Label Spotlight:

SoLyd Records
By Ken Waxman

Like that of many successful endeavours ranging from the mass production of the automobile, the feature-length cartoon or the personal computer, SoLyd record label’s driving force is one person. While Andrei Gavrilov, may or may not like the comparison to Walt Disney, Henry Ford or Steve Jobs, it’s his ideas, taste and finances that keep the Moscow-based label afloat and is responsible for its massive, (more than 400 releases) somewhat idiosyncratic catalogue. “Sometimes, when I look over the catalogue I get confused myself,” he admits.

Founded in 1993 and named for his daughters Sonia (So) and Lydia (Lyd), Gavrilov is not only SoLyd’s “head, president, owner, director, you name it” but also the label’s entire staff. A freelance journalist/broadcaster/translator since 1983, one of whose more unusual jobs is supplying Russian translation for the TV broadcast of the Academy Awards, Gavrilov initially worked for independent Russian publishing houses. He often wrote about art and music, which put him in contact with many musicians who subsequently appeared on SoLyd.

“I’ve known Andrei Gavrilov since the early 1970s when he used to attend all of the concerts when our Trio (Ganelin, Tarasov, Chekasin) played in Moscow,” recalls percussionist Vladimir Tarasov. “He is good friend to all jazz musicians in Russia. When the Sonore label, which published many CDs from our Trio, my solo and other projects went out of business, he bought the publishing rights and the sound archive.” Plans to reissue these sessions on SoLyd haven’t yet been realized. But in 2006 Gavrilov allowed Leo Records to include Tarasov’s Sonore material in its 11-CD Tarasov box set.

Re-issues don’t play too large a part in the SoLyd catalogue. In fact, says Gavrilov, “SoLyd releases only the music that I personally am interested in at the moment, and tastes can change with the time,” he notes. “But even though tastes change, the main principle remains – the project must be something new, something unorthodox and off the beaten track.” SoLyd has never concentrated on a single musical genre. So while jazz fans may know its CDs featuring improvisers, the catalogue also includes contemporary classical music, Russian rock and blues and local, radical “singing poets”. However the majority of rock releases are from bands either initially unknown or are side projects of more popular bands. The few pop CDs that became best-sellers – by Russian standards – also turn enough of a profit to help subsidize so-called avant-garde sessions.

Although SoLyd releases a combination of newly created and already recorded sessions, one fact remains constant: Gavrilov pays all costs involved, and each CD is marketed the same way. This decision was crucial during the late 1990s when the value of the American dollar to the ruble skyrocketed. With many recording firms bankrupt, disc pirating became rampant. To counter this and still sell CDs, legitimate companies such as SoLyd put out budget versions of their discs. Not surprisingly no improvised music was released as these budget “best-of” compilations. While SoLyd hung on to its artists and distributors, earning suffered. That situation finally rectified itself by 2008, but another irritant remains. As Gavrilov states, “Western distribution is the main problem for Russian labels.”

Today SoLyd discs are available for download and distribution through outlets such as CD Baby, Qualiton, Downtown Music Gallery and Amazon.de, but “for more than 10 years I bombarded European and US distributors with e-mail proposals for different kinds of collaborations. I sent out hundreds of samples with minimal results,” he recalls. “Many absolutely great, wonderful Russian musicians and recordings remain unknown in the west because Western distributors do not want to deal with Russian labels.”

That many of these “great, wonderful Russian musicians” released on SoLyd are part of the so-called avant-garde, concentrating on this music wasn’t a conscious decision, reports Gavrilov. It’s just that for him improv became more interesting over the years and other music less so. Many of the first avant efforts had nothing to do with jazz. One consisted of spontaneous improvisations by contemporary composers Vyacheslav Artyomov and Sofia Gubaidulina; another was by rocker Boris Grebenschikov. Ganelin Trio saxophonist Vladimir Chekasin’s Bolero-2 was the first jazz-improv session. Today the catalogue includes discs by pianist Alexey Lapin, bassist Vladimir Volkov and saxophonist Alexey Kruglov among many others.

“Gavrilov was a person who told me that a generation of musicians had arrived in Russia who are young, play well and think for themselves.” remembers Tarasov. “He told me about Alexey Kruglov, rented a studio and asked me to record two CDs [Dialogos SoLyd 403 and In Tempo SoLyd 404] with him. Playing with Kruglov I realized what Gavrilov had said was true. The saxophonist doesn’t play behind or ahead, he plays together with me and that’s great.”

Happenstance also accounted for SoLyd releasing CDs by non-Russians. Among the first was a CD of a Moscow concert by American pianist Joshua Pierce, followed by efforts like the Russian Second Approach trio’s disc with Roswell Rudd. Other SoLyd releases include ROVA’s Planetary (SoLyd SLR 0407), Anthony Braxton/Marel Yakshieva Improvisations (duo) 2008 (SoLyd SLR 0383/4), Matthew Shipp/Sabir Mateen Sama Live in Moscow (SoLyd SLR 0408) and Jones/Jones [Larry Ochs, Mark Dresser and Tarasov]’ We All Feel The Same Way SoLyd SLR 0396). Some sessions were even recorded in the United States. “It doesn’t really matter where the recording is made – you obtain the rights, you pay for them – what’s the difference between Moscow and New York?” asks Gavrilov.

“I only met Gavrilov once in May 2010, but working with him as an artist is a breeze,” says Ochs. An admirer of Tarasov’s playing the SoLyd owner was so impressed with a mix Ochs had done of music from a Jones/Jones mini-tour, that “he accepted the master immediately and released it in September 2009 on the occasion of our performance during the Moscow Biennale.” A Moscow recording the trio made is now set for 2011 release. As for the ROVA connection, the saxophonist recalls: “Somewhere between the mixing of Jones/Jones CD 1 and the recording of CD 2 I suggested a ROVA recording for his label. I thought the connection ROVA had with Russia, because of its two tours there in the 1980s, might interest him. Sure enough he decided that a ROVA CD, our first release on a Russian label, would be cool.”

Besides the second Jones/Jones set, other future SoLyd improvised music releases include Tarasov playing with pianist Matthew Goodheart and ROVA saxophonist Jon Raskin. It’s sessions like this that make jazz fans hope that distribution deals will soon make all SoLyd CDs easier to access.

--For New York City Jazz Record August 2011

August 6, 2011

Matthew Shipp/Sabir Mateen

SaMa Live in Moscow
SoLyd SLR 0408

By Ken Waxman

Rather than Moscow on the Hudson, this session is more like the Lower East Side transferred to near Red Square, as two of Manhattan’s most accomplished downtown improvisers express their art for an enthusiastic audience in the Russian capital.

Associates in a variety of group as well as consummate band leaders, pianist Matthew Shipp and especially multi-reedist Sabir Mateen aren’t constrained by technique when either feels the need for expression beyond standard notes. At the same time, as indicated by the inclusion of Jerome Kern’s “Yesterdays” in the set list, both have strong links to the ongoing tradition.

At the same time staunch traditionalists may blanch at “Yesterdays”, since Mateen’s screeching altissimo textures and Shipp’s initial keyboard pounding spell atonality before the familiar melody statement appears. During the remainder of the tune, the pianist references stride while limning staccato and highly decorated variations, occasionally flirting with the theme. Meanwhile Mateen, on tenor saxophone, is engaged in deconstruction. His passages of screaming glossolalia and irregular vibrations break the tune into whistling and honking sound shards. Cascading keyboard chords again expose the melody near the finale with Matten’s riposte paced animal-like cries.

Although the CD begins with a fairly standard blues progression on Shipp’s part, most of the sounds here are aleatory and aggressive. “Inner Chambers”, the CD’s 21½-minute climax is broken into several interludes transmitting a variety of voicings and dynamics. On clarinet, Mateen’s contralto notes start moderato and gentle, and return to calm at the finale. In between however, his tempo is always staccatissimo and his volume stentorian, with passionate altissimo squeaks and splintered chalumeau. In contrast Shipp’s harpsichord-like internal string plucking gives way to a dramatic near-etude where key coloration encompasses ringing impressionistic variations and concludes with a meditative note overlay.

A glimpse of sonic freedom unaffected by Putin-styled state capitalism, SaMa gave the audience at the DOM cultural center plenty of reasons to lustily applaud.

Tracks: SaMa Blues; Ma Solo; Moscow Spaces; Yesterdays; Inner Chambers; Kinetic (encore)

Personnel: Sabir Mateen: tenor saxophone and clarinet; Matthew Shipp: piano

--For New York City Jazz Record June 2011

June 10, 2011

Matthew Shipp/Sabir Mateen

SAMA
NotTwo NW 817-2

Sabir Mateen

Urdla XXX

RogueArt ROG-0026

One of the linchpins of the Free Jazz scene centred around New York’s Lower East Side, multi-reedman Sabir Mateen’s fiery improvising has been a contributing factor to the musical successes of many bands, most notably those led by bassist William Parker and trombonist Steve Swell, plus his own combos.

Nonetheless the true mark of a sophisticated improviser is how inventively the musician operates alone or nearly so; and these CDs confirm the breadth of Mateen’s creativity. Recorded at New York’s Roulette performance space, but without an audience present, SAMA is a duo date that matches Mateen’s clarinet stylings with the piano of Matthew Shipp, another downtowner who has also worked with everyone from Parker (William) to Parker (Evan). Using alto saxophone, clarinet, alto clarinet, bells and percussive noise-makers Mateen is recorded alone with a live audience on Urdla XXX. His concert marked the 30th anniversary of Urdla, an engraving workshop in Villeurbanne, France.

Infused with the significance of the situation, he begins the French celebration, almost out of earshot, shaking his bell-tree, chanting and yodeling, until he reaches centre stage and begins to play. And what playing it is. Abstract and atonal, it’s also striking and significant. Throughout, side-slipping and tongue-slapping vibrations pump and dart, alternating moderato chalumeau warbles and strident altissimo splutters. Frequently playing in broken octaves, his reed lines encompass double and triple-tongued pressure as often as they’re legato and unforced.

Case in point is “Sekasso Blues” that only in its final measures approaches blues tonality. At the top, Mateen backs into an improvisation, swiftly accelerating from moderato and mid-range lines to honks, quacks and single notes stretched to their limits without breaking. After attaining a series of languid harmonies, he tries out different sonic strategies until reaching the expected blues line.

With gospel-like reed harmonies sounding and shaman-like bell-tree shaking, Mateen’s instrumental message here is universalistic rather than solipsistic; and one that never loses sight of jazz roots. Two earlier Free Jazz reedists – alto saxophonist Jimmy Lyons (1932-1986) and tenor saxophonist Frank Wright (1935-1990) – both of whom were at the prime of their powers in the years when Urdla was establishing itself – are honored in separate compositions.

“Jimmy Lyons”, speaks to the dual inside/outside identity of the saxophonist who was pianist Cecil Taylor’s confrere for many years. It contrasts altissimo alto saxophone screeches and long, mellifluous timbres, building up lines to their limits, but definitely ending in the tonic. More complex, “One for the Rev, which is Rev. Frank Wright”, celebrates this associate of Albert Ayler who moved from R&B to Free Jazz, with what sounds like variations of “Bye Bye Blackbird”. Mateen also plays it on alto saxophone with plenty of wide vibrato flutters, narrowed multiphonics and thematic variations that trade balladic inferences for triple-tonguing and rhythmic patterning. With a shrieking finale, the piece remains singularly less resolved at the climax, unlike the legato and pulsating reed timbres with which Mateen himself ends this live recital.

If Urdla XXX is about singular celebration and memory – honoring Mateen’s heroes along with an important European arts workshop – then SAMA is undoubtedly American and very much in the present. The eight inventions, numbered sequentially, resemble free fantasias, designed to highlight the solo and contrapuntal talents of pianist Shipp and Mateen, who confines himself to standard clarinet.

Compare “SAMA Three” for instance with “SAMA Seven”. The former captures a sound transformation as Mateen’s vibrating flutter-tonguing and top-of-range squeals meet Shipp’s thick chording and powerful voicing in such a way that both parts uptick to feather-light jollity. The pianist bounces arpeggios and bell-pealing-like timbres, with key strumming and fanning, while the clarinetist peeps his way up the scale, finally attaining shrill clusters and an elongated tone held until the end. “SAMA Seven” on the other hand, is awash in dark, bluesy keyboard ruminations from Shipp and slithering glissandi from Mateen. As the largo trills and reed bites press up against languid and pulsated piano chording, the exchange moves from a slight mutual hesitancy to a contrapuntal duet of extended reed slurs and strummed chords.

Establishing a framework, Shipp at points introduces portamanto cascades and percussive rumbles extended with pedal pressure so that Mateen’s narrowed and liquid vibrated tones appear in counterpoint. Elsewhere Shipp reaches into the piano’s innards for soundboard echoes, plucking the wound strings like a guitar’s. This adds an astringent pattern to his playing, spicing it correctly like a chef adding the proper amount of garlic to a pasta dish. When it appears that he figures Mateen’s tremolo obbligatos and smooth glissandi don’t further flavor the musical dish, Shipp speeds up the tempo from andante to presto, forcing the clarinetist to match the change by the means of singular and abstract squeaks.

With help from this friend, SAMA proves that Mateen is a sympathetic and inventive duet partner. Meanwhile Urdla XXX shows that his improvising can be just as stimulating on its own.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Urdla: 1. The City of Lyon 2. Art Dance 3. Dakka Du Boo Yu! 4. Music is Sound and Sound is Music 5. Jimmy Lyons 6. Sekasso Blues 7. One for the Rev. - Rev. Frank Wright 8. More than a Hammer and Nail 9. Blessing to You

Personnel: Urdla: Sabir Mateen (alto clarinet, alto saxophone, small percussions and vocal)

Track Listing: SAMA: 1. SAMA 1 2. SAMA 2 3. SAMA 3 4. SAMA 4 5. SAMA 5 6. SAMA 6 7. SAMA 7 8. SAMA 8 9. SAMA 9 10. SAMA 10

Personnel: SAMA: Sabir Mateen (clarinet) and Matthew Shipp (piano)

August 22, 2010

Sabir Mateen

Urdla XXX
RogueArt ROG-0026

Matthew Shipp/Sabir Mateen

SAMA

NotTwo NW 817-2

One of the linchpins of the Free Jazz scene centred around New York’s Lower East Side, multi-reedman Sabir Mateen’s fiery improvising has been a contributing factor to the musical successes of many bands, most notably those led by bassist William Parker and trombonist Steve Swell, plus his own combos.

Nonetheless the true mark of a sophisticated improviser is how inventively the musician operates alone or nearly so; and these CDs confirm the breadth of Mateen’s creativity. Recorded at New York’s Roulette performance space, but without an audience present, SAMA is a duo date that matches Mateen’s clarinet stylings with the piano of Matthew Shipp, another downtowner who has also worked with everyone from Parker (William) to Parker (Evan). Using alto saxophone, clarinet, alto clarinet, bells and percussive noise-makers Mateen is recorded alone with a live audience on Urdla XXX. His concert marked the 30th anniversary of Urdla, an engraving workshop in Villeurbanne, France.

Infused with the significance of the situation, he begins the French celebration, almost out of earshot, shaking his bell-tree, chanting and yodeling, until he reaches centre stage and begins to play. And what playing it is. Abstract and atonal, it’s also striking and significant. Throughout, side-slipping and tongue-slapping vibrations pump and dart, alternating moderato chalumeau warbles and strident altissimo splutters. Frequently playing in broken octaves, his reed lines encompass double and triple-tongued pressure as often as they’re legato and unforced.

Case in point is “Sekasso Blues” that only in its final measures approaches blues tonality. At the top, Mateen backs into an improvisation, swiftly accelerating from moderato and mid-range lines to honks, quacks and single notes stretched to their limits without breaking. After attaining a series of languid harmonies, he tries out different sonic strategies until reaching the expected blues line.

With gospel-like reed harmonies sounding and shaman-like bell-tree shaking, Mateen’s instrumental message here is universalistic rather than solipsistic; and one that never loses sight of jazz roots. Two earlier Free Jazz reedists – alto saxophonist Jimmy Lyons (1932-1986) and tenor saxophonist Frank Wright (1935-1990) – both of whom were at the prime of their powers in the years when Urdla was establishing itself – are honored in separate compositions.

“Jimmy Lyons”, speaks to the dual inside/outside identity of the saxophonist who was pianist Cecil Taylor’s confrere for many years. It contrasts altissimo alto saxophone screeches and long, mellifluous timbres, building up lines to their limits, but definitely ending in the tonic. More complex, “One for the Rev, which is Rev. Frank Wright”, celebrates this associate of Albert Ayler who moved from R&B to Free Jazz, with what sounds like variations of “Bye Bye Blackbird”. Mateen also plays it on alto saxophone with plenty of wide vibrato flutters, narrowed multiphonics and thematic variations that trade balladic inferences for triple-tonguing and rhythmic patterning. With a shrieking finale, the piece remains singularly less resolved at the climax, unlike the legato and pulsating reed timbres with which Mateen himself ends this live recital.

If Urdla XXX is about singular celebration and memory – honoring Mateen’s heroes along with an important European arts workshop – then SAMA is undoubtedly American and very much in the present. The eight inventions, numbered sequentially, resemble free fantasias, designed to highlight the solo and contrapuntal talents of pianist Shipp and Mateen, who confines himself to standard clarinet.

Compare “SAMA Three” for instance with “SAMA Seven”. The former captures a sound transformation as Mateen’s vibrating flutter-tonguing and top-of-range squeals meet Shipp’s thick chording and powerful voicing in such a way that both parts uptick to feather-light jollity. The pianist bounces arpeggios and bell-pealing-like timbres, with key strumming and fanning, while the clarinetist peeps his way up the scale, finally attaining shrill clusters and an elongated tone held until the end. “SAMA Seven” on the other hand, is awash in dark, bluesy keyboard ruminations from Shipp and slithering glissandi from Mateen. As the largo trills and reed bites press up against languid and pulsated piano chording, the exchange moves from a slight mutual hesitancy to a contrapuntal duet of extended reed slurs and strummed chords.

Establishing a framework, Shipp at points introduces portamanto cascades and percussive rumbles extended with pedal pressure so that Mateen’s narrowed and liquid vibrated tones appear in counterpoint. Elsewhere Shipp reaches into the piano’s innards for soundboard echoes, plucking the wound strings like a guitar’s. This adds an astringent pattern to his playing, spicing it correctly like a chef adding the proper amount of garlic to a pasta dish. When it appears that he figures Mateen’s tremolo obbligatos and smooth glissandi don’t further flavor the musical dish, Shipp speeds up the tempo from andante to presto, forcing the clarinetist to match the change by the means of singular and abstract squeaks.

With help from this friend, SAMA proves that Mateen is a sympathetic and inventive duet partner. Meanwhile Urdla XXX shows that his improvising can be just as stimulating on its own.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Urdla: 1. The City of Lyon 2. Art Dance 3. Dakka Du Boo Yu! 4. Music is Sound and Sound is Music 5. Jimmy Lyons 6. Sekasso Blues 7. One for the Rev. - Rev. Frank Wright 8. More than a Hammer and Nail 9. Blessing to You

Personnel: Urdla: Sabir Mateen (alto clarinet, alto saxophone, small percussions and vocal)

Track Listing: SAMA: 1. SAMA 1 2. SAMA 2 3. SAMA 3 4. SAMA 4 5. SAMA 5 6. SAMA 6 7. SAMA 7 8. SAMA 8 9. SAMA 9 10. SAMA 10

Personnel: SAMA: Sabir Mateen (clarinet) and Matthew Shipp (piano)

August 22, 2010

Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon

Ulrichsberg, Austria
April 30 –May 2, 2009

A site-specific performance that took into account the dimensions and machinery of a still-functioning 1853 linen factory; resounding interface between pulsating electronic and acoustic instruments; and a full-force finale involving a mid-sized band were among the notable performances at 2009’s Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon.

Remarkable as well as the consistently high quality of the 11 concerts that took place during the 23rd edition of this three-day festival, is the location: a farming and small manufacturing village of fewer than 7,000 people about 60 kilometres west of Linz, Austria.

Two years in the planning and the most spectacular – as well as demanding the most from the audience – performance, was Six Plus One’s “Weaving Sounds”. Utilizing the main space of Ulrichsberg’s linen mill, with machinery protected by yellow danger tape, but with enough looms, electrical cables, bobbins and bolts of cloth present to confirm this was a working environment, in many ways the setting was as important as the sonic result.

Yet the clutch of top-flight improvisers participating made sure the constant timbral pulsations were as riveting as the location and the players’ physical strategies. Swiss pianist Jacques Demierre was stationed on one side of the space, abutting an electronic set up encompassing mixing boards and computers, and manned by technicians. On the opposite side of the factory floor was German synthesizer player Thomas Lehn with his instrument connected to the electrical source for one of the largest machines. On identical raised platforms nearby were French clarinetist/vocalist Isabelle Duthoit and Swiss saxophonist Urs Leimgruber; while Swiss violinist Charlotte Hug and singer and hand saw manipulator Dorothea Schürch created undulating tones and sul ponticello squeaks from positions on the cat walk above the factory floor.

With visual cues difficult, 60 miniature speakers placed strategically around the room enabled players to react to one another’s initiatives. If the warp and woof of their concentrated and jagged tones wasn’t stimulating enough, at points Demierre climbed on the piano bench to cue operation of one loom. Shuddering and screeching as the colorful cloth was stretched and sliced, the resulting mechanized clamor meshed seamlessly with fortissimo reed split tones, cascading synthesizer oscillations, strangled throat spewing and catgut gashing from the instrumentalists. Perception of particular passages whether banged out on a keyboard or sputtered from a reed player’s bell – as well as of the piece itself – was dependent on proximity, since most audience members changed positions several times throughout the concert.

Spatial issues didn’t figure into another electro-acoustic showcase by the French Qwart quartet two days previously. With tones bouncing off the stone walls of the Jazz Atelier, a former pig barn sturdily constructed in the 16th century, baritone saxophonist Daunik Lazro’s circular-breathed growls and tongue stops vibrated so powerfully that he had to change reeds mid-set. Meanwhile violinist Michael Nick bowed abrasive spiccato, while Sophie Agnel’s timbre extension involved stopped piano keys plus strings weighted by Styrofoam cups and scraped with looped fishing lines. Providing both crackling and blurry ostinato plus broken octave expansions of the others’ textures with electronics including an e-bow and a camera flash was Jerome Noetinger. A percussive finale was created by Agnel repeatedly slamming the piano lid.

Despite concentrated electro-acoustic performances – including the slow build up of glissandi and looped drones from the Behavior Pattern trio of Austrians, cellist Noid and electronics whiz Ivan Palacky plus Japanese zitherist Taku Unami or the ambient Heavy Metal of extended and fortissimo thudding drones and whooshes from Americans, guitarist Alan Licht and cassette sampler Akli Onda – acoustic sets were often more satisfying. That is if performances were properly harnessed. New York trumpeter Pete Evans, for instance, dazzled with techniques that included brayed triplets, tremolo fluffs and excavated plunger tones. But his quartet showcase appeared never to climax – or end.

More down-to-earth were “Can You Ear Me”, a festival-commissioned tentet composition by French bassist Joëlle Léandre for a mixed Austrian strings-and-horns ensemble plus American percussionist Kevin Norton; and a hushed interpretation of Moron Feldman”s “For John Cage” by British pianist John Tlibury and Irish violinist Darragh Morgan

Equally proficient maintaining a jazz pulse with his standard kit, plus exposing pointillist coloration from struck marimba and vibraphone keys plus unattached sticks, gongs, rattles and cymbals, Norton’s rebounds and strokes sewed together some of the Léandre piece’s fissures, which strained in sections between the notated music orientation of some string players and the improv impulses of the horns. Alongside Léandre’s absorbing command of her instrument – which encompassed pumping straight time, sul ponticello string brushes and vocalized nonsense syllables – the most musically rewarding moments came when guitarist Burkhard Stangl re-directed whammy-bar-aided friction into staccato pulsations; and a section where every musician joyously shook bolo-bat versions of American Indian gourd rattles.

Ironically contrasting with the baroque gold-encrusted sculptures and pictures of saints on the wall of Ulrichsberg’s Pfarrkirche on the fest’s final day, Tilbury and Morgan’s reading of Feldman’s austere score appeared perhaps more coldly minimalist than it was. Certainly the pianist’s clanking single notes plus the violinist’s strangled split tones suggested two parallel courses that hardly intersected. Unrolling at a leisurely pace the result was almost mesmerizing, although it seemed as if the composition took a long time to get to an intermediate point.

More relaxed was a first-time improvisational meeting among Tilbury, Léandre and Norton the previous day. The pianist’s left-handed chord tinkles, which distinguish his contributions to AMM, were in evidence, as were the bassist’s col legno tones and the percussionist’s multi-directional strategies. When Léandre plucked pizzicato, Norton’s vibe strokes doubled her timbres. And when kinetic piano sonorities and string jabs in cello-range were prominent, the percussionist responded by stroking a collection of unattached cymbals, organized in size order. Other times Norton sounded a small gong or used a bow to saw on a small cymbal without ever making the gestures precious.

Precious was an adjective that would never be applied to Norwegian reedist Frode Gjerstad’s 12-piece Circulasione Totale Orchestra, whose sounds blasted the Atelier’s rafters as the Kaleidophon’s finale.

Besides Norton on vibes, the Scandinavian players were spelled by such long-time Gjerstad associates as American Hamid Drake and South African Louis Moholo-Moholo on drums, British bassist Nick Stephens, plus Americans reedist Sabir Mateen and cornetist Bobby Bradford in the front line. Each helped direct the intense Energy Music away from self-indulgence towards group cohesion.

Adding their strokes and paradiddles to a bottom further solidified by Morten Olsen’s percussion and Lasse Marhaug’s electronics, the non-European drummers built a backdrop impermeable enough to serve equally as foundation for chicken-scratch guitar licks and percussive hand-tapping from the electric bassist as well as the jagged, reed-twisting of Gjerstad and Mateen. Harmonized or alone – and often buoyed contrapuntally by Børre Molstad tuba burps or Stevens’ steadying strokes – the reedists zoomed from split tones to multiphonics, advancing improvisations in different pitches. As uncompromisingly atonal as Gjerstad on saxophone, Mateen distinguished himself with pastoral flute passages and stress-less clarinet trills. More iconoclastic still, Bradford maintained his modest and melodic composure even when the rest of the band played fortissimo.

Bradford’s molten creativity was cast in boldest relief however when the cornetist joined with a clarinet-playing Gjerstad for a demanded encore. With harmonies soaring so that they approached pure song, the unaccompanied duo also batted broken octaves back and forth. These timbres, simultaneously challenging and classic, neatly summed up the sort of unexpected sounds exposed at the annual Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon – and the festival’s abiding appeal.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For MusicWorks Issue #105

November 12, 2009

Marc Edwards & Slipstream Time Travel

Ode to a Dying Planet
Ayler Records aylDL 084

Marc Edwards & Slipstream Time Travel

Star Flakes!

Alpha Phonics APCD-R3

Marc Edwards & Slipstream Time Travel

12 Votes!

Alpha Phonics APCD-R2

Described as a profound, evolving sonic or an irritant that refuses to go away, Free Jazz continues to flourish on the margins of the improvised music world despite the efforts of some to label it a short-term, out-of-date aberration.

New York, which arguably birthed the style in the mid-1960s, remains one of its hotbeds, with frequent out-of-way or unknown sessions taking place throughout the city. Each of these CDs by drummer Marc Edwards and his Slipstream Time Travel ensemble is representative of the emotional and experimental gestalt that continues to burble in Gotham, with the main difference between the self-produced Alpha Phonics discs and the Ayler download sessions, a higher standard of mixing and mastering on the latter.

Edwards, still best-known for his tenure with Cecil Taylor in the 1970s, leas an ever-shifting ensemble, whose CDs here encompass music taken from gigs recorded over approximately a year’s time. The core band includes Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut playing percussive piano, although he’s usually a guitarist specializing in Etuning or Environmental Tuning, designed to reflect the everyday sounds of New York. Joining these two on the Ayler disc are guitarists Tor Snyder and Ernest Anderson III, who usually move in similar circles.

Added to this quartet on Star Flakes! is tenor saxophonist Sabir Mateen, veteran of a variety of Free Jazz bands, often in the company of with trombonist Steve Swell or bassist William Parker. Mateen is absent on 12 Votes! but added to the band are alto saxophonist Blaise Siwula, organizer of the C.O.M.A. improv series; French bassist Francois Grillot, who often works with more mainstream aggregations, and ex-Torontonian, trumpeter James Duncan.

Duncan’s smeary, triple-tonguing and fire-drill-like screeches place him in the role of Donald Ayler to Siwula’s Albert Ayler, and the reed man responds with squawking trills, intense overblowing and reed bites. However nowhere on the four live tracks of 12 Votes! is there a suggestion that this septet is attempting to be an ESP-Disk revival band. For a start Edwards’ outward-directed pounding, flams and rebounds are spectacularly distinctive – probably the most individual of his percussion strategies on the three discs – and sometimes rely on conga-drum-like skin smoothing rather than stick attacks. Plus reverberating guitar licks and fuzz-tone distortions adds punk-rock-like velocity to the proceedings.

Although there are points where guitar flails are almost indistinguishable from saxophone vibrations, Snyder and Anderson never seem to miss an opportunity to twist their guitar body’s knobs or introduce multi-effects. Whining, wiggling and sluicing, with hiccupping lines and buzzing flanges more prominent than the few oases of finger-style lyricism exhibited, the power of the two playing in tandem appears to resurrect licks that moves backwards from punk-rock to Heavy Metal to reconnect with Jimi Hendrix vamping at Woodstock. Overall the collaborations move from polyrhythmic crescendos to stilled diminuendos, even though most timbres heard are fortissimo, agitato and nearly endless.

With only Mateen as the fifth participant, Star Flakes! is more of the same; however the lo-fi and muddy recording quality means that the rumble of audience conversation and the odd bandstand discussion is sporadically as sonically evident as the solos. Vibrating with high frequency jabs Shurdut’s pianism is more prominent here, while conversely, Edwards clunking, clinking and subtle drags are more in the background then elsewhere.

Wailing and vibrating note distortions and overall crunching intersection from Snyder and Edwards moves their playing into Rhys Chatham or Glenn Branca-like multi guitar strumming, with sound metaphorically as thick as the Berlin Wall. There is sophistication here too, however, with the guitarists spluttering and oscillating lines at one another or crackling and intersecting traverse tones. Unfazed by dense guitar crunches, Mateen reed-bites and trills a series of flutter-tongued notes in-between, around, above and below the guitar textures. Altissimo, Mateen’s widely spaced multiphonics sometimes muscle the guitarists away from slurred fingering and clanking into performing recognizable blues or country-styled runs.

On Ode, Shurdut’s high frequency chording is even more upfront, chromatically and contrapuntally gliding from concert hall-like legato flourishes to open-handed key fanning and clipping. Edwards’ response is equally varied, encompassing shuffle rhythms plus individual cymbal, snare and bass drum patterns. There’s even a point where one of the tune’s heads is recapped in proper jazz fashion. As for the guitarists, shaking licks and washboard-like scraped rasgueado predominate, leading to kinetic face-offs with the pianist’s tremolo runs. As the drummer keeps the tempo solid and supple, Edwards and Snyder sometimes swerve to the side, allowing Shurdut to barrel ahead with concentrated arpeggios jumps and cadenzas. Palm-slapped string rhythms and distorted fills and drones are then used to decorate the keyboardist’s thematic exuberance.

Precisely because the Ayler CD is the most cleanly recorded of the three, it also provides the most complete picture of the work of Edwards and ensemble. But any one of the three discs could transport listener to Free Jazz Heaven, where emotion and commitment reign paramount.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Ode: 1. Ode to a Dying Planet 2. We’re Lost in Space, Aren’t We? 3. Cygnus Loop Detail

Personnel: Ode: Tor Snyder and Ernest Anderson III (guitars); Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut (piano) and Marc Edwards (drums)

Track Listing: Star: 1. Chasing Comets 2. Floating in Space 3. Star Flakes 4. Drifting in the Bubble Nebula

Personnel: Star: Sabir Mateen (tenor saxophone); Tor Snyder and Ernest Anderson III (guitars); Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut (piano) and Marc Edwards (drums)

Track Listing: 12: 1. Ion Storm 2. Morning Dew 3. Floating in Space 4. Ion Storm/ Morning Dew/Floating in Space 5. Interdimensional Gateway

Personnel: 12: James Duncan (trumpet); Blaise Siwula (alto saxophone); Tor Snyder and Ernest Anderson III (guitars); Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut (piano); Francois Grillot (bass) and Marc Edwards (drums)

December 13, 2008

Steve Swell’s Slammin’ The Infinite

Live At The Vision Festival
Not Two MW 780-2

Steve Swell Presents: Rivers Of Sound, Ensemble

News From the Mystic Auricle

Not Two MW 797-2

Middle age sounds good from Steve Swell. Not that age – or ageism – should be any factor in discussing music. But few American players had the gumption to affiliate themselves with Free Jazz during the Fusion and Neo-con drought years between the late 1960s and the early 1990s. So only a small number of mature stylists such as the trombonist are around, who not only continue the search for original formulae advanced by some older improvisers, but also possess the self-editing skills lacking in many younger players.

One person who is still musically experimenting, although around 80-years-old, is saxophonist Sam Rivers. Without replicating any of his music, News From the Mystic Auricle is dedicated to Rivers. Live At The Vision Festival, on the other hand, is a looser affair, although two of Swell’s three compositions are dedicated to further older improvisers: trombonist Grachan Moncur III and the late tenor saxophonist Frank Lowe.

Speaking of maturity, key members of the bands on both CDs are similarly in the prime of their lives. Multi-reedist Sabir Mateen for instance, has made his name playing with bandleaders ranging from bassist William Parker to pianist Horace Tapscott; while drummer Klaus Kugel has powered a variety of European and American ensembles. On Live the two plus Swell are joined by slightly younger bassist Matthew Heyer, who was in TEST with Mateen and is part of the No Neck Blues band; plus idiosyncratic pianist John Blum. On News they’re spelled by mature trumpeter and flugelhornist Roy Campbell, a member of Other Dimensions in Music with Parker; and bassist Hill Greene, who is in the bands Carnival Skin with Kugel, and Exuberance with Campbell.

Although Campbell adds to the contrapuntal discourse on the studio session, the excitement is really palpable on the Vision Festival CD. From the first notes of “Improv/Box Set” Hayner’s pedal-point harmonies, Kugel’s double-handed rumbles and pops plus occasional focused chording from Blum provide a proper showcase for Swell’s staccato partials and Mateen’s cursive flute lines. Mateen’s subsequent switch to hawk-like squawks on clarinet and still later to altissimo saxophone cries occasion equivalent intensity from the backing three. The pianist turns out speed-skating glissandi and Heyer spiccato incursions.

Never lopsided, the modulated lines continuously intersect even after Swell introduces a roistering secondary theme – an agitated line that could have come from the New York Art Quartet (NYAQ)’s book. Mateen’s snorts, vibrations and chirps solidify into long-lined glossolalia after this incursion, and they’re soon matched by plunger grace notes from the trombonist, pummeling ruffs from the drums and a walking, popping bass line. With the secondary theme used as a shout chorus, the band wraps up.

Exhilaration mixed with ferment characterizes the other tracks as well. Blum asserts himself with chording that alternately visits the recital realm or key clinking from non-idiomatic music. Heyner’s bass lines move from parade-ground-styled accompaniment to sul ponticello squeaks, and Kugel’s dynamic press rolls and ruffs mark the similarities between Free Bop and Free Jazz. When Swell outputs gutbucket smears on “For Grachan”, Mateen’s cistern-deep pitches and split tones on tenor saxophone recall that Moncur gigged with Archie Shepp. Simultaneously the saxophonist’s ricocheting altissimo slurs are further complemented by the trombonist’s contrapuntal asides.

This same consistency is exemplified further on the other CD, recorded less than eight months later. In addition, the braying interpolation, flutter tonguing and brassy triplets from Campbell’s horns give the frontline added polyphony. Campbell often works in counterpoint with huffing trombone timbres, Meanwhile Greene’s arco skills and pumping pizzicato complement Kugel’s sizzling cymbals and blunt strokes.

Cohesion is most evident on the title track where Mateen appears to exercise each of his instruments in turn. Whistling and squeaking clarinet slurs, sharpened and fortissimo flute runs, stuttering tenor saxophone cross tones and tip-top alto saxophone pitches are showcased. Meantime Greene’s buzzing ostinato plus Kugel’s bell-shaking and pulse-quickening kettle drum-like paradiddles set the scene for more contrapuntal development. There are bugle-like brass flashes, staccato trombone timbres and eventually another excursion into NYAQ-like tonal tinctures. Writhing and vibrating, mellow flugelhorn echoes operate above sweeping pedal-point bass lines until entries from the additional horn shove the maximum chordal interactions and minimal instrumental harmonics into a clear-sounding fantasia for all.

These discs are prime examples of why improvised music can never be in thrall to tyro players or feeble oldsters. Middle-aged maturity often produces the most notable and memorable sounds.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Live: 1. Improv/Box Set 2. For Grachan 3. Partient Explorer/For Frank Lowe

Personnel: Live: Steve Swell (trombone); Sabir Mateen (alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet and flute); John Blum (piano); Matthew Heyner (bass) and Klaus Kugel (drums)

Track Listing: News: 1. Journey to Omphalos 2. Healix 3. News From the Mystic Auricle

Personnel: News: Roy Campbell (trumpet and flugelhorn); Steve Swell (trombone); Sabir Mateen (alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet and flute); Hillard Greene (bass) and Klaus Kugel (drums)

October 23, 2008

William Parker

The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield – Live in Rome
Rai Trade RTPJ 0011

William Parker/ Raining On The Moon

Corn Meal Dance

AUM Fidelity AUM043

William Parker Double Quartet

Alphaville Suite

Rogue Art: ROG 0010

Concerned with different varieties of the Black vernacular experience, each of these fine CDs by bassist William Parker is impressive on its own. More profoundly each illustrates in a different way that the musical divisions among jazz, R&B, improvised music and soul are, in many cases, merely arbitrary.

Encompassing themes that are respectively populist (The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield), particular (Alphaville Suite) and highly personal (Corn Meal Dance), the sessions are stimulated not only by the resourcefulness of Parker’s compositions and arrangements, but by emphatic contributions from other band members. Although the personnel vary from disc to disc, each group includes, besides Parker, drummer Hamid Drake, trumpeter Lewis Barnes, and most spectacularly, vocalist Leena Conquest.

A Dallas native who has also worked with jazz-funk vibesman Roy Ayers and neo-bop pianist Mulgrew Miller, Conquest’s impressive vocal range, elevated diction and theatrical presentation pushes the performances on each of her appearance with the combo(s) another notch higher. No strident scat singer or flighty diva, she’s heir both to the clearly enunciated soul tradition of Dinah Washington and Aretha Franklin and to the socio-political undertakings of Abby Lincoln and Jeanne Lee.

That’s one inadvertent disappointment on Alphaville, since as “special guest” Conquest sings only on two short tracks. On the other hand the instrumental work is Parker’s most precise, since his compositions and arrangements salute the themes and influence of Alphaville, French director Jean-Luc Godard’s 1965 film classic. To amplify his compositional palate for the CD, Parker’s core trio is joined by his usual reed partner, alto saxophonist Rob Brown, plus a post-modern version of a string quartet: Mazz Swift on violin, Jessica Pavone on viola and cellists Julia Kent and Shiau-Shu Yu.

Rather than being used for conventional sweetening, the string performances are instead most often angular, spiccato and staccato, adding discordant arpeggios and shredded pulsations which at separate times cleave to Parker’s strummed centre tones or Brown’s skittering vibrato.

Although the CD is an exceptional showcase for the alto man’s tart, neo-bop tongue fluttering, it doesn’t mean that he’s the only soloist who excels here. Drake’s bass drum breaks and shadowed paradiddles add percussive heft to the 10 tracks. Meanwhile, to pick another highlight, Barnes’ trumpet flourishes and muted runs are involved in a contrapuntal duet with the thumping bass line on “Alpha 60”. Another theme is elaborated by Barnes’ darting, swift half-valve brass effects as well as Drake’s single cymbal reverberations, succeeded by sul ponticello circular bowing from the five strings. Its summation involves Barnes’ bugling tempo changes, bent notes and an extended mouthpiece tongue kiss.

With its loping Crime Jazz-like theme filled with sharp arco patterning and splintered tension-release “Doctor Badguy” is one of the two most programmatic tracks here; the other, “Interrogation”, depends on the aural images crated by descending double-pumping massed strings. Still, “Civilizations of the Light”, which was in Duke Ellington-fashion put together in the studio on the day of recording, proves that thematic fidelity doesn’t fully supersede improvisational smarts.

Composed with an almost Latinesque cast the tune has violinist Swift’s fierce, discursive solo introduce contrapuntal shrieks from other strings followed by their tremolo, squeezed triplets and Brown’s spilling arpeggios. Parker’s obbligato whorls finally order the extensions into a connective line. Andante, the contrapuntal horn and string patterns are constricted in the finale courtesy of a walking bass line and Drake’s rim shots.

The string section had been left at home three years previously when Parker and company played a jazz festival in Rome. In their place – and to provide more rhythmic impetus to this salute to Chicago Soul songwriter Curtis Mayfield (1942-1999) – is Daryl Foster on soprano and tenor saxophones, Sabir Mateen on tenor and alto saxophones and pianist Dave Burrell, plus Barnes, Parker and Conquest. In glorious voice, Conquest personifies the Mayfield’s material which encompasses his period with the Impressions (“People Get Ready”) as well as tunes from his influential Superfly soundtrack (“Freddie’s Dead”).

Adding to the purported street cred of the performance is the voice and poetry of professional Black firebrand Amiri Baraka. Although his sardonic, Afro-nationalism adds a few wryly poetic quips to the encore of “Freddie’s Dead” – he even gets off a line about Italy’s ex-right-wing premier Silvio Berlusconi – too often his nattering and mumbling interferes with Conquest’s soaring vocalizing.

Overall a rollicking affair, Parker’s chunky bass lines bring to mind Motown’s 1960s low-string vamp master James Jamerson, the riffing horn section channels 1960s Stax-Volt, while Drake’s stout backbeat could have gotten him R&B studio gigs during Mayfield’s Windy City heyday. Burrell, who has always been comfortable with piano history, adds pre-modern and conscious primitvist inflections to his two-handed accompaniment. Most spectacularly, on “Think” he pulls off the feat of creating a solo that’s simultaneously half-gospel and half-rococo.

However this is also the tune where Foster’s lightweight soprano sax obbligato appears to be paying homage to Grover Washington rather than more substantial players, while Baraka’s shouts and growls are merely annoying. Only Conquest’s verbal tonality and Mateen’s larger horn snorts keep things on an even keel.

Centrepiece of the performance is an almost 21-minute version of Mayfield’s “We Are The People Who Are Darker Than Blue”, with full-bore shuffle rhythm from Drake and undercurrent of riffing horns. Maintaining her bel canto take on the lyrics and backed by Burrell’s gospelish chording and low-frequency coloration, Conquest’s melodious inhabiting of the lyrics provides a profound foundation for Baraka’s heavily rhythmic Afro-American chanting. Later she reveals a hitherto unexposed talent, using scatting glossolalia to blend with Mateen’s altissimo squeaks and slides, while the pianist’s comping accelerates to house-party-style riffs.

A pianist of a far different background joins Parker and company on Corn Meal Dance, which is the newest and perhaps most fully realized CD here. Eri Yamamoto usually plays in more mainstream, piano-trio settings, including on an earlier disc with Parker. Here though, her references are high-frequency near-honky-tonk cadences, which are appropriate for this slice of the modern Black experience reflected not only in the bassist’s compositions, but his gnarly, poetic lyrics as well,

Luckily Conquest is on hand again for verbal interpretation, along with Drake, Barnes and Brown providing the musical ballast. Parker’s imagery appears to equally reflect agit-prop, Black folk tales, the stridency of 1970s’ Gil Scott-Heron and Bob Dylan’s 1960s surrealistic song-poetry. When provided with the proper setting, notable performances result.

“Gilmore’s Hat”, for instance, a light-hearted salute to John Gilmore, the late Sun Ra tenor saxophonist, is a stop-time hand-clapper with snappy words personalized by Conquest, and the music illuminated by Brown’s choked slithery reed lines, wah-wah expansions from Barnes and backbeat rolls from Drake. It concludes with perfectly pitched scatting from the vocalist. On the other hand, proper gravitas is reflected in Conquest’s interpretation of “Tutsi Orphans”, as the band’s vamps underlies this tragic tale of inter-tribal genocide, echoing similar situations in many other Africa countries.

Even better are the overtly political Soledad” and “Land Song”, which unlike Baraka’s limp attempts at relevancy on the Italian disc, manage to score points while remaining sonically first-rate. The latter tune is built up from unison horn lines and metronomic piano key battering, and has lyrics which cleverly mix contemporary asides with references to traditional post-Reconstruction inequalities. Featuring bull fiddle rumbles and drum rolls, it’s also a solo high point on the session for Brown who illustrates the theme with crying, evocative tones.

Mixing a blues progression and progressive lyrics in the mold of Max Roach’s and Charles Mingus’ 1960s militancy, “Soledad” gains its unmistakable power from the sincerity in Conquest’s voice, which in turn humanizes Parker’s lyrics no matter how far-fetched or obscurely poetic. Barnes’ high-pitched obbligatos provide perfect counterpoint to the singer’s warbling, yodeling and soulful groans.

Each of these outstanding discs provides an opportunity to sample the work of two artists – Parker and Conquest – in full maturity. All are worthy of your time.

-- Ken Waxman

.

Track Listing: Inside: 1. The Makings Of You 2. People Get Ready 3. Inside Song #1 4. We Are The People Who Are Darker Than Blue 5. Spoken Introduction 6. Think 7. Freddie’s Dead

Personnel: Inside: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Daryl Foster (soprano and tenor saxophones); Sabir Mateen (tenor and alto saxophones); Dave Burrell (piano); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums); Leena Conquest (voice) and Amiri Baraka (voice and poetry)

Track Listing: Alphaville: 1. Alphaville Main Theme 2. Journey to the End of the Night 4. Natasha’s Theme I 5. Interrogation 6. Alpha 60 7. Oceanville Evening 8. Civilization of Light 9. Outlands 10. Natasha’s Theme II

Personnel: Alphaville: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Mazz Swift (violin); Jessica Pavone (viola); Julia Kent and Shiau-Shu Yu (cellos); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) and Leena Conquest (voice)

Track Listing: Corn: 1. Doctor Yesterday 2. Tutsi Orphans 3. Poem for June Jordan 4. Soledad 5. Corn Meal Dance 6. Land Song 7. Prayer 8. Old Tears 9. Gilmore’s Hat

Personnel: Corn: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Eri Yamamoto (piano); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) and Leena Conquest (voice)

March 28, 2008

William Parker Double Quartet

Alphaville Suite
Rogue Art: ROG 0010

William Parker/ Raining On The Moon

Corn Meal Dance

AUM Fidelity AUM043

William Parker

The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield – Live in Rome

Rai Trade RTPJ 0011

Concerned with different varieties of the Black vernacular experience, each of these fine CDs by bassist William Parker is impressive on its own. More profoundly each illustrates in a different way that the musical divisions among jazz, R&B, improvised music and soul are, in many cases, merely arbitrary.

Encompassing themes that are respectively populist (The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield), particular (Alphaville Suite) and highly personal (Corn Meal Dance), the sessions are stimulated not only by the resourcefulness of Parker’s compositions and arrangements, but by emphatic contributions from other band members. Although the personnel vary from disc to disc, each group includes, besides Parker, drummer Hamid Drake, trumpeter Lewis Barnes, and most spectacularly, vocalist Leena Conquest.

A Dallas native who has also worked with jazz-funk vibesman Roy Ayers and neo-bop pianist Mulgrew Miller, Conquest’s impressive vocal range, elevated diction and theatrical presentation pushes the performances on each of her appearance with the combo(s) another notch higher. No strident scat singer or flighty diva, she’s heir both to the clearly enunciated soul tradition of Dinah Washington and Aretha Franklin and to the socio-political undertakings of Abby Lincoln and Jeanne Lee.

That’s one inadvertent disappointment on Alphaville, since as “special guest” Conquest sings only on two short tracks. On the other hand the instrumental work is Parker’s most precise, since his compositions and arrangements salute the themes and influence of Alphaville, French director Jean-Luc Godard’s 1965 film classic. To amplify his compositional palate for the CD, Parker’s core trio is joined by his usual reed partner, alto saxophonist Rob Brown, plus a post-modern version of a string quartet: Mazz Swift on violin, Jessica Pavone on viola and cellists Julia Kent and Shiau-Shu Yu.

Rather than being used for conventional sweetening, the string performances are instead most often angular, spiccato and staccato, adding discordant arpeggios and shredded pulsations which at separate times cleave to Parker’s strummed centre tones or Brown’s skittering vibrato.

Although the CD is an exceptional showcase for the alto man’s tart, neo-bop tongue fluttering, it doesn’t mean that he’s the only soloist who excels here. Drake’s bass drum breaks and shadowed paradiddles add percussive heft to the 10 tracks. Meanwhile, to pick another highlight, Barnes’ trumpet flourishes and muted runs are involved in a contrapuntal duet with the thumping bass line on “Alpha 60”. Another theme is elaborated by Barnes’ darting, swift half-valve brass effects as well as Drake’s single cymbal reverberations, succeeded by sul ponticello circular bowing from the five strings. Its summation involves Barnes’ bugling tempo changes, bent notes and an extended mouthpiece tongue kiss.

With its loping Crime Jazz-like theme filled with sharp arco patterning and splintered tension-release “Doctor Badguy” is one of the two most programmatic tracks here; the other, “Interrogation”, depends on the aural images crated by descending double-pumping massed strings. Still, “Civilizations of the Light”, which was in Duke Ellington-fashion put together in the studio on the day of recording, proves that thematic fidelity doesn’t fully supersede improvisational smarts.

Composed with an almost Latinesque cast the tune has violinist Swift’s fierce, discursive solo introduce contrapuntal shrieks from other strings followed by their tremolo, squeezed triplets and Brown’s spilling arpeggios. Parker’s obbligato whorls finally order the extensions into a connective line. Andante, the contrapuntal horn and string patterns are constricted in the finale courtesy of a walking bass line and Drake’s rim shots.

The string section had been left at home three years previously when Parker and company played a jazz festival in Rome. In their place – and to provide more rhythmic impetus to this salute to Chicago Soul songwriter Curtis Mayfield (1942-1999) – is Daryl Foster on soprano and tenor saxophones, Sabir Mateen on tenor and alto saxophones and pianist Dave Burrell, plus Barnes, Parker and Conquest. In glorious voice, Conquest personifies the Mayfield’s material which encompasses his period with the Impressions (“People Get Ready”) as well as tunes from his influential Superfly soundtrack (“Freddie’s Dead”).

Adding to the purported street cred of the performance is the voice and poetry of professional Black firebrand Amiri Baraka. Although his sardonic, Afro-nationalism adds a few wryly poetic quips to the encore of “Freddie’s Dead” – he even gets off a line about Italy’s ex-right-wing premier Silvio Berlusconi – too often his nattering and mumbling interferes with Conquest’s soaring vocalizing.

Overall a rollicking affair, Parker’s chunky bass lines bring to mind Motown’s 1960s low-string vamp master James Jamerson, the riffing horn section channels 1960s Stax-Volt, while Drake’s stout backbeat could have gotten him R&B studio gigs during Mayfield’s Windy City heyday. Burrell, who has always been comfortable with piano history, adds pre-modern and conscious primitvist inflections to his two-handed accompaniment. Most spectacularly, on “Think” he pulls off the feat of creating a solo that’s simultaneously half-gospel and half-rococo.

However this is also the tune where Foster’s lightweight soprano sax obbligato appears to be paying homage to Grover Washington rather than more substantial players, while Baraka’s shouts and growls are merely annoying. Only Conquest’s verbal tonality and Mateen’s larger horn snorts keep things on an even keel.

Centrepiece of the performance is an almost 21-minute version of Mayfield’s “We Are The People Who Are Darker Than Blue”, with full-bore shuffle rhythm from Drake and undercurrent of riffing horns. Maintaining her bel canto take on the lyrics and backed by Burrell’s gospelish chording and low-frequency coloration, Conquest’s melodious inhabiting of the lyrics provides a profound foundation for Baraka’s heavily rhythmic Afro-American chanting. Later she reveals a hitherto unexposed talent, using scatting glossolalia to blend with Mateen’s altissimo squeaks and slides, while the pianist’s comping accelerates to house-party-style riffs.

A pianist of a far different background joins Parker and company on Corn Meal Dance, which is the newest and perhaps most fully realized CD here. Eri Yamamoto usually plays in more mainstream, piano-trio settings, including on an earlier disc with Parker. Here though, her references are high-frequency near-honky-tonk cadences, which are appropriate for this slice of the modern Black experience reflected not only in the bassist’s compositions, but his gnarly, poetic lyrics as well,

Luckily Conquest is on hand again for verbal interpretation, along with Drake, Barnes and Brown providing the musical ballast. Parker’s imagery appears to equally reflect agit-prop, Black folk tales, the stridency of 1970s’ Gil Scott-Heron and Bob Dylan’s 1960s surrealistic song-poetry. When provided with the proper setting, notable performances result.

“Gilmore’s Hat”, for instance, a light-hearted salute to John Gilmore, the late Sun Ra tenor saxophonist, is a stop-time hand-clapper with snappy words personalized by Conquest, and the music illuminated by Brown’s choked slithery reed lines, wah-wah expansions from Barnes and backbeat rolls from Drake. It concludes with perfectly pitched scatting from the vocalist. On the other hand, proper gravitas is reflected in Conquest’s interpretation of “Tutsi Orphans”, as the band’s vamps underlies this tragic tale of inter-tribal genocide, echoing similar situations in many other Africa countries.

Even better are the overtly political Soledad” and “Land Song”, which unlike Baraka’s limp attempts at relevancy on the Italian disc, manage to score points while remaining sonically first-rate. The latter tune is built up from unison horn lines and metronomic piano key battering, and has lyrics which cleverly mix contemporary asides with references to traditional post-Reconstruction inequalities. Featuring bull fiddle rumbles and drum rolls, it’s also a solo high point on the session for Brown who illustrates the theme with crying, evocative tones.

Mixing a blues progression and progressive lyrics in the mold of Max Roach’s and Charles Mingus’ 1960s militancy, “Soledad” gains its unmistakable power from the sincerity in Conquest’s voice, which in turn humanizes Parker’s lyrics no matter how far-fetched or obscurely poetic. Barnes’ high-pitched obbligatos provide perfect counterpoint to the singer’s warbling, yodeling and soulful groans.

Each of these outstanding discs provides an opportunity to sample the work of two artists – Parker and Conquest – in full maturity. All are worthy of your time.

-- Ken Waxman

.

Track Listing: Inside: 1. The Makings Of You 2. People Get Ready 3. Inside Song #1 4. We Are The People Who Are Darker Than Blue 5. Spoken Introduction 6. Think 7. Freddie’s Dead

Personnel: Inside: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Daryl Foster (soprano and tenor saxophones); Sabir Mateen (tenor and alto saxophones); Dave Burrell (piano); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums); Leena Conquest (voice) and Amiri Baraka (voice and poetry)

Track Listing: Alphaville: 1. Alphaville Main Theme 2. Journey to the End of the Night 4. Natasha’s Theme I 5. Interrogation 6. Alpha 60 7. Oceanville Evening 8. Civilization of Light 9. Outlands 10. Natasha’s Theme II

Personnel: Alphaville: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Mazz Swift (violin); Jessica Pavone (viola); Julia Kent and Shiau-Shu Yu (cellos); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) and Leena Conquest (voice)

Track Listing: Corn: 1. Doctor Yesterday 2. Tutsi Orphans 3. Poem for June Jordan 4. Soledad 5. Corn Meal Dance 6. Land Song 7. Prayer 8. Old Tears 9. Gilmore’s Hat

Personnel: Corn: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Eri Yamamoto (piano); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) and Leena Conquest (voice)

March 28, 2008

William Parker/Raining On The Moon

Corn Meal Dance
AUM Fidelity AUM043

William Parker Double Quartet

Alphaville Suite

Rogue Art: ROG 0010

William Parker

The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield – Live in Rome

Rai Trade RTPJ 0011

Concerned with different varieties of the Black vernacular experience, each of these fine CDs by bassist William Parker is impressive on its own. More profoundly each illustrates in a different way that the musical divisions among jazz, R&B, improvised music and soul are, in many cases, merely arbitrary.

Encompassing themes that are respectively populist (The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield), particular (Alphaville Suite) and highly personal (Corn Meal Dance), the sessions are stimulated not only by the resourcefulness of Parker’s compositions and arrangements, but by emphatic contributions from other band members. Although the personnel vary from disc to disc, each group includes, besides Parker, drummer Hamid Drake, trumpeter Lewis Barnes, and most spectacularly, vocalist Leena Conquest.

A Dallas native who has also worked with jazz-funk vibesman Roy Ayers and neo-bop pianist Mulgrew Miller, Conquest’s impressive vocal range, elevated diction and theatrical presentation pushes the performances on each of her appearance with the combo(s) another notch higher. No strident scat singer or flighty diva, she’s heir both to the clearly enunciated soul tradition of Dinah Washington and Aretha Franklin and to the socio-political undertakings of Abby Lincoln and Jeanne Lee.

That’s one inadvertent disappointment on Alphaville, since as “special guest” Conquest sings only on two short tracks. On the other hand the instrumental work is Parker’s most precise, since his compositions and arrangements salute the themes and influence of Alphaville, French director Jean-Luc Godard’s 1965 film classic. To amplify his compositional palate for the CD, Parker’s core trio is joined by his usual reed partner, alto saxophonist Rob Brown, plus a post-modern version of a string quartet: Mazz Swift on violin, Jessica Pavone on viola and cellists Julia Kent and Shiau-Shu Yu.

Rather than being used for conventional sweetening, the string performances are instead most often angular, spiccato and staccato, adding discordant arpeggios and shredded pulsations which at separate times cleave to Parker’s strummed centre tones or Brown’s skittering vibrato.

Although the CD is an exceptional showcase for the alto man’s tart, neo-bop tongue fluttering, it doesn’t mean that he’s the only soloist who excels here. Drake’s bass drum breaks and shadowed paradiddles add percussive heft to the 10 tracks. Meanwhile, to pick another highlight, Barnes’ trumpet flourishes and muted runs are involved in a contrapuntal duet with the thumping bass line on “Alpha 60”. Another theme is elaborated by Barnes’ darting, swift half-valve brass effects as well as Drake’s single cymbal reverberations, succeeded by sul ponticello circular bowing from the five strings. Its summation involves Barnes’ bugling tempo changes, bent notes and an extended mouthpiece tongue kiss.

With its loping Crime Jazz-like theme filled with sharp arco patterning and splintered tension-release “Doctor Badguy” is one of the two most programmatic tracks here; the other, “Interrogation”, depends on the aural images crated by descending double-pumping massed strings. Still, “Civilizations of the Light”, which was in Duke Ellington-fashion put together in the studio on the day of recording, proves that thematic fidelity doesn’t fully supersede improvisational smarts.

Composed with an almost Latinesque cast the tune has violinist Swift’s fierce, discursive solo introduce contrapuntal shrieks from other strings followed by their tremolo, squeezed triplets and Brown’s spilling arpeggios. Parker’s obbligato whorls finally order the extensions into a connective line. Andante, the contrapuntal horn and string patterns are constricted in the finale courtesy of a walking bass line and Drake’s rim shots.

The string section had been left at home three years previously when Parker and company played a jazz festival in Rome. In their place – and to provide more rhythmic impetus to this salute to Chicago Soul songwriter Curtis Mayfield (1942-1999) – is Daryl Foster on soprano and tenor saxophones, Sabir Mateen on tenor and alto saxophones and pianist Dave Burrell, plus Barnes, Parker and Conquest. In glorious voice, Conquest personifies the Mayfield’s material which encompasses his period with the Impressions (“People Get Ready”) as well as tunes from his influential Superfly soundtrack (“Freddie’s Dead”).

Adding to the purported street cred of the performance is the voice and poetry of professional Black firebrand Amiri Baraka. Although his sardonic, Afro-nationalism adds a few wryly poetic quips to the encore of “Freddie’s Dead” – he even gets off a line about Italy’s ex-right-wing premier Silvio Berlusconi – too often his nattering and mumbling interferes with Conquest’s soaring vocalizing.

Overall a rollicking affair, Parker’s chunky bass lines bring to mind Motown’s 1960s low-string vamp master James Jamerson, the riffing horn section channels 1960s Stax-Volt, while Drake’s stout backbeat could have gotten him R&B studio gigs during Mayfield’s Windy City heyday. Burrell, who has always been comfortable with piano history, adds pre-modern and conscious primitvist inflections to his two-handed accompaniment. Most spectacularly, on “Think” he pulls off the feat of creating a solo that’s simultaneously half-gospel and half-rococo.

However this is also the tune where Foster’s lightweight soprano sax obbligato appears to be paying homage to Grover Washington rather than more substantial players, while Baraka’s shouts and growls are merely annoying. Only Conquest’s verbal tonality and Mateen’s larger horn snorts keep things on an even keel.

Centrepiece of the performance is an almost 21-minute version of Mayfield’s “We Are The People Who Are Darker Than Blue”, with full-bore shuffle rhythm from Drake and undercurrent of riffing horns. Maintaining her bel canto take on the lyrics and backed by Burrell’s gospelish chording and low-frequency coloration, Conquest’s melodious inhabiting of the lyrics provides a profound foundation for Baraka’s heavily rhythmic Afro-American chanting. Later she reveals a hitherto unexposed talent, using scatting glossolalia to blend with Mateen’s altissimo squeaks and slides, while the pianist’s comping accelerates to house-party-style riffs.

A pianist of a far different background joins Parker and company on Corn Meal Dance, which is the newest and perhaps most fully realized CD here. Eri Yamamoto usually plays in more mainstream, piano-trio settings, including on an earlier disc with Parker. Here though, her references are high-frequency near-honky-tonk cadences, which are appropriate for this slice of the modern Black experience reflected not only in the bassist’s compositions, but his gnarly, poetic lyrics as well,

Luckily Conquest is on hand again for verbal interpretation, along with Drake, Barnes and Brown providing the musical ballast. Parker’s imagery appears to equally reflect agit-prop, Black folk tales, the stridency of 1970s’ Gil Scott-Heron and Bob Dylan’s 1960s surrealistic song-poetry. When provided with the proper setting, notable performances result.

“Gilmore’s Hat”, for instance, a light-hearted salute to John Gilmore, the late Sun Ra tenor saxophonist, is a stop-time hand-clapper with snappy words personalized by Conquest, and the music illuminated by Brown’s choked slithery reed lines, wah-wah expansions from Barnes and backbeat rolls from Drake. It concludes with perfectly pitched scatting from the vocalist. On the other hand, proper gravitas is reflected in Conquest’s interpretation of “Tutsi Orphans”, as the band’s vamps underlies this tragic tale of inter-tribal genocide, echoing similar situations in many other Africa countries.

Even better are the overtly political Soledad” and “Land Song”, which unlike Baraka’s limp attempts at relevancy on the Italian disc, manage to score points while remaining sonically first-rate. The latter tune is built up from unison horn lines and metronomic piano key battering, and has lyrics which cleverly mix contemporary asides with references to traditional post-Reconstruction inequalities. Featuring bull fiddle rumbles and drum rolls, it’s also a solo high point on the session for Brown who illustrates the theme with crying, evocative tones.

Mixing a blues progression and progressive lyrics in the mold of Max Roach’s and Charles Mingus’ 1960s militancy, “Soledad” gains its unmistakable power from the sincerity in Conquest’s voice, which in turn humanizes Parker’s lyrics no matter how far-fetched or obscurely poetic. Barnes’ high-pitched obbligatos provide perfect counterpoint to the singer’s warbling, yodeling and soulful groans.

Each of these outstanding discs provides an opportunity to sample the work of two artists – Parker and Conquest – in full maturity. All are worthy of your time.

-- Ken Waxman

.

Track Listing: Inside: 1. The Makings Of You 2. People Get Ready 3. Inside Song #1 4. We Are The People Who Are Darker Than Blue 5. Spoken Introduction 6. Think 7. Freddie’s Dead

Personnel: Inside: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Daryl Foster (soprano and tenor saxophones); Sabir Mateen (tenor and alto saxophones); Dave Burrell (piano); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums); Leena Conquest (voice) and Amiri Baraka (voice and poetry)

Track Listing: Alphaville: 1. Alphaville Main Theme 2. Journey to the End of the Night 4. Natasha’s Theme I 5. Interrogation 6. Alpha 60 7. Oceanville Evening 8. Civilization of Light 9. Outlands 10. Natasha’s Theme II

Personnel: Alphaville: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Mazz Swift (violin); Jessica Pavone (viola); Julia Kent and Shiau-Shu Yu (cellos); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) and Leena Conquest (voice)

Track Listing: Corn: 1. Doctor Yesterday 2. Tutsi Orphans 3. Poem for June Jordan 4. Soledad 5. Corn Meal Dance 6. Land Song 7. Prayer 8. Old Tears 9. Gilmore’s Hat

Personnel: Corn: Lewis Barnes (trumpet); Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Eri Yamamoto (piano); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) and Leena Conquest (voice)

March 28, 2008

Steve Swell’s Slammin’ The Infinite

Remember Now
Not Two Records MW 772-2

Profound and proficient practitioners of adroit improvisation, the Slammin’ The Infinite band is just one of the many configurations in which the members of this dexterous foursome are involved.

But what a quartet it is.

Dedicated – at least on this CD – to performing trombonist Steve Swell’s compositions, the band’s instrumentation and creative effervescence put a 21st Century spin on a combo sound first perfected in the mid-1960s by the New York Art Quartet (NYAQ), which had a similar line-up.

A close associate, and in many ways the heir of the NYAQ’s Roswell Rudd, Swell has as wide-ranging experience and technique as the older trombonist, but exhibits more compositional heft. Sabir Mateen, who plays alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet and alto clarinet here, has at least as much adaptable skills as the NYAQ’s John Tchicai – and is likely proficient on more reeds. Both men are close associates of bassist William Parker among many other of their front-liners gigs.

No Milford Graves, drummer Klaus Kugel substitutes the NYAQ’s most famous percussionist’s domineering mysticism for an efficient command of the kit, using flams, press rolls, cymbal smacks and snare punctuation to advance the eight tunes without calling undue attention to himself. Prone to sul ponticello squeaks as well as double-stopping color and traditional walking, bassist Matthew Hayner emphasizes the improv side of his talents which are often masked in the No Neck Blues Band, his best-known affiliation.

Overall, throughout the disc, Swell’s solos are bracing. His technical prowess encompasses such jaw-clenchers as wide-bore fortissimo slurs, rubato slide manipulation and pedal-point growls. The use of chromatic tonguing in his solo often expands to include additional grace notes as well. Logical, the notable end product is neither logorrheic nor logaoedic.

Often working in double counterpoint during the course of the compositions, Mateen brings a different conception to each of his horns. Most New Thing-oriented on alto saxophone, he favors triple-tonguing and overblowing, screeches and elongated diaphram vibrato. On tenor, powerful and passionate smears and cries often adumbrate accelerated rumbles and focused pops from Kugel, not to mention concentrated passionate low-pitched outings from Swell. The reedist’s playing is most unique when manipulating the clarinet family however. Compressing squeaky coloratura lines into ululating breaths and tongue-stopping, his lines are sometimes call for seconding by slinky adagio beats and thick col legno drones from Hayner.

Kugel’s bell-rattling, cymbal smacks and contrapuntal tapping help maintain and extend the CD’s modernism. At the same time, a glance at track two, “MB-1”, honoring pioneering New Thing alto saxophonist Marion Brown, a label mate an associate of the NYJQ, shows that the band members are cognizant of jazz history as well.

Taken as a whole, Remember Now can easily – and equally – be enjoyed by those with an appreciation of the improvisational advances over the past 40 years as well as those who admire the passion and commitment of earlier Free Jazzers.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Antlers 2. MB-1 (for Marion Brown) 3. Patient Explorer 4. Grow Your Own 5. We Interrupt This Channel 6. Remember Now 7. Different Degrees 8. Stride Right

Personnel: Steve Swell (trombone); Sabir Mateen (alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet and alto clarinet); Matthew Hayner (bass) and Klaus Kugel (drums)

December 5, 2006

Hamid Drake & Bindu

Bindu
RogueArt ROG-0001

With the ensemble and the CD entitled Bindu, an Indian concept that signifies action as in worship or prayer, you know that this almost 75-minute, eight-track CD is not going to be a standard blowing session.

A further look at the personnel confirms this. Leader Hamid Drake plays drums, percussion and tabla, while the other participants are four saxophonists – Daniel Carter and Sabir Mateen from New York; and Greg Ward and Ernest Dawkins from Chicago –

plus Windy City flautist Nicole Mitchell. The reason why the CD is not wholly satisfying however is that the date is segmented: harder, fast-paced riff pieces featuring the reed players and two devotional pieces, the lengthiest of the set.

Moving among his extended percussion kit, which ranges from J. Arthur Rank-like gongs to regular snares, cymbals and floor toms and on to sound makers that resemble congas, bongos, djembes and batás, Drake manipulates and maneuvers them to confirm why his rhythmic aptitude is in demand literally throughout the world. Yet the result may be more inspirational for those who worship at the alters of Paiste and Sonar etc. than those seeking a group identity from Bindu. There’s also a short prelude to this display of spiritual percussion placed midway on the disc.

Similarly, in fact, the lead off track finds Mitchell at variance with the other players. Sticking to complementary hand and palm modulated rhythms, with African echoes, the percussionist only allows the flutist full range for her improvisations. Moving between mostly legit-sounding trills and sometimes raggedy duple-toned timbres, Mitchell proves that her traverse mastery is on the level of Drake’s percussion chops. Together the two oscillate space filling tones that speed up and slow down as she showcases Pan-flute like reverberations, piccolo-shrill double tones and harsh, almost electronically altered overblowing with the same facility.

Regrettably those instrumental stunners seem to be designed for a different CD than the five tracks with Carter, Mateen, Ward and Dawkins. Honoring some of Drake’s heroes such as tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson and drummer Ed Blackwell most of the action takes place with distinctive, vamping call-and-response trills plus outward sounding vibrations from all the horns as the drummer pitter patters on conga and other diminutive parts of his kit.

Most memorable is the consecutive “Bindu #1 for Ed Blackwell” and “Bindu #1 for Ed Blackwell, from Bindu to Ojas”. Despite the mystical trappings of the title, both contain the sort of funky, pared-to-the-bone riffing that wouldn’t have been unfamiliar to Count Basie’s or any other Southwestern territory band reed section. Off-kilter foot-tappers, they highlight irregular vibrated split tones and glottal punctuates from one altoist, double tongued, overblown honks from one of the tenorists and intense ornamentation from a clarinetist as Drake supplies triple-metered Africanized beats.

Unhappily none of the soloists are identified, which is a drawback when four of the horn men play alto saxophone, three tenor and two clarinet. Only Matten stands out because of his guttural chanting screaming and yodeling on the second tune.

Drake’s major devotional and rhythmic statement has many fine moments scattered among the eight tracks here. But those who prefer the music a bit more chordal and cerebral associations will have to live with disappointments.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Remembering Rituals* 2. Bindu #1 for Baba Fred Anderson+ 3. A Prayer for the Bardo, for Baba Mechack Silas+ 4. Meeting and Parting+ 5. Born Upon a Lotus 6 Bindu #1 for Ed Blackwell+ 7. Bindu #1 for Ed Blackwell, from Bindu to Ojas+ 8. Do Khyentse’s Journey, 139 Years and More

Personnel: Daniel Carter (tenor and alto saxophone and clarinet)+; Greg Ward (alto saxophone and clarinet)+; Ernest Dawkins (tenor and alto saxophone and percussion) +; Sabir Mateen (tenor and alto saxophone, clarinet and bass clarinet and voice); Nicole Mitchell (flute)*; Hamid Drake (drums, percussion, tabla and voice)

November 10, 2006

FREEDOMLAND

Yia Yia’s Song
rent control records rcrcd 012

STEVE SWELL
Slammin’ the Infinite
Cadence Jazz Records CJR 1175

Notes from New York’s Lower East Side underground, these two fine sessions show that the spirit of experimentation still shines brightly whether the sounds are called avant garde, the New Thing or Ecstatic Jazz.

What the nine improvisers are playing here is really noting less than intense modern music, but these sounds are often labeled unconventional since the neo-cons have perverted the idea of modern mainstream.

No matter, featured on SLAMMIN’ THE INFINITE and YIA YIA’S SONG is a literal who’s who of top-flight players. A co-op band, Freedomland is one of the myriad groups that feature bassist William Parker and reedist/trumpeter Daniel Carter. Other members are alto and baritone saxophonist Dave Sewelson and bass saxophonist David Hofstra -- who splits and tuba duty with Parker here – also are in Parker’s Little Huey Creative Orchestra (LHCO). Band drummer, Ex-Bush Tetra Dee Pop plays with a variety of other improvisers. Two other LHCO members, trombonist Steve Swell and reedist Sabir Mateen, are featured on SLAMMIN’ THE INFINITE. Matt Heyner, bassist on that date is in the band TEST with Carter and Mateen. Only German-born drums Klaus Kugel isn’t a regular downtowner. In Europe however he has longtime associations with other progressive Continental musicians such as trumpeter Markus Stockhausen and saxophonist Michel Pilz.

Heir to the avant tailgate style of Roswell Rudd, trombonist Swell, who wrote all the tunes on SLAMMIN’ THE INFINITE, is his own man, adding bop articulation and speed to classic smears and shouts in his solos. Broken counterpoint involving his horn and Mateen’s helps focus, “For Frank Lowe”, a hushed threnody for the recently departed first generation New Thinger. It also shows that these musical explorers know the tradition as well as the neo-cons that claim a monopoly on it.

“Box Set”, a stop-and-go piece, confirms this. Built on a freebop theme from both horns, walking bass and the Kugel’s press rolls, it could have been played by the New York Art Quartet in 1966. As it is, the episodic theme recapitulations give plenty of room for Mateen and Swell to open up. The later offers a double-tongued set of rubato slurs, while the later is in irregularly vibrated Aylerian tenor mode with upper-pitched squeaks. The title track is more of the same, although it features legato blowing from Swell. Also notable are Heyner’s long, loping lines at the beginning and his slurred focused bowing that plucks out individual notes, amplified with a burst of spiccato at the end.

“Dresden Art Maneuvers”, at a second less than 18 minutes, is the set’s tour-de-force. Commencing with a throbbing ostinato bass line plus hunt-and-peck martial drum action, it eventually redefines itself into a series of orchestral miniatures. A cappella, Matten twists out obtuse clarinet timbres, Swell slides out muted and open-horn blats, growls and plunges; Kugel contributes door-knocking raps and a double-quick rush over elevated toms; and Heyner creates a resonating tuning peg-scraping bass line.

A little farther on, the bassist’s grating tone almost push his higher strings into erhu territory – a tone that’s joined by harmonic interjections from rattled bells and shaken cymbals, a wavering tenor sax and bisected by a chromatic trombone line. For a climax, the elliptical trombone exhalation is matched by mirroring movements from the bass.

If the CD does have a modest downside, it’s when Kugel gets overexcited -- or the mix is unbalanced -- and he threatens to mask one or another of the others’ work.

When everything is taken into consideration, though, the CD is a fine example of how four in-tune musicians can accompany and complement one another. It’s another stellar achievement for Swell and company.

The same could be said for YIA YIA’S SONG, though here the kudos have to be divided five not four ways. Or maybe that number should be a dozen, since that’s the collective count of instruments the five use. Only Pop sticks to the singular traps set --though the odd percussion fillip can be heard. On the other hand, Carter is the most versatile, turning in beatific work on alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet, flute and trumpet. The prototypical modest sideman -- which is probably why he’s so busy in New York -- he can contribute a flute tone as rarefied as those created by a legit symphony section player, or blast a plunger line from his trumpet as hot and unrefined as a Dixielander – often on the same piece.

You can hear that on the title tune, which also allows the others to show off their quick-change identities. Undulating flute carries the main theme, which is complemented by a rugged bass ostinato, stuttering cross harmonies from alto saxophonist Sewelson and simian-like ritualistic cries from all concerned. Pop, who could be auditioning for Papa Wemba, sounds as if he’s resonating bugarabu or djembe drums as well as mythic Africanized little instruments.

Hofstra’s bass saxophone tone is restrained here to harmonize with the lead alto line, but on the almost 16½-minute “One Blue Eye”, he gets to stretch and speechify from the farthest reaches of his sax, adding to the harmonic Donnybrook of the others. With the other saxophones whinnying, irregularly pitched and jutting across the bar lines, his reed monster billows, buckles and snorts. Finger cymbal cracks and double stopping bass lines presage pedal point bass sax action with broken horn harmonies vamping behind. Carter adds musette-like writhing counterpoint from his clarinet and Parker, elephant-like trumpeting from his tuba,. Meanwhile, Sewelson, unperturbed, plays a fairly legato alto line.

However elsewhere, in some of his solo spots on baritone, Sewelson confirms his fellowship with Freedomland’s other members of by skronking Pat Patrick-like pitch vibrations with the same facility he brings to mellow Gerry Mulligan-like moderato expositions elsewhere.

If you can’t afford the time and expense to hang out in Manhattan’s East Village or Lower East Side, these two CDs will give you an authentic picture of the freeform music thriving there.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Yia: 1. Don’t Throw Out The Sky 2. Yia Yia’s Song 3. One Green Eye 4. Moonbeams in a Jar 5. One Blue Eye

Personnel: Yia: Daniel Carter (alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet, flute and trumpet); Dave Sewelson (alto and baritone saxophones); David Hofstra (tuba and bass saxophone); William Parker (bass and tuba); Dee Pop (drums)

Track Listing: Slammin’: 1. With the Morning Hope 2. East Village Meet and Greet 3. Box Set 4. Dresden Art Maneuvers 5. Slammin’ the Infinite 6. Voices from the Asphalt 7. For Frank Lowe

Personnel: Slammin’: Steve Swell (trombone), Sabir Mateen (alto and tenor saxophones, clarinet, alto clarinet and flute); Matt Heyner (bass); Klaus Kugel (drums)

March 28, 2005

DENNIS GONZÁLEZ NEW YORK QUARTET

NY Midnight Suite
Clean Feed 20

DENNIS GONZÁLEZ’S INSPIRATION BAND
Nile River Suite
Daagnim CD9

Products of a two-day bushman’s holiday in the Big Apple by Dallas-based trumpeter Dennis González, these CDs should irrefutably proves that non-New Yorkers can show Naked City denizens a thing or two.

González, who is also a schoolteacher and a visual artist, runs a supportive co-op organization in Dallas and in the past has recorded with other advanced hinterland players like New Orleans saxist Kidd Jordan and Chicago bassist Malachi Favors. Taking two suites of compositions with him, the brassman plus local drummer Michael Thompson recorded these two CDs in two days with different bands of New York’s finest.

NY MIDNIGHT SUITE links the two with certified downtowners, who are also leaders on their own: tenor saxophonist Ellery Eskelin and bassist Mark Helias. Longer and more ambitious NILE RIVER SUITE finds González and Thompson, in the company of players who often work with bassist William Parker: multi-reedist Sabir Mateen, recently rediscovered bassist Henry Grimes and brassman Roy Campbell, in whose band Thompson also plays. Both are impressive achievements.

More raucous, MIDNIGHT sounds like Ornette Coleman quartet with Don Cherry or Albert Ayler’s band with his brother trumpeter Donald. But González is a more sophisticated soloist than those men were, while Eskelin’s bent is to append Gene Ammons-like soulfullness to a modern overlay.

This is made most clear on “Dominant Fang”, whose antecedents include Latin ass well as freebop. It sometimes sounds as if what would happen if Sonny Rollins’ “East Broadway Rundown” was recast as a hip cop show theme. Here the tenor man double tongues and produces a crying tone, while González, staying in lockstep with him not only frequently reprises the theme but holds to a gentler, more graceful tone.

Meanwhile, the most descriptive part of the Suite, “Runaway Taxi Uptown” has a definite Manhattan vibe and almost replicates a cab ride. Centred on call-and-response between the saxist’s reed biting and the trumpeter’s high triplets, mellow smears and bent notes, it finds Eskelin deconstructing his tone as he ascends the scale. Behind them Thompson mixes his splintering bounces and flams with sandpaper-like incursions on his drumheads and Helias contributes arco punctuation. Ending finds González recapitulating the musical theme as Eskelin sources taxi honks.

On the other hand, “Angels of the Dark Streets”, Part II of the Suite and the unrelated, more-than 18 minute “Hymn for the Elders” showcases a more temperate, style, but with toughness still present. On the first, Eskelin unleashes an atonal, irregularly pitched trill that sounds as it comes straight from the sax bow. With Helias moving from walking bass line to spiccato and Thompson cymbal smashing, the trumpeter unleashes a clutch of triplets, which later on suggest “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”. With the front line contrapuntal, both appear to be voicing different parts of the melody, as the saxist finally slows down to lower intensity slurred vibrations.

Polytonal counterpoint enlivens “Hymn” as well, as does unaccompanied cadenzas from Eskelin at the top, a resounding bass drum tone and ground bass lines from Helias. Spurting a few broken grace notes González moves lazily up the scale, encouraging the reedist to spew colored air, the drummer to scour his cymbal and the bassist to slide portamento across his strings. Harmonically muted legato tones from both hornmen gradually curve and double tongue to the quiet ending.

“The Nile Runs through New York (Part IB)” and The Nile Runs through My Heart (Part II)”, two parts of the Nile suite which also run into one another, demonstrate what the composer-trumpeter can do with additional aural colors. The entire CD was recorded the day following the previous session.

On the first tune, Mateen’s vamping flute and Grimes’ bowed bass buffer González’s bravura performance, which logically from the performer comes with a certain Spanish-tinged majesty. Muted, the trumpeter faces off with sluicing clarinet work from Mateen, whose flutter-tongued obbligatos add a certain folksiness to the proceedings. Using soaring moderato grace notes, the composer’s contrapuntal resolution ends the piece with a woody growl. Bridged by a slow-paced bass solo, the second track showcases Campbell amplifying González’s solo, but identifying himself by squeezing, staccato valve work, producing spirals of growls and bleats.

Elsewhere, as on the more than 18 minute “Lyons in Lyon”, named for the altoist Jimmy and the French city, Grimes’ unvarying bass pulse sometimes threatens to push the band back to the anthematic 1960s. But Mateen’s raspy overblowing on alto and Campbell’s looping, vocalized triple tonguing prevents the tune from becoming too chant-like. Soon González adds wiggling counterlines to the other oracular horns, eventually leading one brassman to concentrate on the modulated mid-range as the other shrills higher notes. The bassist offers up a metallic, ponticello tone, Mateen vibrates clarinet pitches and Thompson’s rolls, flams and rebounds on snares and toms help the piece moderate and becomes softer with more unison octave harmonics.

Ultimately the CD is brought to the end with “Hymn for the Ashes of Saturday”. But it’s one religious song whose mixed secular/sacred reference includes a “Night Train”-like shuffle head that’s extended with march tempo rat-tat-tats from Thompson. Meanwhile, as González pecks ahead of the beat on his horn, the other horns riff behind him. Following a ratamacue-ready solo from the drummer that ratchets the wooden parts of his kit, the bands exits as the trumpeter plays a bugle-call-like reveille and Mateen twists and smears his reed into a double timed ending.

As the song goes, “If you can make it here/You can make it anywhere” and González has proven that statement with some help from the locals. Judging from his skills as a composer, arranger and player, what’s really needed is for New Yorkers and other urbanites to pay more attention to his scene in Dallas.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: NY: Suite: 1. (III) Sketch the Wings of Midnight 2. (II) Angels of the Dark Streets 3. (I) Runaway Taxi Uptown 4. Hymn for the Elders 5. Dominant Fang 6. New Short Song

Personnel: NY: Dennis González (trumpet); Ellery Eskelin (tenor saxophone); Mark Helias (bass); Michael Thompson (drums)

Track Listing: Nile: 1. Lyons in Lyon 2. Sand Baptist 3. The Nile Runs through New York (Part IA) 4. The Nile Runs through New York (Part IB) 5. The Nile Runs through My Heart (Part II) 6. The Nile Runs through Us All (Part III) 7. Hymn for the Ashes of Saturday

Personnel: Nile: Dennis González (trumpet); Roy Campbell Jr. (trumpet, pocket trumpet, flugelhorn and flute); Sabir Mateen (alto and tenor saxophones, flute, alto and Bb clarinets); Henry Grimes (bass); Michael Thompson (drums and percussion)

October 18, 2004

WILLIAM PARKER & THE LITTLE HUEY CREATIVE MUSIC ORCHESTRA

Spontaneous
Splasc (h) WS CDH 855

SATOKO FUJII ORCHESTRA-EAST
Before the Dawn
NATSAT MTCJ- 3010

Downtown, they say, is a state of mind. So is so-called downtown music, as these two live big band sessions demonstrate. With polychromatic ideas enlivening both groups, and with composers extending and distend the status quo, the points of congruence between SPONTANEOUS -- recorded in May 2002 at the epicentre of hip, Manhattan’s CBGB’s -- and BEFORE THE DAWN -- recorded 16 days later at a jazz festival in Hamamatsu, Japan -- are closer than you’d imagine.

Each CD features a clutch of top-rank soloists and section players, although the first CD’s two compositions are firmly in the instinctive tradition of post-New Thing large ensembles, while the BEFORE THE DAWN’s five tunes are more carefully arranged. That difference may reflect the orientation of the leaders, though, rather than where each is domiciled.

Bassist William Parker, the unofficial mayor of New York’s Lower East Side, has been in thick of the avant garde for 30 years, playing with groups of every size and with everyone from Cecil Taylor to David S. Ware. Formally educated with degrees from both Japanese universities and Boston’s New England Conservatory, pianist Satoko Fujii has evolved her own style drawing on mentors like Paul Bley, traditional Japanese sounds and echoes of post-Rock. She also lives part of the year in Tokyo and part in New York, where besides leading smaller bands, she helms her Orchestra-West, with sidemen often closely allied to the Parker circle.

DAWN allows her to show off her hometown team as Orchestra-East, which is both good and bad. Some 0f the players have a history in the Island’s somewhat insular experimental music scene, and add unexpected textures to her composition. Others toil at more conventional gigs, which on this disc sometimes leads to the creation of vamps from the sections that are more reminiscent of the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra than so-called outside large bands.

This musical schizophrenia is most notable on the almost 20 minute “Joh-Ha-Cue”. Initially moody and atmospheric, it begins by featuring Kunihiro Izumi, the alto saxist from Shibusa Shirazu (SS), a local avant-big band soloing in a reedy Klezmer-lite style. But in his showcase, Pikaia leader trumpeter Takao Watanabe moves between a whinnying muted lead line and a Maynard Ferguson-like screech. Almost before you know it, SS’s drummer Masahiro Uemura is bearing down on the sounds like a rock-influenced Buddy Rich and bassist Toshiki Nagata comes up with enough highly amplified thumb pops to fit in on a Brothers Johnson West Coast R&B session. Here and elsewhere, tenor saxophonist Hiroaki Katayama takes on the role Flip Phillips and much later Sal Nistico had in successive Woody Herman Herds: the reed sparkplug whose gruff growls and honks goose on the others.

Eventually swing gives way to gentle suggestion of gagaku music in the tune’s second section, with SS’s baritone man Ryuichi Yoshida, providing gentle, rural- sounding flute playing that could almost come from a shakuhachi. Cowbell thwacks and irregular patterns characterize the drummer’s contributions, until unison andante trombone lines give way to an open-horned, chromatic trumpet solo by Natsuki Tamura, Fujii’s husband and closest collaborator. Working with only the bass and drums behind him, his outbursts alternate with unison smears from brass and reed sections. As the other horns ascend and descend the chord structure, the drummer rolls and ruffs. Tamura then comes up with some unexpectedly gritty freylach tones, while the bassist’s unvarying rhythmic structure holds the tune together. Ending with all 15 musicians shouting out discordant timbres as loudly as they can, the coda showcases Jungle-style plunger work from the trumpeter.

Earlier, on “Pakonya”, baritonist Yoshida slurs, snarls, shouts and triple tongues out split tones, bouncing in and out of the altissimo range to confirm his avant-garde credentials. Added as well are darting Cecil Taylor-like arpeggios from the keyboard, one of the few times Fujii solos. Nevertheless, the underlying theme is strictly AfroCuban, complete with the band members noisily vocalizing, as well as a Randy Brecker-style high notes and brassy solo that isn’t ascribed to, but probably comes from trumpeter Yoshihito Fukumoto, who plays in Orquestra de la Luz, Tokyo’s (!) most acclaimed salsa band.

On other tracks there are effervescent and symphonic suggestions that meld conventional horn parts with contributions from Fukumoto, Free Improv veteran trombonist Tetsuya Higashi and tenor saxophonist Kenichi Matsumoto, whose slow, gliding aural walk contains a sprinkling of split tones. With wounded rhino squeals from the baritone sometimes vying with Arabic-sounding high reed interludes, and a restless drummer whose boppish bomb-dropping mixed with steady rock-like thump alternately pays homage to Kenny Clarke and Rush’s Neil Peart, other tracks seem to lack a cohesive vision.

Then again would the unison vocal spirit chanting that mixes with riffing horns on “Wakerasuke” have an additional resonance for an Oriental, rather than an Occidental audience? Older pianist Toshiko Akiyoshi wrote a similar section in a composition on her SHOGUN album years ago. With the sound reminiscent of a crowd at a sumo wrestling match or amateur talent time in Bedlam, it adds a confusing subtext to the piece. Otherwise it’s all daringly speedy bass runs, mewling trombone slurs, honking, dueling tenor sax lines plus octave jumps and piano clipping from the leader.

More catholic in conception than Fujii’s CD, SPONTANEOUS is a sound monument to the bigger band currents that have been around since ASCENSION. Setting the pace with judicious rhythm at the beginning, Parker is subsequently heard as infrequently on his session as Fujii is on hers. Here he sets up the pulse, helps create some light, Gil Evans-like rhythmic underpinning, and then gets out of the way for the other 16 musicians.

Along the way Gold Sparkle Band (GSB) member Charlie Waters sounds out some shrill, split-tone swaggering clarinet tones and trumpeter Matt Lavalle moves from shrill slurs, a more mellow middle register and chromatic runs, with the double drum team hitchhiking along behind him. Lavalle ends his solo double-tonguing with an allusion to the Woody Woodpecker theme. Squealing, multiphonic alto work from Rob Brown, trombonist Dick Griffin’s more expansive brass vibrations, lockstep rhythmic patterns and double bass drum pedal action and press rolls set up other standards. As another point of difference between this group and Fujii’s, tenor saxophonist Sabir Mateen may double time and swoop over the massed sections playing behind him, but you wouldn’t confuse that work with what Joe Farell used to do with the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis band. This is especially true when Mateen introduces snarling panting dog tones.

Throughout, there’s enough room for the soloists as there would be in more traditional big bands, yet riffing tutti passages, with the occasional high trumpet trill poking through the other sounds, provide the connective tissue to holds this together. By the end of the first track, the sections are moving as one, with themes sounded at different times varying the beat, all of which finally combine into a lumbering, shuddering end stop.

Dedicated to bassist Charles Mingus, there are times on the second track that the offbeat shuffle from the drummers -- who individually power the GBS or David S. Ware’s and Matthew Shipp projects -- plus the wiggling, blaring brass are more reminiscent of Sun Ra’s Arkestra or a studio funk band than anything Mingus wrote. Still Alex Lodico, playing Jimmy Knepper to Parker’s Mingus, corkscrews out emphasized plunger tones with a bit of grit at the end, while longtime Parker associate, trumpeter Lewis Barnes glisses from bent notes to repetitions. As the band forges on polyrhyhmically, with a tuba’s pedal point ostinato added, trumpeter Roy Campbell, Parker’s associate in Other Dimensions in Music, makes his way up the scale in half step grace notes backed by a steady walking pulse from the bassist. All around him the brass peck out their parts as the reeds surge and smudge the bar lines below them. As spontaneous hand clapping breaks out -- another Mingusian touch -- Matten overblows himself into dog whistle territory. Spurring the band forward as it undulates back-and-forth at the same time, his reed-shattering, incendiary tones serve the same incendiary purpose tenor saxophonist Booker Ervin’s did with Mingus. With the reeds and brass still detonating sounds every which way the piece fades away.

Whether your preference is for downtown Tokyo or downtown Manhattan, if you’re a modern big band follower, you’ll probably want both these discs.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Spontaneous: 1. Spontaneous Flowers 2. Spontaneous Mingus*

Personnel: Spontaneous: Lewis Barnes, Roy Campbell, Matt Lavalle (trumpets); Dick Griffin, Masahiko Kono, Alex Lodico, Steve Swell (trombones); Dave Hofstra (tuba)*; Rob Brown (alto saxophone, flute); Ori Kaplan (alto saxophone); Charlie Waters (alto saxophone, clarinet); Sabir Mateen (alto and tenor saxophones); Darryl Foster (tenor and soprano saxophones); Dave Swelson (baritone saxophone); William Parker (bass); Andrew Barker, Guillermo E. Brown (drums)

Track Listing: Dawn: 1. Pakonya 2. Joh-Ha-Cue 3. Wakerasuke 4. Before the Dawn 5. Yattoko Mittoko

Personnel: Dawn: Natsuki Tamura, Yoshihito Fukumoto, Takao Watanabe, Tsuneo Takeda (trumpets); Hiroshi Fukumura, Haguregumo Nagamatsu, Tetsuya Higashi (trombones); Sachi Hayasaka, Kunihiro Izumi (alto saxophones); Hiroaki Katayama, Kenichi Matsumoto (tenor saxophones); Ryuichi Yoshida (baritone saxophone, flute); Satoko Fujii (piano); Toshiki Nagata (bass); Masahiro Uemura (drums)

December 15, 2003