), BMN (with Wilber Morris and Reggie Nicholson), BMC (with Wilber Morris and Denis Charles), and trios with Borah Bergman and Peter Brötzmann. His most prominent band is Ruf der Heimat, a quartet with Willi Kellers, Luten Petrowsky and Christoph Winckels. There have been some wonderful albums – try Nasty and Sweet and Live in Poland – but he‘s had not played in the US since the turn of the century.

Here, Cisco Bradley comes into play. Bradley, a newly tenured history professor at Pratt Institute in New York, has been running a blog called Jazzrightnow, focused on the Brooklyn improv scene. He's also been organizing a series of house concerts -- New Revolution Arts. In 2015, Bradley invited Borgmann, long-time colleague Willi Kellers (who’d never played in the US) and New York based bassist Max Johnson, and set up a handful of gigs as well as a sax festival at the I-Beam, at which this album was recorded.

One for Cisco is a beautiful album. However, not all free jazz fans rate Borgmann. After a Ruf der Heimat concert the person next to me complained that he had no voice of his own. I don’t agree. His sound is the sum of many styles, integrating different voices to produce a distinct musical personality.

One for Cisco is an excellent example of this. At the beginning of the set Borgmann plays a very romantic solo, a slow blues, vibrato laden, reminiscent of great saxophonists like Ben Webster or Coleman Hawkins. He‘s supported by Johnson’s bass lines and dead-on harmonics while Kellers drives the piece forward. In a barely noticeable fashion, Borgmann shifts the mood with bebop lines so that the rhythm section can move away from the groove - a classic Ayler moment –  a propulsive and beautiful free saxophone trio at work.

After a short interruption by a drum solo the band plays another blues melody - melancholic, dramatic, again fully aware of jazz history. At the end of the A side Borgmann uses the soprano and the music gets bumpier and more angular. There‘s then a toy melodica to take us over to the B side, and a simple folk ditty. Kellers strokes his cymbals like wind chimes, echoed by Johnson's a bowed, gentle melody. Here Kellers steers the track in a different direction with a pulsating tom-tom beat to which Johnson replies with dark, scratched lines. Borgmann joins in with a mild-mannered tenor, typical of his understated manner. The trio accelerates, but with a light-footed tone, even when they move into more extreme fields. Borgmann makes sure that there’s always a melody below the free outbreaks, deep down he‘s a great balladeer and the others let him have his way.

Borgmann may not have a prominent signature like Evan Parker or John Butcher, nor is he an iconoclast like Peter Brötzmann, but he has a mature and rich vocabulary. One for Cisco is nice and old-fashioned (in a positive way) and should convince the skeptics.

The album is available as an LP in a limited edition of 300.

You can buy it from there label www.nobusinessrecords.com.

You can watch an excerpt of the concert here:

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