Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke

Tiebreaker
Not Two MW 789-2

Michael Bates’ Outside Sources

Clockwise

Greenleaf Music 09

Francois Carrier/Michel Lambert/ Jean-Jacques Avenel

Within

Leo CD LR 512

John Heward-Joe McPhee

Voices: 10 Improvisations

Mode Avant 05

Expatriates or homebodies, Canadian improvisers interact with many first-class players from and in any country. The results can be imposing, even if there’s nothing intrinsically Canuck about the music.

Take the Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke CD, Tiebreaker, Not Two MW 789-2. The crowd at this Krakow, Poland date probably thought they were applauding three Americans. Yet while astute trombonist Bishop and solid bassist Roebke are both Chicago-based, versatile drummer Eisenstadt is a Toronto native now in New York.

Bishop’s gutsy slurs and growls lock in place so completely with Roebke’s steady walking and Eisenstadt’s rumbling, funky beats that other instruments aren’t missed. While some tracks may be snappier, the key performance is the almost-39-minute medley that seamlessly links two of the trombonist’s compositions, one by the drummer and another by the bassist.

As the tunes flow into one another, Bishop’s buzzing grace notes elongate into brays, strengthened by Eisenstadt’s drags and rim shots. Moving to “Double Dog”, the second tune, brass chromaticism turns to horn whistles and squeaks, until the drummer’s cymbal embellishments signal the shift into his own “How Are You Dear”. Bishop’s lip burbles personalize the tender line, while adding vocalized tessitura. The bassist’s “Northstar” brings out trombone snorts and tongue gymnastics, answered with fidgety arco sweeps and timed drum strokes. The four compositions fit together as effectively as the players improvise together.

Another essay in co-operation is Clockwise Greenleaf Music 09 by Michael Bates’ Outside Sources, a long-standing quartet. Like Eisenstadt, bassist Bates and tenor saxophonist/clarinetist Quinsin Nachoff are ex-Torontonians now Brooklynites. Americans, trumpeter Russ Johnson and drummer Jeff Davis, join them to create notable sounds.

Steadfastly tonal, the bassist’s nine compositions flit among polyrhythms, waltz time, odd bar lengths and multi-part counterpoint to tell stories ranging from emotional balladry to rhythm dissertations. Bates’ admiration for composers such as Prokofiev and Shostakovich is expressed most profoundly on “The Russian School”, a nocturne with its drama and passion channeled through Nachoff’s saxophone. As the saxophonist’s guttural lines augment in pitch and strength, they transform into coarse, excited cries, as trumpeter Johnson’s muted harmonies add placid coloration. Balanced on top of the bassist’s fierce string-thumping, the tune darken, deepen and is resolved with a steadying confluence of measured sul tasto sweeps from Bates and flutter tonguing from Nachoff.

Nachoff confirms his clarinet credentials on “Fellini” and “Lighthouskeeping”. Stop-time, the later tune allows him to vibrate the pitch-sliding theme contrasted with parallel staccato trumpet, bass and drum intonation. Before the piece concludes diminuendo, both horns interlace with flowing flutter-tonguing. Like its namesake’s films, “Fellini” is buffo and sensuous, as waltz time advances slinky reed motions, ruffs and bounces from Davis and the trumpeter’s half-valve ornamentation. Eventually back-and-forth theme splintering resolves the tonal divide.

Featuring a similarly other-directed saxophonist and a solid bassist, but in trio form, Within Leo CD LR 512 provides a variation on this theme. Alto saxophonist Francois Carrier and his long-time associate, drummer Michel Lambert, are Montréalais, but bassist Jean-Jacques Avenel is French.

Like Tiebreaker, Within captures a first-time alliance that sounds as if the players have worked together for years. The three parts of the 60-minute improvisation, recorded at the Calgary Jazz Festival, depend on mind-melding between the guest and the long-time duo. Avenel’s spiccato thumps help stretch the thematic line to its furthest without shattering, whenever Carrier’s spetrofluctuation and reed-biting threaten to do so. In the tune’s mid-section however, the saxophonist’s slithery, human-sounding cries make common cause with each musician in turn. His contrapuntal interlude with Avenel features ground bass sweeps and col legno sawing used as connective tissue to bond with Carrier’s curt squeaks and flutter tonguing. A similar strategy is apparent on the Lambert-Carrier duets. The drummer’s opposite sticking and ratamacues subtly counter Carrier’s blustering pressure that metaphorically follows every note with an exclamation point. Expanding the time frame the drummer creates kalimba-like plinks and tam-tam resonations. His Asiatic echoes moderate Carrier’s strained Arabic textures so that the resulting timbres simultaneously resemble a gagku orchestra concertizing and Bird and Bags in a bop improvisation. In his duets with Carrier, Avenel’s tremolo plucking allows the saxophonist’s tensile reed-biting to downshift, creating a climatic section that is stately, harmonic and discreet.

Montreal-based visual artist John Heward organized a similar meeting with Poughkeepsie N.Y. multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee. Matching Heward’s drums and kalimba with McPhee’s pocket trumpet and soprano saxophone Voices: 10 Improvisations Mode Avant 05, aurally illuminates Heward’s skills and the extent of McPhee’s instrumental virtuosity. As comfortable in microtonal New music situations as screaming Free Jazz blowouts, except for some watery bluster from McPhee’s saxophone, Voices’ powerful improvisations angle more towards the later than the former.

McPhee’s tenor talents allow him to glide from harsh hocketing to portamento slurs in nanoseconds during “Improvisation 9”. When he reorients the line by blowing colored air through the instrument’s body tube, Heward’s response encompasses frame drum-like resonation and individualized strokes. Beginning the track with bugle-like emphasis in double counterpoint with Heward’s press rolls, the saxophonist’s glottal punctuation ceases by the climax. Completing the “Reveille” inference at the top, his final notes suggest “Taps”, with the drummer’s strokes appropriately martial.

Equally impressive on the trumpet, McPhee chromatically emphasizes various textures where appropriate. He brings an understated 1950s-Miles-vibe to “Improvisation 2” as his muted grace notes, coupled with Heward’s kalimba plucks, conjure up an African savannah as much as an American night club. Matched in broken-octave story-telling, Heward’s drum tops bangs and cymbal smacks complement McPhee near-static internal horn breaths and plunger squeaks.

These CDs don’t make the self-defeating case that Canadian improvisers are good enough to play with outsiders. Instead they confirm that this mixture of locals and others creates a common musical ground notable by any criteria.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For Whole Note Vol. 14 #3

November 1, 2008

Michael Bates’ Outside Sources

Clockwise
Greenleaf Music 09

Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke

Tiebreaker

Not Two MW 789-2

Francois Carrier/Michel Lambert/ Jean-Jacques Avenel

Within

Leo CD LR 512

John Heward-Joe McPhee

Voices: 10 Improvisations

Mode Avant 05

Expatriates or homebodies, Canadian improvisers interact with many first-class players from and in any country. The results can be imposing, even if there’s nothing intrinsically Canuck about the music.

Take the Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke CD, Tiebreaker, Not Two MW 789-2. The crowd at this Krakow, Poland date probably thought they were applauding three Americans. Yet while astute trombonist Bishop and solid bassist Roebke are both Chicago-based, versatile drummer Eisenstadt is a Toronto native now in New York.

Bishop’s gutsy slurs and growls lock in place so completely with Roebke’s steady walking and Eisenstadt’s rumbling, funky beats that other instruments aren’t missed. While some tracks may be snappier, the key performance is the almost-39-minute medley that seamlessly links two of the trombonist’s compositions, one by the drummer and another by the bassist.

As the tunes flow into one another, Bishop’s buzzing grace notes elongate into brays, strengthened by Eisenstadt’s drags and rim shots. Moving to “Double Dog”, the second tune, brass chromaticism turns to horn whistles and squeaks, until the drummer’s cymbal embellishments signal the shift into his own “How Are You Dear”. Bishop’s lip burbles personalize the tender line, while adding vocalized tessitura. The bassist’s “Northstar” brings out trombone snorts and tongue gymnastics, answered with fidgety arco sweeps and timed drum strokes. The four compositions fit together as effectively as the players improvise together.

Another essay in co-operation is Clockwise Greenleaf Music 09 by Michael Bates’ Outside Sources, a long-standing quartet. Like Eisenstadt, bassist Bates and tenor saxophonist/clarinetist Quinsin Nachoff are ex-Torontonians now Brooklynites. Americans, trumpeter Russ Johnson and drummer Jeff Davis, join them to create notable sounds.

Steadfastly tonal, the bassist’s nine compositions flit among polyrhythms, waltz time, odd bar lengths and multi-part counterpoint to tell stories ranging from emotional balladry to rhythm dissertations. Bates’ admiration for composers such as Prokofiev and Shostakovich is expressed most profoundly on “The Russian School”, a nocturne with its drama and passion channeled through Nachoff’s saxophone. As the saxophonist’s guttural lines augment in pitch and strength, they transform into coarse, excited cries, as trumpeter Johnson’s muted harmonies add placid coloration. Balanced on top of the bassist’s fierce string-thumping, the tune darken, deepen and is resolved with a steadying confluence of measured sul tasto sweeps from Bates and flutter tonguing from Nachoff.

Nachoff confirms his clarinet credentials on “Fellini” and “Lighthouskeeping”. Stop-time, the later tune allows him to vibrate the pitch-sliding theme contrasted with parallel staccato trumpet, bass and drum intonation. Before the piece concludes diminuendo, both horns interlace with flowing flutter-tonguing. Like its namesake’s films, “Fellini” is buffo and sensuous, as waltz time advances slinky reed motions, ruffs and bounces from Davis and the trumpeter’s half-valve ornamentation. Eventually back-and-forth theme splintering resolves the tonal divide.

Featuring a similarly other-directed saxophonist and a solid bassist, but in trio form, Within Leo CD LR 512 provides a variation on this theme. Alto saxophonist Francois Carrier and his long-time associate, drummer Michel Lambert, are Montréalais, but bassist Jean-Jacques Avenel is French.

Like Tiebreaker, Within captures a first-time alliance that sounds as if the players have worked together for years. The three parts of the 60-minute improvisation, recorded at the Calgary Jazz Festival, depend on mind-melding between the guest and the long-time duo. Avenel’s spiccato thumps help stretch the thematic line to its furthest without shattering, whenever Carrier’s spetrofluctuation and reed-biting threaten to do so. In the tune’s mid-section however, the saxophonist’s slithery, human-sounding cries make common cause with each musician in turn. His contrapuntal interlude with Avenel features ground bass sweeps and col legno sawing used as connective tissue to bond with Carrier’s curt squeaks and flutter tonguing. A similar strategy is apparent on the Lambert-Carrier duets. The drummer’s opposite sticking and ratamacues subtly counter Carrier’s blustering pressure that metaphorically follows every note with an exclamation point. Expanding the time frame the drummer creates kalimba-like plinks and tam-tam resonations. His Asiatic echoes moderate Carrier’s strained Arabic textures so that the resulting timbres simultaneously resemble a gagku orchestra concertizing and Bird and Bags in a bop improvisation. In his duets with Carrier, Avenel’s tremolo plucking allows the saxophonist’s tensile reed-biting to downshift, creating a climatic section that is stately, harmonic and discreet.

Montreal-based visual artist John Heward organized a similar meeting with Poughkeepsie N.Y. multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee. Matching Heward’s drums and kalimba with McPhee’s pocket trumpet and soprano saxophone Voices: 10 Improvisations Mode Avant 05, aurally illuminates Heward’s skills and the extent of McPhee’s instrumental virtuosity. As comfortable in microtonal New music situations as screaming Free Jazz blowouts, except for some watery bluster from McPhee’s saxophone, Voices’ powerful improvisations angle more towards the later than the former.

McPhee’s tenor talents allow him to glide from harsh hocketing to portamento slurs in nanoseconds during “Improvisation 9”. When he reorients the line by blowing colored air through the instrument’s body tube, Heward’s response encompasses frame drum-like resonation and individualized strokes. Beginning the track with bugle-like emphasis in double counterpoint with Heward’s press rolls, the saxophonist’s glottal punctuation ceases by the climax. Completing the “Reveille” inference at the top, his final notes suggest “Taps”, with the drummer’s strokes appropriately martial.

Equally impressive on the trumpet, McPhee chromatically emphasizes various textures where appropriate. He brings an understated 1950s-Miles-vibe to “Improvisation 2” as his muted grace notes, coupled with Heward’s kalimba plucks, conjure up an African savannah as much as an American night club. Matched in broken-octave story-telling, Heward’s drum tops bangs and cymbal smacks complement McPhee near-static internal horn breaths and plunger squeaks.

These CDs don’t make the self-defeating case that Canadian improvisers are good enough to play with outsiders. Instead they confirm that this mixture of locals and others creates a common musical ground notable by any criteria.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For Whole Note Vol. 14 #3

November 1, 2008

Francois Carrier/Michel Lambert/ Jean-Jacques Avenel

Within
Leo CD LR 512

Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke

Tiebreaker

Not Two MW 789-2

Michael Bates’ Outside Sources

Clockwise

Greenleaf Music 09

John Heward-Joe McPhee

Voices: 10 Improvisations

Mode Avant 05

Expatriates or homebodies, Canadian improvisers interact with many first-class players from and in any country. The results can be imposing, even if there’s nothing intrinsically Canuck about the music.

Take the Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke CD, Tiebreaker, Not Two MW 789-2. The crowd at this Krakow, Poland date probably thought they were applauding three Americans. Yet while astute trombonist Bishop and solid bassist Roebke are both Chicago-based, versatile drummer Eisenstadt is a Toronto native now in New York.

Bishop’s gutsy slurs and growls lock in place so completely with Roebke’s steady walking and Eisenstadt’s rumbling, funky beats that other instruments aren’t missed. While some tracks may be snappier, the key performance is the almost-39-minute medley that seamlessly links two of the trombonist’s compositions, one by the drummer and another by the bassist.

As the tunes flow into one another, Bishop’s buzzing grace notes elongate into brays, strengthened by Eisenstadt’s drags and rim shots. Moving to “Double Dog”, the second tune, brass chromaticism turns to horn whistles and squeaks, until the drummer’s cymbal embellishments signal the shift into his own “How Are You Dear”. Bishop’s lip burbles personalize the tender line, while adding vocalized tessitura. The bassist’s “Northstar” brings out trombone snorts and tongue gymnastics, answered with fidgety arco sweeps and timed drum strokes. The four compositions fit together as effectively as the players improvise together.

Another essay in co-operation is Clockwise Greenleaf Music 09 by Michael Bates’ Outside Sources, a long-standing quartet. Like Eisenstadt, bassist Bates and tenor saxophonist/clarinetist Quinsin Nachoff are ex-Torontonians now Brooklynites. Americans, trumpeter Russ Johnson and drummer Jeff Davis, join them to create notable sounds.

Steadfastly tonal, the bassist’s nine compositions flit among polyrhythms, waltz time, odd bar lengths and multi-part counterpoint to tell stories ranging from emotional balladry to rhythm dissertations. Bates’ admiration for composers such as Prokofiev and Shostakovich is expressed most profoundly on “The Russian School”, a nocturne with its drama and passion channeled through Nachoff’s saxophone. As the saxophonist’s guttural lines augment in pitch and strength, they transform into coarse, excited cries, as trumpeter Johnson’s muted harmonies add placid coloration. Balanced on top of the bassist’s fierce string-thumping, the tune darken, deepen and is resolved with a steadying confluence of measured sul tasto sweeps from Bates and flutter tonguing from Nachoff.

Nachoff confirms his clarinet credentials on “Fellini” and “Lighthouskeeping”. Stop-time, the later tune allows him to vibrate the pitch-sliding theme contrasted with parallel staccato trumpet, bass and drum intonation. Before the piece concludes diminuendo, both horns interlace with flowing flutter-tonguing. Like its namesake’s films, “Fellini” is buffo and sensuous, as waltz time advances slinky reed motions, ruffs and bounces from Davis and the trumpeter’s half-valve ornamentation. Eventually back-and-forth theme splintering resolves the tonal divide.

Featuring a similarly other-directed saxophonist and a solid bassist, but in trio form, Within Leo CD LR 512 provides a variation on this theme. Alto saxophonist Francois Carrier and his long-time associate, drummer Michel Lambert, are Montréalais, but bassist Jean-Jacques Avenel is French.

Like Tiebreaker, Within captures a first-time alliance that sounds as if the players have worked together for years. The three parts of the 60-minute improvisation, recorded at the Calgary Jazz Festival, depend on mind-melding between the guest and the long-time duo. Avenel’s spiccato thumps help stretch the thematic line to its furthest without shattering, whenever Carrier’s spetrofluctuation and reed-biting threaten to do so. In the tune’s mid-section however, the saxophonist’s slithery, human-sounding cries make common cause with each musician in turn. His contrapuntal interlude with Avenel features ground bass sweeps and col legno sawing used as connective tissue to bond with Carrier’s curt squeaks and flutter tonguing. A similar strategy is apparent on the Lambert-Carrier duets. The drummer’s opposite sticking and ratamacues subtly counter Carrier’s blustering pressure that metaphorically follows every note with an exclamation point. Expanding the time frame the drummer creates kalimba-like plinks and tam-tam resonations. His Asiatic echoes moderate Carrier’s strained Arabic textures so that the resulting timbres simultaneously resemble a gagku orchestra concertizing and Bird and Bags in a bop improvisation. In his duets with Carrier, Avenel’s tremolo plucking allows the saxophonist’s tensile reed-biting to downshift, creating a climatic section that is stately, harmonic and discreet.

Montreal-based visual artist John Heward organized a similar meeting with Poughkeepsie N.Y. multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee. Matching Heward’s drums and kalimba with McPhee’s pocket trumpet and soprano saxophone Voices: 10 Improvisations Mode Avant 05, aurally illuminates Heward’s skills and the extent of McPhee’s instrumental virtuosity. As comfortable in microtonal New music situations as screaming Free Jazz blowouts, except for some watery bluster from McPhee’s saxophone, Voices’ powerful improvisations angle more towards the later than the former.

McPhee’s tenor talents allow him to glide from harsh hocketing to portamento slurs in nanoseconds during “Improvisation 9”. When he reorients the line by blowing colored air through the instrument’s body tube, Heward’s response encompasses frame drum-like resonation and individualized strokes. Beginning the track with bugle-like emphasis in double counterpoint with Heward’s press rolls, the saxophonist’s glottal punctuation ceases by the climax. Completing the “Reveille” inference at the top, his final notes suggest “Taps”, with the drummer’s strokes appropriately martial.

Equally impressive on the trumpet, McPhee chromatically emphasizes various textures where appropriate. He brings an understated 1950s-Miles-vibe to “Improvisation 2” as his muted grace notes, coupled with Heward’s kalimba plucks, conjure up an African savannah as much as an American night club. Matched in broken-octave story-telling, Heward’s drum tops bangs and cymbal smacks complement McPhee near-static internal horn breaths and plunger squeaks.

These CDs don’t make the self-defeating case that Canadian improvisers are good enough to play with outsiders. Instead they confirm that this mixture of locals and others creates a common musical ground notable by any criteria.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For Whole Note Vol. 14 #3

November 1, 2008

John Heward-Joe McPhee

Voices: 10 Improvisations
Mode Avant 05

Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke

Tiebreaker

Not Two MW 789-2

Michael Bates’ Outside Sources

Clockwise

Greenleaf Music 09

Francois Carrier/Michel Lambert/ Jean-Jacques Avenel

Within

Leo CD LR 512

Expatriates or homebodies, Canadian improvisers interact with many first-class players from and in any country. The results can be imposing, even if there’s nothing intrinsically Canuck about the music.

Take the Jeb Bishop/Harris Eisenstadt/Jason Roebke CD, Tiebreaker, Not Two MW 789-2. The crowd at this Krakow, Poland date probably thought they were applauding three Americans. Yet while astute trombonist Bishop and solid bassist Roebke are both Chicago-based, versatile drummer Eisenstadt is a Toronto native now in New York.

Bishop’s gutsy slurs and growls lock in place so completely with Roebke’s steady walking and Eisenstadt’s rumbling, funky beats that other instruments aren’t missed. While some tracks may be snappier, the key performance is the almost-39-minute medley that seamlessly links two of the trombonist’s compositions, one by the drummer and another by the bassist.

As the tunes flow into one another, Bishop’s buzzing grace notes elongate into brays, strengthened by Eisenstadt’s drags and rim shots. Moving to “Double Dog”, the second tune, brass chromaticism turns to horn whistles and squeaks, until the drummer’s cymbal embellishments signal the shift into his own “How Are You Dear”. Bishop’s lip burbles personalize the tender line, while adding vocalized tessitura. The bassist’s “Northstar” brings out trombone snorts and tongue gymnastics, answered with fidgety arco sweeps and timed drum strokes. The four compositions fit together as effectively as the players improvise together.

Another essay in co-operation is Clockwise Greenleaf Music 09 by Michael Bates’ Outside Sources, a long-standing quartet. Like Eisenstadt, bassist Bates and tenor saxophonist/clarinetist Quinsin Nachoff are ex-Torontonians now Brooklynites. Americans, trumpeter Russ Johnson and drummer Jeff Davis, join them to create notable sounds.

Steadfastly tonal, the bassist’s nine compositions flit among polyrhythms, waltz time, odd bar lengths and multi-part counterpoint to tell stories ranging from emotional balladry to rhythm dissertations. Bates’ admiration for composers such as Prokofiev and Shostakovich is expressed most profoundly on “The Russian School”, a nocturne with its drama and passion channeled through Nachoff’s saxophone. As the saxophonist’s guttural lines augment in pitch and strength, they transform into coarse, excited cries, as trumpeter Johnson’s muted harmonies add placid coloration. Balanced on top of the bassist’s fierce string-thumping, the tune darken, deepen and is resolved with a steadying confluence of measured sul tasto sweeps from Bates and flutter tonguing from Nachoff.

Nachoff confirms his clarinet credentials on “Fellini” and “Lighthouskeeping”. Stop-time, the later tune allows him to vibrate the pitch-sliding theme contrasted with parallel staccato trumpet, bass and drum intonation. Before the piece concludes diminuendo, both horns interlace with flowing flutter-tonguing. Like its namesake’s films, “Fellini” is buffo and sensuous, as waltz time advances slinky reed motions, ruffs and bounces from Davis and the trumpeter’s half-valve ornamentation. Eventually back-and-forth theme splintering resolves the tonal divide.

Featuring a similarly other-directed saxophonist and a solid bassist, but in trio form, Within Leo CD LR 512 provides a variation on this theme. Alto saxophonist Francois Carrier and his long-time associate, drummer Michel Lambert, are Montréalais, but bassist Jean-Jacques Avenel is French.

Like Tiebreaker, Within captures a first-time alliance that sounds as if the players have worked together for years. The three parts of the 60-minute improvisation, recorded at the Calgary Jazz Festival, depend on mind-melding between the guest and the long-time duo. Avenel’s spiccato thumps help stretch the thematic line to its furthest without shattering, whenever Carrier’s spetrofluctuation and reed-biting threaten to do so. In the tune’s mid-section however, the saxophonist’s slithery, human-sounding cries make common cause with each musician in turn. His contrapuntal interlude with Avenel features ground bass sweeps and col legno sawing used as connective tissue to bond with Carrier’s curt squeaks and flutter tonguing. A similar strategy is apparent on the Lambert-Carrier duets. The drummer’s opposite sticking and ratamacues subtly counter Carrier’s blustering pressure that metaphorically follows every note with an exclamation point. Expanding the time frame the drummer creates kalimba-like plinks and tam-tam resonations. His Asiatic echoes moderate Carrier’s strained Arabic textures so that the resulting timbres simultaneously resemble a gagku orchestra concertizing and Bird and Bags in a bop improvisation. In his duets with Carrier, Avenel’s tremolo plucking allows the saxophonist’s tensile reed-biting to downshift, creating a climatic section that is stately, harmonic and discreet.

Montreal-based visual artist John Heward organized a similar meeting with Poughkeepsie N.Y. multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee. Matching Heward’s drums and kalimba with McPhee’s pocket trumpet and soprano saxophone Voices: 10 Improvisations Mode Avant 05, aurally illuminates Heward’s skills and the extent of McPhee’s instrumental virtuosity. As comfortable in microtonal New music situations as screaming Free Jazz blowouts, except for some watery bluster from McPhee’s saxophone, Voices’ powerful improvisations angle more towards the later than the former.

McPhee’s tenor talents allow him to glide from harsh hocketing to portamento slurs in nanoseconds during “Improvisation 9”. When he reorients the line by blowing colored air through the instrument’s body tube, Heward’s response encompasses frame drum-like resonation and individualized strokes. Beginning the track with bugle-like emphasis in double counterpoint with Heward’s press rolls, the saxophonist’s glottal punctuation ceases by the climax. Completing the “Reveille” inference at the top, his final notes suggest “Taps”, with the drummer’s strokes appropriately martial.

Equally impressive on the trumpet, McPhee chromatically emphasizes various textures where appropriate. He brings an understated 1950s-Miles-vibe to “Improvisation 2” as his muted grace notes, coupled with Heward’s kalimba plucks, conjure up an African savannah as much as an American night club. Matched in broken-octave story-telling, Heward’s drum tops bangs and cymbal smacks complement McPhee near-static internal horn breaths and plunger squeaks.

These CDs don’t make the self-defeating case that Canadian improvisers are good enough to play with outsiders. Instead they confirm that this mixture of locals and others creates a common musical ground notable by any criteria.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For Whole Note Vol. 14 #3

November 1, 2008

Steve Lacy/John Heward

Recessional (for Oliver Johnson)
Mode Avant 04

Culmination of a 20-year friendship, Montreal drummer John Heward’s and American soprano saxophonist Steve Lacy’s first – and last – duo concert is preserved on this CD. A less-than-39-minute bagatelle, Recessional gains added poignancy due to Lacy’s death from cancer a year later.

It’s fitting that the live show honored Oliver Johnson, long-time drummer in the saxophonist’s Paris-based sextet. For Heward, a renowned Canadian painter and sculptor, has recently evolved into an avocational percussionist, proficient enough to play with improv masters like multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee and violinist Malcolm Goldstein

Sensitive yet sturdy, Heward’s duple meter rumbles, cymbal slaps, press rolls and drum-top pitter patter provide the perfect backdrop for Lacy’s improvisations, which after all are the main draw here. Unobtrusive, he fluidly marks tempo and timbre changes along with the saxophonist.

Lyrical and polyphonic with a suggestion of both “Taps” and tap dancing, the main theme is the finale of the concert. Repetitive, melancholy and celebratory, it culminates in an emphasized, echoing split tone from Lacy.

Earlier, the saxophonist, who first defined the soprano’s role in modern jazz, displays his matchless technique. He produces a wide, almost Dixieland-like vibrato at times, and straight, sharp clipped tones elsewhere. Flutter tonguing, double-tonguing and reverberating his body tube, his collection of quacks, snarls and growls is second to none. Yet never do these narrowed, nasal pitches or spit-encrusted obbligatos fail to communicate. Jittery reed-biting textures plus rubato tongue-stopping surround concise story-telling phrases. Meanwhile, the drummer uses bell ringing, kalimba scrapes and press rolls to underline and extend the multiphonic interface.

Never to be repeated, the CD faithfully captures a moment in time.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For CODA Issue 330

January 1, 2007

JOHN HEWARD TRIO

Let Them Pass/Laissez-Passer
Drimala DR 04 347-02

MICHAEL BISIO
Composance
Cadence Jazz Records CJR 1173

Held together by the substantial bass playing of Seattle’s Michael Bisio, these trio sessions are still more different than alike.

Led by Montreal-based visual artist and drummer John Heward and featuring the reeds of Joe Giardullo, both of whom have extensive playing history with multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee -- as does Bisio -- LET THEM PASS is an out and out free music session. Recorded 3,000 miles away in his hometown, Bisio’s COMPOSANCE not only features two other Left Coast improvisers, showcasing what he calls improvisers composing and performing simultaneously -- as the awkward title tries to convey -- but is also Freebop. More often than not, echoes of one of the bassist’s admitted influences -- Charles Mingus -- is heard.

All this is done with a substantially smaller band then Mingus ever led, and lacking three instruments that were part of almost every Mingus date: trombone, saxophone and piano. Bisio’s soloing and accompanying takes up part of the slack, as does the varied percussion of young Greg Campbell -- who has played with saxophonist Wally Shoup -- and the under-celebrated brassman Rob Blakeslee. Blakeslee, who plays trumpet and flugelhorn, has been featured to good effect in big bands and small groups led by multi-reedist Vinny Golia.

Oddly enough, “Charles Too!” the composition named in honor of Mingus doesn’t sound as Mingusian in execution as “CRT”, which honors two saxophone giants - - John Coltrane and Sonny Rollins is a guess. On it, as Campbell breaks up the beat with flourishes, Bisio showcases fleet pizzicato finger work, the trumpeter double tongues as he moves up the scale. The bassman’s woody, resonating tone helps as he walks, the drummer showcases proper bop cymbal work and Blakeslee never sounds a sour note at any tempo.

The more-than-10½ minute “Charles Too!” on the other hand, features gamelan-like rebounds from Campbell that mesh with Bisio’s ponticello swipes that echo as they unroll. As the bassist bows, short percussion resonation is joined by sharper vibes-like sounds and a cymbal beat. With two snaking string melodies, it seems as if the bassist is playing two bull fiddles at once -- or at least is manipulating two bows on different parts of his axe. Entering at midpoint, Blakeslee phrases in an unhurried Miles Davis-like manner, quickening his high pitches so that he ends with short strangled toots. Finally emphasizing his bottom tones, Bisio stays andante as Campbell explodes into a multi-rhythmic metal fest. Finally, a near ecclesiastical, arco bass and trumpet intermezzo sums up the melody.

Duke Ellington, another of Bisio’s -- and Mingus’ -- influences gets his due on “Come Sunday”, where Campbell’s melodious and resonant French horn lines split the partials of the tune as do wheezing trumpet slurs and bee-busy bass shuffles.

Many of the other pieces are episodic in nature, with the three displaying polyphonic tonality and distinct interpretations. Bisio strums flamenco-like chords and finger picks, Blakeslee outputs strangled trumpet breaths and a wide rubato tone, and Campbell brings out the metallic qualities of his extended kit with asymmetric drum pulses.

This versatility is especially noticeable on the title track where the percussionist moves sequentially onto the snares, bass drum and cymbals. Hand-hitting the strings, Bisio digs and scratches until he lets loose with a snatch of Mingus’ “Boogie Stop Shuffle”. Soaring, jagged phrases come from the trumpeter until climax is reached. Then, throat-clenching unconnected phrases mix with fingernail scraped bass strings and the resonation of unselected cymbals.

These sorts of unique timbres are more common on LET THEM PASS, which also has Giardullo playing one of four reeds: tenor saxophone, bass clarinet, alto flute and piccolo, plus featuring extended percussion and bass techniques from Bisio and Heward. All three reach true concordance on the final three tracks -- of seven -- which unsurprisedly are titled “Let Them Pass Five … Six … Seven”.

“Seven” and “Five” give full rein to Giardullo’s Aylerian tenor saxophone styling which enlivens earlier tracks as well. Making use of flattement and spetrofluctuation, split tones turn to overblowning as timbres morph into extended cries and grainy growls. Double-tonguing, the tenorist produces as much motion as sound, and that sound is a trilling squeal that quickens as the piece go on. Reaching a point where reed variations start shredding the upper partials into honks and exaggerated shrieks, Heward contributes ratamacues and flams from his snares and cymbals, while Bisio’s arco sweeps and pizzicato finger picking complement the others’ output perfectly. Percussion rattles and nerve beats buttress Bisio to produce a sluicing bass solo that resonates outwards from his f-holes. Turning straightahead, the bassist meets tam tam intimations from Heward as the saxman reprises the theme with variations.

Both section men are polyrythmically more inventive on “Five” with the drummer seemingly rubbing his sticks over the heads and cymbals rather than hitting them, and the bassist turning to slurred bowing. Although the reedist begins with squeaky sax runs, a couple of minutes on it sounds as if his (overdubbed?) bass clarinet is there as well, adding great, hollow contrapuntal echoes.

Antithetically “Six” is a showcase for alto flute smudges emanating and sympathetically vibrated ponticello bass strings. Using the space and openness available with dissonance, textures soon meld. When Bisio turns to col legno bow percussion, Giardullo adds piercing trills to occupy the other part of the harmonic concordance.

Earlier on the CD, Heward’s counter rhythm invoke everything from thumb piano textures to Arabic-style ceremonial percussion and Bisio’s wavering tonal rhythms stay focused no matter the surroundings. If Giardullo creates peeping piccolo tones, the bassist answers with slurred bowing; should the reedist’s output spetrofluctuation that really sounds trumpet-like, he accompanies it that way; and when smooth bass clarinet lines take on a Middle-Eastern cast, then Bisio emphasizes oud-like bass gestures.

Depending on your capacity for atonality, you can be satisfied with either of these sessions or both. LET THEM PASS is only available at www.drimala.com but that should be a minor impediment.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Pass: 1. Let Them Pass One 2. Let Them Pass Two 3. Let Them Pass Three 4. Let Them Pass Four 5. Let Them Pass Five 6. Let Them Pass Six 7. Let Them Pass Seven

Personnel: Pass: Joe Giardullo (tenor saxophone, bass clarinet, alto flute and piccolo); Michael Bisio (bass); John Heward (drums and percussion)

Track Listing: Composance: 1. CRT 2. Refused 3. Charles Too! 4. Less Than 5. Yo’ Mike Kleimo Here 6. Composance 7. Come Sunday 8. Pretty Boy, Pig Face and the Family God

Personnel: Composance: Rob Blakeslee (trumpet and flugelhorn); Michael Bisio (bass); Greg Campbell (percussion and French horn)

December 20, 2004