It seems every year there is at least one piano trio album that upends and
reinvents one of the oldest formats in the genre. In this case, it’s not
quite a trio, as the first transformational move made by drummer, composer
and bandleader Dan Weiss is to add a second bass player. But the result is
much more than the sum of its players, as Weiss and pianist Jacob Sacks are
joined by bassists Thomas Morgan and Eivind Opsvik together and separately,
the four together drawing on some of Weiss’s finest compositions to date.
Much was made, rightfully, of Weiss’s Starebaby, a fantastic album
of metal-jazz with a band I was lucky to see live at the Angel City Jazz
Fest a couple of years ago.
That band delighted several of u
s
and has apparently recorded its follow-up album. In the interim, however,
Weiss returned to one of his earliest groups, a trio with Sacks and Morgan.
And the group jumps right into the deep end with the nearly 20-minute-long
title track. The liner notes describes the subtle, gradual shifts of “Utica
Box” as “a la Morton Feldman,” but this is texturally different from
Tyshawn Sorey’s Feldmanian
piano tri
o
. In Weiss’s hands, texture rhythm, and melody warp in unpredictable ways.
In the opening minutes, the trio plus one balances Sacks’s piano with a
loping, hypnotic beat. The combination sounds like a backing track
custom-made for producer and rapper RZA. Later, when Weiss shifts into a
hip-hop/EDM-inspired rhythm, it’s Sacks who restrains the group,
maintaining a brilliant combination of timbre and tempo, as
the meta-commentary of the titl
e
provides a framework for Weiss, Sacks, Morgan, and Opsvik to meditate on a
seemingly linear melody from prismatic angles.
The album features three of these lengthier songs, “Utica Box” at the
start, “Orange” at its center, and “Bonham” as the closer. In a number of
ways, each one of these showcases Sacks’s mutability. He’s become one of
the foremost players, with an ability to push himself to remarkable limits.
Around the midpoint of “Orange,” he takes a 180-degree dynamic pivot that
opens the door wide for Morgan’s excellent solo. Separating each of these
extended tracks are relatively short excursions, “Jamerson,” “Rock and
Heat,” “Please Don’t Leave,” and “Last Time One More Time.”
“Last Time One More Time” is one of the more contemplative and evocative
songs on the album. The title, inspired by Weiss’s daughter, was,
interestingly, one of his large-ensemble compositions, reconfigured for
this quartet. I haven’t heard the other arrangement, but this appears to
have been completely overhauled, as it fits the two-bass voicing
beautifully. Morgan previously performed on David Virelles’s superb Mbókò, in a double-bass quintet with Robert Hurst, but he comes at
Weiss’s music from a completely different angle, and his duet with Opsvik
on “Last Time One More Time” is wonderful.
Throughout, I was repeatedly reminded of the album’s cover art, where an
outline of an orange contrasts with orange paint in the shape of a pear.
However Weiss does it (and it is an amazing feat), his music lives in a
binomial space, each half provided equal room to breathe and stretch, or
else both sides fold together into something like an orangear or pearnge.
It was only a matter of time for this group, with Mary Halv orson and Tim Berne, to happen. Before they all appeared on Formanek'sEnsemble Kolossus release, they'd had their fingers in each other's recorded pies. Formanek and Berne have worked since Bloodcount in the 90s, and the bassist and Halvorson make up two thirds of Thumbscrew. Berne has worked in small groups with Bill Frisell, Nels Cline and Marc Ducret so the genre bending Mary should be an intriguing guitar foil for his insistently probing syncopated lines. Also it's almost impossible to imagine their paths having never crossed in venues like The Stone or at festivals. So clearing busy schedules with other working groups led to this.
I was fully expecting to like this just fine for an initial statement from three musicians I enjoy, while still wanting it to have the more-than-the-sum-of-the-parts synergy that comes from extended interplay as a working group. This disc is truly Even Better than that; a fully mature sounding statement as a collective entity. Formanek composed all the pieces, except for Scott LaFaro's "Jade Visions" closing cut, surely with knowledge of how the lines would sound as played by the other two. And how each has the ability to maintain the rhythm in a drumless trio giving free rein for the others to venture hither and yon while veering away from a chaotic mess.
Things get off to a rousing start on "Suckerpunch" with Formanek and Halvorson playing a stop and go syncopated uptempo line before Berne enters with a slower counter melody which Mary joins up with before they go their separate ways, none stating the original motif but not straying completely away from it either, before ending it with a satisfying return. "Two Pillars" might refer to the saxophonist and guitarist framing the opening with parallel long tones. Berne has long had a haunting tone effectively employed on slower tempos and in this setting it's nicely augmented by the guitar through parallel fragile clear notes, or smeared with delays or shimmering reverb laden chords.
But kudos to the nominal leader (there's no "apostrophe s" as his group, per se, but he's obviously top billed) for these compositions enabling a blending of distinct talents while ebulliently holding up his end on bass. I've been a fan of Formanek for around thirty years but lately he seems to have reached a new plateau. In the last year and a half I saw him with Thumbscrew and a duet with his son, Peter; in both settings his bass was more aggressively out front, in a good way, than I'd previously recalled. But seeing the Elusion Quartet with Tony Malaby, Kris Davis and Ches Smith, where they transformed the compositions on their disc into something different and better, was the real stunner. Hopefully the Very Practical Trio can find time to tour and try to do something similar to this already very enjoyable release.
Ghosts was truly a welcome surprise. I have been following the Dutch duo Dead Neanderthals for years now. The band’s core, Otto Kokke on sax and René Aquarius on drums, has remained constant in personnel, but has transformed the project from a spazzy, blow-until-your-eyes burst act to a group focused on long, intense siren-sounds overlaying a steady, thudding percussive rhythms. The intensity is still there, but it is more focused than on their earlier efforts.
This transformation has taken place incrementally over the a few years and many releases. Some, such as the pivotal Body Horror and Polaris (both released by Utech in 2013), grabbed me right away. Much of the band’s work in between those releases and this one, however, has seemed like a study of extended tones and drum repetitions, sometimes in collaboration with other musicians (Nick Millevoi, Colin Webster, others). Although some of these albums really work (such as Worship the Sun), many give the impression that these guys have a big vision that they are searching for but have not yet realized. Ghosts might be that realization.
The two tracks on Ghosts, aptly titled “Bone Hill” and “Death Bell” deploy many of the same ideas as the band’s earlier releases. There are loud and tempestuous. It is often difficult to figure out if Kokke or Aquarius provides the propulsion. Both, members of the group, however, are slightly more restrained than on previous efforts. This is not quite the free blow-grindcore hybrid characteristic of Kokke’s and Aquarius’ early work. Instead, it is relentless, almost punitively so, but measured. It peaks just a few seconds into the first track, then transforms that peak into a panicked plateau.
Ghosts also sounds fuller than a lot Dead Neanderthals’ earlier work. Some of this is a result simply of better recording and mixing (cheers to Martin Wolterink) that abandons some of the punk-rock (or maybe Arthur Doyle?) ethos that fed the band’s first few EP’s. Much, however, also comes from the addition of Scott Hedrick on guitars and keys. Although the music here is that much more propulsive, that much more inspired than some of the digital-only releases that paved the way to it, it also has that much more sonic density. And that density makes it not just heavy, but also bright. Eerily, almost terrifyingly bright, but stunning nonetheless. Ghosts is available on digital and LP, accompanied by some beautiful, surrealist digital collage artwork by Pierre Schmidt.
New trio albums with French master of the double bass Joëlle Léandre, one with a new trio and another with a working one.
Robert Dick / Joëlle Léandre/ Miya Masaoka - Solar Wind (Not Two, 2019)
****½
Three master improvisers in their first ever recording session - New
York-based flutist Robert Dick and koto player Miya Masaoka, who also plays
assorted percussion instruments, and French Léandre, who also
vocalizes-sings, recorded on September 2018 in New York. The 12 collective,
acoustic free-improvisation stress the urgent passion of Dick, Léandre and
Masaoka to search for new timbres and voices, resisting to follow familiar
strategies and dynamics, until it is almost impossible to identify
instruments and their players. Still, this ad-hoc trio succeeds to sound
like a seasoned, working trio that has found its very own aesthetics.
Some of the concise pieces sound as if the draw inspiration from
extraterrestrial winds and ancient journeys as the first “Whispering of the
Stars”, where the trio acts like they are communicating with friendly aliens. But this
atmosphere soon changes on “Speed of Silence” when Dick explodes-vocalizes
through his flutes - glissando, bass and contrabass, while Léandre and
Masaoka intensify the stormy-chaotic vein. Léandre’s low-end bowing on
“Chronotype” and “How Old Is Your Shadow?” trigger like-minded sounds from
Dick and Masaoka’s bowed koto, solidifying the cryptic spirit of this
piece. You can marvel at the delicate, magical interplay of this trio on
the exotic, last piece “Adiabatic”.
Australian, New York-based pianist Marc Hannaford who contributed liner
notes to Solar Wind writes about the paradox of “attributing agency and
intention in spite of my inability to tell which musician is making which
sound. Furthermore, this paradox of disembodied-yet tangential interaction
emerges from lucidity rich musical textures in which textures sound
overlap, interfere, evade and encircle each other, rather than extreme
textural density. This recording reveals the lush, playful beauty of this
paradox”. And indeed, with each listening you may decipher another
enigmatic element from the imaginative, microtonal sonic universes that
Dick, Léandre and Masaoka construct and deconstruct instantly and
constantly, alone and together.
Tiger Trio - Map of Liberation (Rogue Art, 2019) ****
Another trio of master improvisers that features Léandre with pianist Myra Melford and flutist Nicole
Mitchell. The Tiger Trio,
titled after a saying of Orson Wells who boasted that he had “the great
honor of swimming in the company of a tiger”, gravitates towards dense,
free jazz textures than the abstract, extraterrestrial flights of the trio
of Dick, Léandre and Masaoka trio. Map of Liberation is the sophomore album
of this trio, following Unleashed (Rogue Art, 2016), recorded live over two
days at a gallery in 19 rue Paul Fort, Paris, and at Festival Jazzdor,
Strasbourg, both in France on November 2018.
The 11 free-improvised, acoustic pieces are titled as Buddhist virtues but
by no means call for passive, quiet meditation, more like a deep dive with
a hyperactive tiger. These pieces stand for a total commitment for the art
of free-improv, for passionate, poetic fury and the urge to be one with
one’s instrument and fully aware of the moment. But this trio also
expresses a profound - spiritual and emotional - need to to search for new
ways to confront one’s instrument and find in it new sounds and meaning,
alone and together.
You can feel how this trio suggests the right kind of “Courage”- as one of
the pieces is titled, for Mitchell, Léandre and Melford to abandon familiar
modes; to enjoy, playful “Compassion, as another piece is titled; or
experiment with troubling “Reflection” of the self and contemplate, in a
quite loud manner, the concept of “Emptiness”, or in reserved, thoughtful
manner the meaning of “Steadfastness”. All as a tight trio that has
explored its very own “forest of sounds liberated by the instrumentalists”
- to quote French journalist Fançois-René Simon who wrote the liner notes -
and has found its balanced communion. Now you can understand why the last
three pieces answer to the titles “Respect”, “Humility” and “Honesty”.
There’s a question once posed by John Cage that seems to invite an expanding variety of answers, something about what’s more musical, a truck driving by a factory or a truck driving by a music school.
Percussionist Zlatko Kaučič’s quintet adds another environment to the mix, a church, and has musicians standing in for other elements: bassist Silvia Bolognesi and three reed players: Michael Moore on alto saxophone and clarinet; Michael Colonna on clarinet and bass clarinet; and Albert Cirera on tenor saxophone. “All music is by” assigns the work to the five musicians, usually a sure mark of collective improvisation, though the music has qualities of thoroughness, reflection and inevitability that suggest it might all be notated and then rehearsed until it sounds completely natural. It often invites a long, slow inhalation followed by a similar exhalation.
The music is profoundly grounded, even to the extent that Kaučič lists his instruments as “ground sounds,” his various percussion instruments, some unidentifiable, laid on the floor of St. Martin's Church, in Šmartno, Slovenia. He’s a discreet presence, almost spirit-like, often making discrete sounds, isolated flurries, taps, rattles, brushes and cymbal sounds. His initial contribution to the sublime “September” sounds like off-hand knife sharpening. His duet with Bolognesi on “Mlaj” hovers between the invisible, the accidental and the sublime.
About that music school? Moore, Bolognesi and Colonna are all skilled free improvisers, highly inventive, disciplined musicians whose sonorities, intonation, evenness and attention to details of dynamics and inflection would delight an academician (at least one open to free improvisation in a church). The abilities to develop continuous and evolving form are at the highest level, and it’s a performance that in 1960 would have stunned Jimmy Giuffre and George Russell, two of the finest minds in jazz history and pressing, by degrees, towards a similar art, whether improvised or composed.
Albert Cirera? His presence, too, is sometimes discreet. He supplies concordant melody, rhythmic force and lightly overblown tones to the collective, including some that sound flute-like. He’s also capable of great subtlety, but when the three winds dance around one another with repeated rhythmic figures on the brief “Jutranja,” his contributions are the honks. On “Strehe” his feature amid Kaučič’s rattling metal, he’s playing hard-edged multiphonics—dissonant, industrial--with something rattling, likely foil or metal, on the bell of his horn. He follows with a high whistling line broken by occasional low-end rhythmic blasts. Coming to the fore, he’s the truck driving by the music school, the debris of an exploded factory falling on music school and church alike.
While the others play musical instruments, Cirera plays an irrepressible noise machine. It’s the element raising this music from perfection to something really great.
This review was long in the making, so I'll shorten it with some very high level appreciations about new solo cello albums.
Séverine Ballon - Inconnaissance (All That Dust, 2018) ****
We met French cellist Séverine Ballon already in 2011 for a review of her duo with Vincent Royer, performing music by Giacinto Scelsi. On this album, she presents her first solo work with own compositions. Despite her nationality, she studied cello with Joseph Schwab at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin and with Troels Svane at the Musikhochschule in Lübeck.
"Inconnaissance" is a real treat. Ballon dares go beyond tradition, and her courage takes her to areas of high musical risk, not by the complexity of the material, but by the explorations of sound, and their possible rejection by the audience. This makes her music not the most accessible, yet the active listening effort is really worth it. Her tone is raw at times, with double stops, high pitched flageolet sounds, multiphonics, scrapings and other inventive use of the complete instrument. Ballon has clearly left even contemporary classical music well behind her. Her CV mentions that she "is currently working on developing extended techniques for her instrument and finding appropriate notation". But it is more than just the instrument, as the liner notes write: "Everything is put under a microscope, allowing for sounds to be dissected and obsessed over. Variation comes through bowing techniques: Ballon is fascinated by the sounds that emerge before and after a 'normal' sound, as if defracting, refracting or diffusing light."
And it is even more than technique and sound resonance. It is also about the music, about the value of harmonies, about dissonance, about tension and playing with silence and volume.
Ballon's music has character, it has power, not because of its volume or physicality, but in its sensitive energy (the French would say "ça a de la gueule", but this sounds to irrespectful in this context), in its attitude of take-it-or-leave-it. It takes courage to go there.
Recorded 27-28 January 2018 at City, University of London
Lori Goldston - The Passion of Joan of Arc (Substrata, 2019) ***
American cellist Lori Goldston is comfortable to perform in any style, and she has done so, from classical to jazz, from performing with Chinese and Turkish orchestras to Nirvana, just to illustrate the breadth of her skills and also of the influences in her music.
On "The Passion of Joan of Arc" she gives an interpretation of possible film music of the silent movie by Carl Thedor Dreyer of the same name. For those who don't know, Joan of Arc is the real historical figure who fought for the French against the English in the Hundred Years War. She was eventually captured by a group of French nobles who fought with the English and burned at the stake.
Goldston's music is slow and reverent, and her cello played without extended techniques (she is not Okkyung Lee). She is accompanied by Aidan Baker on electric guitar and Andrea Belfi on drums and percussion. Both guest musicians offer sparse touches to her melancholy sound, adding dramatic effects and contrasts.
The album presents thirteen movements, for what could easily be described as one long suite, resulting in a very coherent whole, but with limited variation. It is only on a few of the pieces that she goes beyond her usual sound.
The performance was recorded in the Christuskirche in Bochum, Germany.
Lori Goldston - Things Opening (Second Editions, 2019) ***½
She shows a broader sense of variation on her recent "Things Opening". The album is less ambitious, more intimate and possibly better. Even if the playing is very contained - this is modern classical music after all - there are moments when she colors outside of the lines, both pizzi and arco, which is welcome to hear. On the A-side of the album she performs her own compositions/improvisations and on the B-side the music is composed by other artists: Jessika Kenney, Satchel Henneman and Julio Lopezhiler respectively. Kenney's piece is an interpretation of the muslim Call to Prayer, and interesting to hear the classical instrument absorb and work with Arabic sounds.
This album gives a better perspective on her skills as a cellist.
Goldston finds a like-minded cellist in Australian Judith Hamann, who perform two long improvisations on "Alloys". As its title suggest, they melt several metals together to form a new one.
This album is very slow, very dark and meditative. The two 26 -minute pieces evolve suite-like with changing names: "Silver, Amalgam, Mother Of Pearl, Felt, A Thin Piece Of Whale Bone" for the first track and "Carbon, Sitka, Rabbit Hide, Solder, Matter Attacking The Body". Both musicians dig deep into their instruments and souls to find a mesmerising and slowly shifting piece of art, exploring the full sound of their instruments. Even if its minimalistic approach lacks the energy and nervous agitation of free improvisation, I'm sure avant-garde lovers and cello lovers will find their interest here.
Maja Bugge is a Norwegian cellist, composer and teacher. "No Exit" presents a solo performance in the Standedge Canal Tunnel as part of Marsden Jazz Festival 2017. The tunnel is the longest of its kind in the UK, stretching for three and a half miles underneath the Pennines.
Bugge is a fan of the dialogue between instrument and the surroundings. Even if this does sound like a John Butcher concept, the music is not so. Bugge's compositions and improvisations are calm, precise, carefully performed with the occasional hint at a theme and the occasional exploration outside the known boundaries.
Obviously, this kind of music should also be experienced in the setting for which it was conceived to better understand the dynamics. The video below will give some idea about this.
Francesco Guerri - Su Mimmi Non Si Spara! (Rare Noise, 2019)
Italian cellist Francesco Guerri's album is presented as "contemporary jazz", which it isn't. Guerri is a wonderful cellist, with a very pure tone and broad range of capabilities on his instrument, and I guess that's also the weakness of this album. Guerri has composed all the music on the album, and he is very keen to demonstrate his skills, resulting in too much variety to be coherent. The title track is almost a classical piece, followed by a tune which could be the soundtrack for a silent movie full of pathos and drama, with "Paper" adding a real avant-garde piece with extended techniques, an almost compulsory pizzicato piece, called "Mimmi Resisti" or a cello version of rock 'n' roll, and the album ends with the even more out of place "Lester Tango" which is ... a tango. Guerri has technique. He now needs a producer to work on material with more quality and coherence to make his technique shine.
The Fallow Curves of the Planospheres **** The Hotel of Thirteen Losses ***½ Rotterdam **** Berlin ****½ No Signal ****½ O+O+ ****
Aaron Novik may be known best by readers of this site for his radical,
brilliant 2012 album Secret of Secrets. Earlier this year, Novik released a bold statement showcasing his
puckish, punk aesthetic, a compilation of material from five EPs he planned
to release over the following months. The Fallow Curves of the Planospheres was a mindbending
experience, tracking Novik’s experimentation in different, simultaneous
directions. The result is not unlike Ben LaMar Gay’s Downtown Castles Can Never Block the Sun, as Novik challenges
listeners’ expectations by swapping lineups and conceptual material song by
song. Before I go too far in overselling the difficulty of listening to it,
just know that The Fallow Curves of the Planosphere is a extremely
fun record. I took my time settling into it, with the understanding that
“Ballroom of Lost Faith” (from The Hotel of Thirteen Losses) told
me almost nothing of the final EP, as it lead into edited tracks from O+O+ and No Signal. As a teaser of what was to come, they
admirably gave away little, while the subtle disjointedness of the album
settled into a welcome discomfort.
Few experiences were as surprising as hearing the final EPs as they were
released throughout the year. Take, for example, the differing lineups of
each: The Hotel of Thirteen Losses has Novik solo on clarinet and
bass clarinet, augmented by field recordings. On Rotterdam, he has
a sextet, with Kasey Knudsen on sax, Dina Maccabee on violin, Marie Abe on
accordion, Lisa Mezzacappa on bass, and Jamie Moore on drums. Novik has a
quintet for Berlin, with Mezzacappa, Kyle Bruckmann on oboe and
English horn, Crystal Pascucci on cello, and Jordan Glenn on “found object
percussion.” O+O+ features the largest group of the series, a
septet, with Mezzacappa, Matt Nelson on tenor sax, Evan Francis on flute,
Mark Clifford on vibes, Tim Bulkley on drums, and Michael Coleman on piano.
For No Signal, Novik plays A clarinet, with Jeremiah Cymerman on
Bb clarinet, and Ava Mendoza and Matt Hollenberg on guitar.
Based on the lineups alone, it may not be a surprise that No Signal was my personal favorite, with its absorbing, unique
sound world. Cymerman and Mendoza are among this blog’s favorites
performers, brilliant and Berlin is a close second, with the great
Bruckmann and Pascucci playing some excellent tandem lines, accentuated by
Mezzacappa and Glenn’s excellent counter-improvisations. Mezzacappa is
simply incredible throughout the series, one of the finest contemporary
bass players, and she and Novik share a knack for inspired and slightly
mischievous inspiration. Pulling from references to what, on paper, might
be incongruous sights and sounds, Novik and Mezzacappa both make
deliriously entertaining music. And together, their work across Berlin, Rotterdam, and O+O+ is simply fantastic.
I recommend the full set of albums, including Fallow Curves, for
each is its own self-contained unit, and the journey from one to the other
is delightful trip worth taking again and again.
Christopher Dell (vibraphone), Christian Lillinger (drums) and Jonas
Westergaard (double bass) have released the predecessor of their new album
six years ago. But this doesn’t mean that they haven’t cooperated since
then. In the years between these two releases they’ve recorded an album with
Johannes Brecht on electronics (Boulez Materialism), for example. Additionally, Dell and Westergaard are also core members of
Christian Lillinger’s projects
Grund
and
Open Form For Society. Grammar II is now, according to the musicians, intended to shift
the boundaries of experimental music and document the progress of the trio.
Like Grammar I (gligg Records, 2013) the new album combines new
classical music with improvisation. The pieces are presented on four levels
and especially the influences of Morton Feldman and Pierre Boulez become
obvious.
Those who know the three musicians as mad wizards on their instruments will
be surprised at first. On "Duration - Structure 1“ each tone is set next to
another one in an almost pointillist way, the sound spaces are opened very
wide, bass and drums respond to every single sound of the vibraphone and
vice versa. The structure of the piece slowly evolves, creating consonant
chordal patterns and sonic ghost lights that are reminiscent of sphere
music. The piece is a wonderful web of textures that ebb and flow,
expanding and contracting and finally flowing exhaustedly into “Duration -
Structure 1I“, where the density of the composition increases dramatically.
Now the music is much more pronounced, the piece clearly shows the
emergence of musical concepts through structural frameworks. Tiny melodies
blossom again and again, but basically there is a strong focus on harmonies
and rhythms here, as if a rhythm section was bored by backing their
soloists. So they get rid of them in order to start working consistently on
the rhythmic framework instead and exhibiting their results consistently.
“Duration - Structure III“ is the track which displays influences by Pierre
Boulez’s “sound proliferation“ philosophy. The musicians replace musical
themes with structural, harmonic cells. These cells are created through
minimal parameters like intervals or rhythmic units, first there’s often
some kind of a reduction, but only to let these structures grow
exuberantly. The whole track is a juxtaposition of open chords, wild runs,
complex rhythm shifts, zig zags, and bumpy stops and goes. Finally,
“Duration - Structure IV“ is like a summary of the previous three pieces.
In a weird way, it also reminds me of a highly complex heavy metal piece
which is played by an acoustic trio.
Once again - like many Lillinger projects - all this may sound a bit
intellectual and bloodless. However, one does not only hear abstract
structures, but due to the intensity of the musicianship, the structural
strictness is always superimposed with musical emotions, physicality and
plasticity. The music the trio creates is not just self-referential, but
highly communicative. In spite of being really tight its of a floating
lightness as well. Highly recommended.
Grammar II
is available on double vinyl and as a CD. You can buy it from the label or from Christian Lillinger’s bandcamp site.
The work of Swedish reeds master Fredrik Ljungkvist, known from the Swedish-Norwegian quintet Atomic, is criminally undocumented. His new album Atlantis is only the sixth album of his as a leader, over a career that spans about 25 years, but reflects faithfully Ljungkvist’s aesthetics. This new album swings - literally - between memories and homages to seminal jazz icons and mentors and fresh, bold yet always melodic and elegant ideas, performed beautifully.
Atlantis was recorded during “one sunny day” in April 2019 in the legendary Atlantis studio in Stockholm. Ljungkvist dedicates this album to the memory of recently passed Swedish saxophone player Roland Keijser, his lifelong friend and mentor. Ljungkvist is accompanied by his trusty trio - double bass player Mattias Welin amd drummer Jon Fält who have played with him since 2002 and his larger groups Yun Kan 5 and Yun Kan 10.
The title-piece offers Ljungkvist’s brand of swing, moving organically, between playful, rhythmic modules and asymmetric, open patterns, with a natural charismatic voice on the tenor sax. Thelonious Monk’s classic “Monk’s Dream”, with young pianist Max Agnas, is stripped and reconstructed rhythmically again and again by Ljungkvist and Agnas and the rhythm session of Welin and Fält, all flow with engaging energy. Ljungkvist’s own ballad “Rue Oberkampf” sounds as a natural expansion of the Monk-ish language.
“Jag vet Inte“ (I Don’t Know in Swedish) is a beautiful and openly emotional, free-improvised duet of Ljungkvist on baritone sax and the operatic, wordless vocals of Sofia Jernberg, with subtle support of Welin and Fält. “Flykt” (Escape in Swedish), with Ljungkvist again on baritone sax and its hard-swinging spirit, sounds at first as paying respect to one of Sweden sax giant Lars Gullin but explodes later as a free jazz piece. The lone reading of Keijser’s fragile ballad “So-do-so-do-re” is one of emotional peaks of Atlantis. Ljungkvist concludes with another homage to another master, Bill Evans’ “Very Early”, with veteran pianist Göran Strandberg, known for his work with Red Mitchell, and himself on the clarinet. This piece succeeds sound untimely and fresh at once.
As a fan of Don Cherry, I have always been fascinated by the trumpeter's openness to engage with musicians with totally different backgrounds and approaches: from Hassan Hakmoun over Lou Reed to Krzysztof Penderecki and Terry Riley, and of course all the real jazz configurations he played in. And that was one of his strengths: to be open to influences, to find new synergies and musical possibilities. That not every endeavour can be called succesful should not be a surprise, and - at least to me - the big disappointment was his collaboration with John Appleton on the album "Human Music" (1970). Despite its name, Appleton gave me the impression to "dehumanise" Cherry's music, and reducing it to bleeps and peeps and squeaks. Or even worse, the sounds Appleton produced were non-music, dead, machine sounds. The only positive aspect about the album is that an effort was made to try and reconcile man and machine in a musical environment, even if unsuccessful. British trumpeter Tom Arthurs takes up the challenge. He is fascinated by music in all its diversity, and he holds a PhD in music from the University of Edinburgh, for which he conducted an Ethnography of Improvised Music in Berlin, in which electronics is apparently much more abundant than what I had imagined. Tom Arthurs & Alberto Novello - Cahier De Petits Coquillages Vol. IV-V (Setola Di Maiale, 2018)
Last year, Arthurs released "Cahier De Petits Coquillages Vol. IV-V", in collaboration with the electronics and multimedia artist Alberto Novello. As much as I like Arthurs' playing on this album, as much as I dislike Novello's sounds. I try to listen to the trumpet without noticing the electronics and it sounds beautiful. The question is whether it would have sounded beautiful without the interaction of the electronics. That is a question nobody can answer. I have listened to this album several times, but it requires real effort on my part, and it starts irritating quite fast. Novello's sound is an acquired taste.
Listen and download from Bandcamp.
Arthurs luckily keeps expanding his universe, including turning his former duo "Vaucanson's Muse" with Isambard Khroustaliov (aka Sam Britton) on electronics, to a trio with drummer Julian Sartorius.
Interestingly enough, the interaction with the electronics on this album proves to be a success, and that is possibly due to two factors. First, Khroustaliov is a really subtle musician. He is not the in-your-face bleeps-peeps&squeaks-manufacturer who shows off his software and electronic wizardry. No, his approach is that of a musician rather than of a techie, he understands music and sound art. His sounds add drama, contrast, emotion, surprise. Second, Sartorius is equally astonishing on percussion. Together with the electronics, he creates a wonderful backdrop of alien sounds. No two sounds are alike and very few of those sounds were ever created before."Being interested in fine-scaled variations, tension and release, mass and vibrancy, he creates projects like the 12-LP-box set «Beat Diary» (Everest Records, 2012), consisting of 365 beat tracks", says his bio, implicitly emphasising his unique and uncompromising passion to percussive creativity. In a way, the album would even be interesting by just listening to the interaction between Khroustaliov and Sartorius. Against the formidable sonic canvas created by these two hyper-specialists, Arthurs' trumpet navigates full of depth and sensitivity, challenged by the sounds, interacting with them, harmonising with them. Like his two partners on this album, Arthurs' technical skills are truly impressive: from crystal-clear pure tones to muddled multiphonics and beyond. What could have become a clash of egoes, a combat for front-stage, wonderfully results in a very mature and cohesive effort where the co-creation and the musical result dominate. The pace is slow, measured, intense. Especially in the last track - "Reréaux" - the intensity is even more increased by the higher density, apparent chaos and sheer volume of the interaction. It is unusual music, one in which I have to revisit my reluctance with electronics. In the right hands (minds?) and in the right company, they may benefit the overall sound and create an astonishing listening experience, as on this album. An ear-opener! Listen to "Duch"
