Günter ‘Baby’ Sommer & The Lucaciu 3

Günter ‘Baby’ Sommer/Fabrizio Puglisi
Elements
Aut Records AUT 07

Recorded nearly nine years apart in different countries these duo and quartet sessions reflect the ongoing creativity of one of Free Jazz’s most inventive percussionists: Günter ‘Baby’ Sommer. Now 78, the  Dresden-based drummer has gone from playing with East German colleagues to international collaborations spread over several generations. The earlier session is a duo with resourceful Italian pianist Fabrizio Puglisi, a veteran improviser who has recorded with the likes of Han Bennink and Kenny Wheeler. Fellow Germans, the three brothers with Sommer on Karawane are two generations younger than the percussionist. Yet alto saxophonist Antonio Lucaciu, bassist  Robert Lucaciu  and pianist Simon Lucaciu have amassed enough experience working with Sascha Stiehler and Achim Kaufmann.

While each disc contains 12 tracks, a distinctive paradigm defines each. Mixing a miniature suite, other originals and a few standards, the elements that go into Elements include characteristic form investigation plus a hearty helping of noise and badinage, which are always present in both musicians’ performances More precise in form because of the instrumentation, though consisting of all instant compositions, the other disc cycles through many improvisational styles, with the saxophonist and pianist especially featured as much as the drummer.

The standards side of the duo disc include a jerky, jokey deconstruction of “White Christmas”, with unexpected slide whistle peeps plus strings slides and key plinks from Puglisi; and an extended version of “Passion Flower”, which despite an unexplained two minutes of silence in the middle, transforms from loving gentle swing to smack and smash drum beats and spectacular keyboard rolls and detours; and a witty Monk triptych. Paced appropriately, Puglisi uses glissandi and subterranean pitches and a touch of Stride to glide among the Monk heads, becoming faster and more rugged in his interpretation during transitions. Along with the pianist’s string strumming, repeated key clipping and pressure, Sommer adds solid door-knocking accents, echoing pops and a final small cymbal ping.

While the four-part “Fünf Miniaturen” collection gives the drummer a chance to expose archetypal percussion tropes like slaloming smacks militaristic rolls and unlathed cymbal slices that are contrasted with video-game-like whooshes and boings, the three variants of the instant composition that gives the CD its name are more profound. Properly setting up the session “Elements: Air” mixes stopped piano keys, nyckelharpa-like string stretches and prestissimo chording with eccentric vocalizing and seemingly unstoppable cymbal/drum rhythms. “Elements: Earth”, the final tranche, cleverly defines the boisterousness and bulk  that went into the creations. Thunder sheet rumbles and bass drum stresses provide enough power so that Puglisi can define the interaction with a combination of keyboard intensity and leavened floating melodies.

Functioning like a working combo, Sommer and the Lucacius define their parameters from the top with linear expression confirmed by Robert Lucaciu’s walking bass line, Simon Lucaciu’s measured piano comping and Antonio Lucaciu’s pinched alto saxophone cries as well as Sommer’s ruffs, rumbles and cymbal crashes. While as German as beer and sausages, the quartet seems particularly comfortable in tracks that have Blues and Gospel tinges. For instance “Impressions of Little Bird”, with its slurping saxophone lead and slap-drum patterns is mostly defined by the rocking Bobby Timmons-out-of- Arizona Dranes piano chording. Later Simon Lucaciu appears to be channeling gospel and country & western comping during the concluding “Hymnus”. An African-American-like ecclesiastical melody is heard over and over, mixed with reed squeals plus vocal yells and percussion thumps from Sommer.

While other themes may have a so-called classical formalism to them as well as a default to Saxon folk tunes, any ethnic seriousness is undercut by band boisterousness. The drummer’s expected vocal scatting with onomatopoeic inferences and percussion bangs, pitter-patter and cymbal scratches has plenty of help here from piano keyboard pecking and reed squeaks, often elaborated at allegro and presto tempos. Confident enough to assay a herky-jerky “Samba Pastouron”, with an alto saxophone lilt and shuffle drumming and felt rather than heard bass thumps, this spirt ensures that all 12 selections evolve in a horizontal fashion.

Like few improvisers of his generation, Sommer appears to have tapped into the elusive fountain of musical youth. These accomplished discs show that there are also many  exciting and younger players who can keep up with him as well as contribute something of their own.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Elements: 1. Elements: Air 2. Pannonica/Bemsha Swing/Off Minor 3. Hitu 4. Fünf Miniaturen: 1 5. Fünf Miniaturen: 2 6. Fünf Miniaturen: 3 7. Fünf Miniaturen: 4 8. Fünf Miniaturen: 5 9. Elements: Water 10. Elements: Earth 11. White Christmas 12. Passion Flower

Personnel: Elements: Fabrizio Puglisi (piano, toys and objects) and Günter ‘Baby’ Sommer (drums and percussion)

Track Listing: Karawane: 1, Dunkle Wolken 2. Unter jedem Dack ein Ach 3. Zeitwandlerin 4. Dialogue 5. Impressions of Little Bird 6. MKK 103 Breviarium 7. Karawane 8. Aether 9. Zustaende 10. Pan 11. Samba Pastouron 12. Hymnus

Personnel: Karawane: Antonio Lucaciu (alto saxophone); Simon Lucaciu (piano): Robert Lucaciu (bass) and Günter ‘Baby’ Sommer (drums and voice)