Woo
September 23, 2024Hoo-Hah
Circum-Disc CIDI 2402
Christine Wodrascka/Didier Lasserre
Lupercales /1
Freddy Morezon Mr. Morezon 034
Somewhat under the radar over the years , perhaps because of her distance from Paris as well as other international Jazz centres, French pianist Christine Wodrascka has continued to create notable free improv on her own and with associates like Susana Santos Silva and Gerry Hemingway. As these recent discs attest though some of her most profound sounds are created with continental associates.
Drummers Peter Orins on Hoo-Hah and Didier Lasserre on Lupercales /1 have often worked with the pianist. Ironically though both these sessions were conceived of when Wodrascka after playing separately with each of the drummers in larger ensembles decided to collaborate in smaller iterations. The main difference between the sets is that Lupercales /1 features only Wodrascka and Lasserre, whereas Hoo-Hah adds Polish alto saxophonist Paulina Owczarek.
Getting her duet with Lasserre off to a rousing start, the pianist moves among two-handed, low pitch variations and elevated note chiming, Sophisticated and gentle her expositions also include detours, asides and sudden clef leaps, as the drummer, who often works with Benjamin Duboc, isolates roistering press rolls, rim shots and low-pitch rumbles. Both reach a connective apogee on “Quotidien des gestes et des vitesses”, the disc’s nearly 22 minute centrepiece. Applying different variants of pressure as they move through variations of tempo and pitch, after elevated key tinkles the pianist settles into soundboard ruminations as Lasserre emphasizes pop and ruffs from his drum set.
Building an exposition also encompassing silent pauses, Wodrascka’s intermittent piano key echoes involves the instrument’s hammers, dampers and action. Responding in kind, Lasserre’s stop-time patterning encompasses gentling raps and quivering thumps. As every subsequent chorus becomes more reflective the drummer’s woody nerve beats intersect with Wodrascka darting around the notes’ highest pitches.
The remaining tracks produce theme variation with strums on the piano’s inner strings and progressive cymbal abrasions finally climaxing on “Autre et pareil”. The apex actually becomes relaxed story-telling. That exposition fits multiple notes into a straight line narrative with occasional cascades adding keyboard strength and her final two-handed emphasis as the drummer sounds positioned press rolls.
The Woo trio provides a glimpse of how another drummer reacts to Wodrascka’s keyboard skills. Orins knows instinctively how to play with committed improvisers. Having been part of numerous ensembles including ones with Satoko Fujii or Sakina Abdou, He brings distant drum top pops, barely-there rumbles and ratcheting scrapes forward when the other players introduce extended techniques such as Owczarek blowing dyspeptic air through the saxophone with no key movement or Wodrascka introducing stop-time keyboard emphasis.
Like the other CD, it’s “Why Not?” the first, almost 35 minute track which defines the program. With Orins sounding tones that seem to promogulated with plastic sticks on drum top plus wooden box slaps, he creates a undulating backdrop. On top of it, the pianist ascends from isolated key clips and clatters to a seemingly unstoppable exposition, while the saxophonist creates a similar nearly unbroken series of sighs, cries and tongue stops. Owczarek’s emphasis on choked air pressure is met with strums on the piano’s internals strings and Orins steadying metallic slaps and cymbal vibrations.
One-third of the way through as the reed lines become thinner the contrapuntal response come from drummer and pianist. Wodrascka combines ringing key clips, pedal pressure and soundboard shakes; Orins percussion crunches and shudders. Meanwhile small implements wobble on both piano strings and drum tops. Owczarek’s strained yelps continue to contrast tellingly with percussive pianism, with the narrative finally reconfigured from the saxophonist’s crowing split tones and the pianist’s bouncy key thumps. Drum pops signal the finale, with a coda finding Wodrascka resonating single keys one at a time.
Creative music avatars exist and improvise in many settings other than major Jazz centres. These two sessions by Wodrascka and associates prove that.
–Ken Waxman
Track Listing: Hoo-Hah: 1. Why not? 2. Spacer w angielskim orgrodie 3. Hoo-Hah
Personnel: Hoo-Hah: Paulina Owczarek (alto saxophone); Christine Wodrascka (piano) and Peter Orins (drums)
Track Listing: Lupercales: 1. D’un un équilibre interrrompu 2. Comme le veut l’usage 3. Quotidien des gestes et des vitesses 4. Où se découpe la tache claire 5. De brève durée, sans autre formule 6. Autre et pareil
Personnel: Lupercales: Christine Wodrascka (piano) and Didier Lasserre (drums)