Potsa Lotsa XL

Silke Eberhard Trio
Being-A-Ning
Intakt CD 435

Rather like asking if you want your favorite repast regular or supersized, Berlin-based alto saxophonist/composer Silke Eberhard offers up two tasty and sonically satisfying versions of her well-prepared musical fare. Two classic ensembles, Being-A-Ning plates her long-time trio with bassist Jan Roder and drummer Kay Lübke. Another menu favorite, Amoeba’s Dance is an augmented variant of her 15-year-old Potsa Lotsa quartet, supersized to 10 pieces as she and Lübke spice up the program, adding timbral condiments from eight other musicians.

Someone who has worked in configurations ranging from duos to big bands with the likes of Ake Takase and Hans Lüdemann, Eberhard’s playing is assertive, but no more dominating in trio form than with the tentet. Notably though Lübke, who has worked with Ulrich Gumpert and Uli Kempendorff among many others, provides the necessary zest for both bands’ musical meals.

During the trio’s 10 tracks the drummer adds clangs, paradiddles and ruffs to regulate the accompaniment abetted by Roder’s thick bass string stops and pumps. On other tracks he breaks up the time with Mylar slaps, bell clanging and a chain rattles. He even uses his rowdy Max Roach-like thunderous pressure in an exchange of fours with Eberhard in the last sequence of the title track, preceding a walking bass resolution and following a reflective introduction built around the saxophonist piling on light and laughing tones.

While Eberhard is obviously capable of creating high energy interpretation to realize a moderated and straight-ahead groove, her horn explorations are frequently dissonant  as well. “Sao” for instance her outputting a high-pitched beep that’s stretched into no-keys inner horn investigations and eventually quivers into a stop-time interlude alongside Roder’s arco-string stops and Lübke’s hard percussion thumps.

Meanwhile tracks like “Lake” and “Die Urwald II” show how to enliven simple themes with triple-tongued reed split tones and flattement, working up the scale while preserving horizontal moves doubled by cymbal crashes and snare pressure on the former and multi-string bass strums and low-key pumps on the latter. Each trio member is completely in sync with the others ideas and production. Throughout this disc they function like the interlocking parts of efficient machinery, but with none of the slickness that could suggest.

Potsa Lotsa XL’s Amoeba’s Dance is a different matter. It’s a suite based on 18 compositions Eberhard wrote after exposure to amoeba dynamics during a residency at Canada’s Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in Alberta. However the full range of instrumental textures are blunted during several tracks that seem more succinct that the microscopic, single-celled organism they reflect. Happily the amoeba’s shape-changing capacities are better emulated in augmented tracks.

Most notable are the multi-sectional “Spineolate” and “Flabellate”. Beginning with a pastoral exposition of blended reed tones sliced apart by Johannes Fink’s sul ponticello cello string pressure, the first slows so that Eberhard’s saxophone trills and flutters slide forward backed by Antonis Anissegos’ piano plinks before climbing the scale. This switch is motivated by Lübke’s percussion pressure torqued with Jürgen Kupke’s clarinet glissandi and Nikolaus Neuser’s trumpet triplets before all convene into a moderated linearity. Initially defined by flatulence and growls from trombonist Gerhard Gschlößl, subsequent textures are soon joined by spiccato string shakes and drum pummeling. Switching tempos to highlight clarion glissandi from the clarinetists, trumpet bites and reed jumps, Gschlößl’s plunger tones eventually smear into theme elaboration.

Among the harmony and discord that alternately define most of the other tunes, the cosmopolitan arrangements are refined enough so that certain assertive motifs define the program. For instance resonations from Taiko Saito’s vibraphone or marimba often slide or strike wooden or metallic tones on top of massed horn lines, elevated brass smears or half-valve scoops. This turn lightens too heavy intonations and in the case of “Orthotactic” provides a moderated coda to previously ascending and descending harsh tones.

Other times unique individuality is exhibited as on “Striate”, where Eberhard’s soprano recorder lead is balanced by percussion smacks and portamento brass pressure. Alternately on “Paraflabellulian”, one of the many swing motifs, rhythm is projected by wide clip clops, clave shakes and xylophone pops as well as drum paradiddles as Neuser and Kupke join Lübke and Saito in creating a percussion showcase.

Creative outlets offer elevated creativity in many sizes and shapes, all of the same high quality. Eberhard proves that maxim in these sets from different sized ensembles.

–Ken Waxman .

Track Listing: Being: 1. What’s In Your Bag 2. Golden Fish 3. Sao 4. Hans Im Glück 5. New Dance 6. Stranger Bossa; 7. Being-A-Ning 8. Lake 9. Die Urwald II 10. Rubber Boots.

Personnel: Being: Silke Eberhard (alto saxophone); Jan Roder (bass) and Kay Lübke (drums)

Track Listing: Amoeba: 1. Dactylopodial 2. Polytactic 3. Reticulate 4. Orthotactic 5. Palmate 6. Monotactic 7. Rhizomonotactic 8. Rugose  9. Striate 10. Lingulate  11. Spineolate 12. Acanthopodian 13. Fan-Shaped/Lanceolate 14. Mayorellian 15. Paramoebian 16. Flabellate 17. Paraflabellulian 18. Vexilliferian

Personnel: Amoeba: Nikolaus Neuser (trumpet, percussion); Gerhard Gschlößl (trombone); Silke Eberhard (alto saxophone, soprano recorder); Patrick Braun (tenor saxophone, clarinet); Jürgen Kupke (clarinet, percussion); Antonis Anissegos (piano); Johannes Fink (cello); Igor Spallati (bass); Kay Lübke (drums); Taiko Saito (vibraphone, percussion)