Reviews that mention Patricia Brennan
October 23, 2019
Phalanx Ambassadors
Pi Records Pi 81
One of the go-to keyboardists on the present New York scene, Matt Mitchell has been a sought-after associate for everyone from Tim Berne to Dan Weiss. Re-convening his own group for Phalanx Ambassadors, Mitchell creates a layered program of themes and overtones that ironically in instrumentation updates the line-up of the quintets pianist George Shearing led from the late 1940s to the 1970s.
It’s not very likely any fan of the Shearing Quintet’s pop-Jazz approach could confuse this group of contemporary improvisers with that group’s members, and it’s as feasible that none of Mitchell’s crew is cognizant of the link, even though such major stylists as Gary Burton and Joe Pass were in the Shearing quintet over the years. In contrast to Shearing’s easy listening three- minute tracks, as well, Mitchell’s original compositions range from less than two minutes in length to almost 16. Throughout the seven tracks, textural contrasts and extensions come from Miles Okazaki’s guitars: Patricia Brennan’s vibraphone and marimba, Kim Cass’ bass and electric bass and Kate Gentile’s drums and percussion as well as Mitchell keyboards and acoustic piano. MORE
March 18, 2018
A Pouting Grimace
Pi Recordings 71
Onze Heures Onze Orchestra
Vol 1
Onzeheurs Onze ONZ020
Having a singular, original vision is often cited as the best way to create outstanding music, more so when, as on these sessions here, concepts can be communicated to a large ensemble. Yet individualism doesn’t necessarily edge out a collegial approach. New York-based keyboardist Matt Mitchell for instance obviously aimed to create an original take on contemporary sounds that mixed notated, improvisational and electronic tropes, and he rounded up a dozen of the city’s most accomplished players to interpret his 10 compositions. Yet all too often on A Pouting Grimace, the composer and his associates appear to be leaping from one idea to another, exposing a variety of concepts, but with no logical continuum that draws together the detonating themes. MORE
June 6, 2016
Michael Formanek Ensemble Kolossus
The Distance
ECM 2484
The Who
Zoo
Auricle Aur 14+15
Carlberg/Morris/Niggenkemper/Gray
Cosmopolitan Greetings
Red Piano RPR 4699-4419-2
Eric Platz
Life After Life
Allos Documents 012
Florian Hoefner
Luminosity
Origin Records 82706
Something In The Air: Those Who Teach Can Also Play
By Ken Waxman
As shibboleths go, the hoary “those who can do, those who can’t teach,” must rank at the very top of the list. Besides libelling the majority of educators who devote themselves to the task of imparting knowledge to students, it negates the activities of those who teach and do. Here are some musicians who maintain a full-time teaching carer along with consistent gigging. MORE
January 29, 2010
Terraphonia
Creative Sources CS 595 CD
Rugged tone challenges and resolutions are synchronized distinctively by alto saxophonist Patrick Brennan and dual electric guitar conductor Abdul Moimême on the seven tracks of this duo session. Two inhabitants of the exploratory segment of Free Music, New York-based Brennan’s associates have ranged from Lisle Ellis to Gnawi Ma’alem Najib Soudani, while Lisbon’s Moimême has played with the likes of Steve Adams, and Wade Matthews.
Corralling the guitars-and-objects’ wide vibrations, clangorous shuffles and washtub-like pulsating clouts, Moimême sets up a surging continuum around and within a sequence in which Brennan’s reed smears and split tones gnaw outwards. In an adversarial relationship with the guitarist’s dial twisting frails and metallic smashes throughout, the saxophonist’s reed motifs often also resemble aviary peeps or small animal-like clawing. Eventually though, as guitar string pressure builds, hollow resonations and clarion reed cries maintain the sequences’ staccato strength. By the time the concluding “Witness Ampersand” arrives, Brennan’s and Moimême’s dual procedure allows the improvisations to be expressed with the same power but more quietly even as the track’s sonic crannies are filled. MORE