Bagatellen

Euphonic Coup

There’s been surprisingly scarce rattling of sabers in the wake of the announcement of the latest MacArthur “Genius’ Awardees. That’s a $500,000 purse doled out over five years to 23 “Fellows.” This year’s bushwack in the musical category: pianist Reginald Robinson. Robinson’s just 31, a Chicagoan with three albums on the Delmark label. He’s been mining & dusting off the geriatric rituals of Ragtime for quite some time, but not necessarily in Wyntonian fashion. His back-story is pretty interesting too, having taught himself how to play in his early teens on a cheap toy keyboard. He later switched to spinet, sharpening a daunting technique, but still unable to read music. Classes at the Conservatory of Music in Chicago changed that and he started churning out original compositions at a prolific pace. The Delmark deal, inked on the stature of a single demo, came a few years later.

I’ve only heard one of his albums, Euphonic Sounds (his third), and found it an enjoyable if somewhat workaday exercise where Robinson trafficked in the patterns of Joplin and Morton, occasionally putting complex modern spins on the interlocking syncopated melodies and undergirding rhythms. Sort of a more conventional version of what Dave Burrell’s been doing for over three decades, without the freer improv leanings (and so the inevitable question- why wasn’t Burrell picked for the prize?). The absence of outcry is unexpected and refreshing. But it makes me scratch my stubble-stippled chin with suspicion.

Odd echoes of Vandermark here, who plucked the trophy back in 99’ and incited a whirligig of contention & grousing that still rears up its pointed snout occasionally (pretty much whenever Ken’s mug pokes back up into the limelight). Robinson’s press blurb states that he “plans to plans to reach out and educate the public - more specifically children - about ragtime and its place in American musical history.” Visions of an Institute for Ragtime Research & Development with degrees in Euphonics and Joplinology keep percolating through my pate.

But again, why isn’t the jazz intelligentsia up in arms over Robinson’s anointing? Is it because Ragtime really doesn’t register on the radar of most? Or is it that the art form is more acceptable given its antediluvian roots? Robinson’s even younger than Vandermark was when he received the award. Also, the music he’s chosen to work with has some strong self-imposed limitations in terms of the directions he can take it. My guess is that a lot of the potential backbiters just haven’t registered his coup yet.

The MacArthur Foundation’s methods of selecting its medalists have long intrigued me. Anonymity of its award committee members is central to its mystique. Much of the press surrounding the annual announcement makes certain to emphasize how each winner has no prior knowledge of his or her place in the selection pool. Each is notified by an “out of the blue” phone call. The money is shelled out “no strings attached.” I’ve had my doubts about these details over the years, but there’s no arguing that it makes for good copy. Also cool is the usual far-flung range of recipients. A few of this year’s other “Fellows’ include: a marine roboticist, a farmer, a high-school debating coach, a philologist and a glass technologist. Robinson is in some good company and I wish him the best with his newly found financial freedom.

Eno at Stylus

Just a quick note to point readers to week-long series at Stylus about the peculiar Mr. Brian Eno.

The series focuses in on Eno's "ambient" period of 1978-82, skipping over his immediately post-Roxy Music work, and jumps right into his collaborations with Robert Fripp (so beloved by a certain writer about these parts). Lots of worthwhile anecdotes, the series works partially as an appendix to David Toop's Ocean of Sound, helps to flesh out some of the concerns therein. It's also appropriately critical, and not too fawning.

Also noteworthy: Eno is only a few steps removed from Cardew. On his Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy, he enlists the aid of the Portsmouth Sinfonia, whose connections to the Scratch Orchestra are numerous.

Fred Van Hove - Spraak And Roll

WIMproacht/negen CD 030304

Fred Van Hove’s almost forty years as an innovative force in avant-garde piano have not lead to an evolution in his style. His Vogel recordings of 1972-74, recently reissued on Atavistic, show him already in full command of a prodigious and exploratory technique. This new double set exudes a modicum of introspection amid Van Hove’s customary pyrotechnics; lines merge, intertwine and disentangle with even more internal clarity and playfulness than on earlier recordings, possibly as a result of Van Hove’s many hours logged at the organ. Even the layout of the two discs bespeaks both a unifying intellectual rigor and a deep mischievous streak.

The first disc, called “Spraak”, sports song titles without vowels, but neither rocket science nor fluency in Torah Hebrew is necessary for pattern recognition -- “FST”, “FSTR”, “FSTST” being only one series in a Boulezian labyrinth. Or is it Joycean? Do I hear some retrospective self-reference in “BLLS”, or is Van Hove really alluding to the first suite for Vogel, employing similarly extended piano preparation, rather than to the FMP Balls? Hard to say, but Boulez and Stockhausen are certainly present in the quick and staccato phrasing, the serio-comic silences, the layers of counterpoint and terraced dynamics all shot through with an unflagging virtuosity. All of this is, however, subservient to gesture; these fifteen tracks do not sing, drone or hum -- they speak in all manner of dialects.

The second disc presents music as different from the first as are its titles. Texture here is dense but minimal, the main focus being melodic complexity on a grand scale. “Roll” is a three-part suite, the last of which clocks in at a surprisingly fast-moving forty-six minutes. Dubbed “Roll Over” to complement the disc's two other tracks --“Roll On” and “Roll Off” -- that’s just what the piece does. It’s a large but abortive crescendo and decrescendo, beginning in a low register with pedal-produced counterpoint, rising steadily with growing force and subdued brutality, but we barely get above middle C! The circle closes with a relative whimper, almost a stutter. Approaching and retreating from the apex, the sonority is massive, monolithic, never overly loud but absolutely concentrated and often moving. As with the other two pieces on the disc, Ligeti’s micropolyphonic clusters and rock and roll’s sinewy syncopations are simultaneously referenced: another extended twist in Van Hove’s serpentine construction. It is a brilliant closer to a set which attests to his awe-inspiring talents both as an improvising musician and as a composer.

~ Marc Medwin

Cocteau Twins - Treasure (4AD)

Chronic Town-era M. Stipe, Starsailor's Captain Buckley, Gollum Yorke, they've got no ululation on E. Fraser.

Souxsie Sioux sprechstimme, scat and Lillywhite echo winding through tear- and tea-stained doilies hung out to dry. Cherubs mumble, of course, bad poetry and all. Choirs can't fill the void vacated by sense. And harps are only muted by the heavenly hash of the clouds. So these fantasies -- not wholly aurual -- spin themselves out of Aegean taffy, pumice, Joseph Mallord William Turner landscapes (rather than Wyndham Lewis vortices), and the heavy floral perfumes favored by women who become little girls all over again, demurring as they do to the swathe and billow of their taupe, shapeless frillery. For all its synthesized sparkle, this pop is more Victorian than The Kinks at their most gazing-back-over-the-garden-wall.

Ciò è tutto il così mess bello, risposte, parole che non erano mai. Cela est tout l'ainsi mess beau, réponses, mots que pas erano jamais. Aquilo é todo l'ainsi mess bonito, respostas, palavras que não erano nunca. Αυτό είναι όλο l'ainsi όμορφο δεν βρωμίζει, απαντήσεις, λέξεις εκείνο το όχι erano ποτέ.

The twins jumped the wall on the back of a hiccup.

~ Joe Milazzo

Lileks

Roach/Braxton - One In Two - Two In One

Max Roach / Anthony Braxton
One In Two - Two In One
hatOLOGY 601

Art Lange’s liner notes give the misleading impression that this performance at Willisau was a “spontaneous collaboration” between Roach, who performed the previous day in a duet with Archie Shepp (captured in The Long March on Hat Hut), and Anthony Braxton, who performed with his quartet on the following day (also been released on the label). Perhaps this cross-generational melding of icons had not been planned by the festival organizers. However, the two were far from unfamiliar with each other, having performed a year before on the Black Saint release, Birth and Rebirth. That studio recording occurred within a period of great artistic fertility for Roach; within a four year span he recorded Streams of Consciousness with Abdullah Ibrahim, Historic Concerts with Cecil Taylor, M’Boom re: Percussion for Columbia, as well as two recordings of his touring quartet. Braxton was certainly no stranger to duet recordings, having done so with George Lewis, Richard Teitelbaum, Roscoe Mitchell, Ran Blake and Muhal Richard Abrams.

Birth and Rebirth was a true meeting of very different artistic minds - a rhythmic master who cut his teeth on bebop but always kept his ears open to further musical possibilities, and a multi-instrumentalist who was an integral part of the AACM before moving to Europe to spread the word of his unique approach to improvisation and composition. The result was a performance that grabs one’s attention from the first note, with a stylistic give and take that is both entertaining and challenging.

One In Two - Two In One contains most of the earlier compositions performed as a medley. As one would expect, the songs have morphed into somewhat different entities through time, as some phrases are emphasized differently in reaction to the audience or the mood of the moment. There are some additional unidentified collaborations in the live performance, including a memorably bizarre one where Max plays chimes under Braxton’s contrabass clarinet croakings, and some solo performances in the latter part of the concert. The one annoyance is that despite several appropriate places for track divisions, the CD reissue's only track division comes where the first lp of the original release ended and the second began. But this is the only caveat about an otherwise exemplary reissue; and the music itself is wonderful.

~Steve Griffith

Joe Pass - Virtuoso in New York

Pablo 2310-979-2

When it comes to bountiful vault holdings, few musicians can compare with the oeuvre established by guitarist Joe Pass. As the Pablo label’s plectral staple his tape stacks rival and possibly even surpass those of Norman Granz’s other resident factotum Oscar Peterson. The steady crop of titles (one or two each year) that continue to find their way to circulation on disc gives the illusion that virtually ever note he ever picked in studio or on stage was captured by mics both covert and overt for posterity.

This latest set offers more of what’s already available in abundance. Pass by his lonesome in the studio circa summer of 75’, trusty hollow-body slung over shoulder, his mind primed to the task of doing what he did best. The disc’s title dispenses with vagaries and skips right to the transparent. Pass was a virtuoso, a label I feel more than comfortable ascribing despite my somewhat checkered past with its usage. Over a three-quarter of an hour stretch he spins improvistory fantasias on a septet of chamois-polished standards, the solitary original blues thrown into the mix in two takes. True it’s nothing too removed from the usual press of the Pass mold, but like his arguable piano counterpart Art Tatum, Pass could make the same old tunes shine under the close scrutiny of brilliant new hues and colors.

He’s partially successful in the cause here. Ear-ringingly fast single notes vie with strummed chords in a performance that sounds as if at least one other guitarist is sitting in with the maestro. “A Ghost of a Chance” decelerates to a leisurely lope as Pass places attention on crafting gliding chords that orbit easily around the tune’s cloying melody. The original “Blues for Alagarn,” which trades grace and gentility for a healthy dollop of fatback lard. Applying creative heat and grease to string of expressive choruses, Pass pops out bent notes like a hot kettle spouting billowy kernels of corn. He caps it off with a call and response coda of single notes and rhythmic strums redolent with reflexive humor.

The slightly shorter alternate of the tune which closes the program is packed with even more surprises. Here, Pass favors a sharper tone and crisper attack, playing a knuckle-cracking run in the middle that never jumbles or stumbles in its precise note placement. “The Way You Look Tonight,” registers a finger-speed record with cheetah-paced middle and later choruses that could easily give Johnny Griffin’s various breakneck versions a run for their money. An equally dazzling spin through Kurt Weill’s “Moritat” puts more serious friction to Pass’s calluses. Both tunes are among the handful of other suspects that receive demiurgic recastings.

Considering the track record, there’s little doubt that another Pass pearl from the Pablo vault will be down the pike directly. In the meantime there’s this aptly titled repast to tide our appetites over. Sometimes more of the same can be a mighty agreeable thing.

~ Derek Taylor

Tina Louise - It's Time For Tina ( P & S / Fresh Sound)

Believe it or else, but the former Miss Tina Blacker and the future "option" for regressive drunkards -- as in the bar game WOWY, or "Which one would you?" -- actually studied at Strasberg's Actor's Studio in the 1950's. And what you will hear on this, her lone long-playing record, is something like Method balladeering. The torchy Louise can carry a tune, and not as if she's hauling coconuts or buckets of lagoon water. (On a related note: a close inspection of the original cover for this LP reveals that the come-hither photo of the actress has been modified. Where she was no doubt wearing only a bikini top in the source shot, an artist has painted her torso so that it looks as if she is wearing evening attire. Reminiscent of the necktie painted over Blind Lemon Jefferson's collarless farm-boy shirt in the only known image of the bluesman... The 1998 Oglio reissue of It's Time For Tina uses a 1960's vintage close-up of Ms. Louis, ruining half of the record's effect.)

In fact, Louise's breathy, sub-sub-Marilyn Monroe vocal stylings lace together to form a unique enthrallment. She is never far from panting over orchestra leader Buddy Weed's raunchy yet gossamer arrangements, but who ever thought panting could be so expressive of a whole range of, if not emotions, then at least levels of desire. Singing like this was supposed to be winkingly exhibitionistic for its time, I guess, but 50 years later, the pleading boudoir mannerisms leave the listener feeling much like a peeping tom. Music heard from the other side of a fogged-up car window, or through a key-hole. The music is coming from a place where one is not supposed to be.

Quite apart from Louise's performance, there are guest appearances on this record by Tyree Glenn (trombone, no vibes), Hilton Jefferson, and Coleman Hawkins. Jefferson's obbligatos in particular are stunning; why one of the most accomplished alto saxophonists in jazz made so few recordings after his star turn with the Calloway orchestra remains a rather sad mystery. But while Glenn and even the majestic Hawkins are still knocking on the bedroom door, Jefferson is draining another bottle of champagne and contemplating the nape of his lady's neck as if it were moonlight itself.

~ Joe Milazzo

take this post, please

Doesn't seem to be much happening on the main page these days, though there's so much going on in the world. It's a helpless feeling, what with hurricanes bearing down so relentlessly on our brothers and sisters in the southeastern US, and with cookie cutter pundits waxing critical on assembly line politicians and wandering aimlessly while making people dumber in what a dear friend calls a Political Kindergarten. I can only offer diversion, and so the following are things/ideas in which I've lately found escape:

• Lost quartets and forlorn dates:
  Johnny Griffin's Introducing Johnny Griffin is at once a hard bop firestorm and the loneliest of classic jazz performances. It's a buried treasure of sorts, one that revitalizes some standards and charges with originals encased in the spirit of the era. Lonely, because there it will sit, until you rifle through the shelves and happen upon it in your search for something else entirely, and remember inconclusively that maybe there's something special about the music inside, until you spin it again and wonder why you don't listen every day. Wynton Kelly at his bluesiest (chain), Messengers mainstay Curly Russell (capstan) and Max Roach (anchor).
• All things Orwell (and McCarthy to boot):
  Whenever I'm in a rut or simply looking for inspiration, Orwell's the writer I most frequently embrace. Having finished a re-read of Homage to Catalonia, but not quite ready to let go of George's familiar, welcoming voice, I revisited Shooting an Elephant, perhaps his most honest bio-snippet (at least it feels that way) and skilled for its demonstration of concision. But attention has turned to Cormac McCarthy, that sure thing from the latter half of the 20th century, the one whose settings are as memorable as his characters, and then only to their own broken, regional prose.
• Single Mode fiber optics and walking the dog:
  In all of my adult training, nothing has been as immediately beneficial as becoming a fiber optics technician. Fasten a 100 lb weight to the end of a length of fiber, 10 microns in diameter, and it will hold forever. Flick the same length laterally, with the tip of your finger, and that weight crashes to the floor. Never mind that that same strand of fiber is engineered to carry entire lives, binary representations of DNA, or all the text in the Library of Congress in record time. Think about that the next time you're favoring the mindless, or taking the beagle around the block.
  
• Improv or inconsequence? 
  And does it really matter? Not so much anymore. You won't find the unmistakable heart or near-tangible humility that's in a Joe Maini solo or a Holman arrangement or a Barry Guy composition in the new breed of improv, but you'll find real music, improv that might not be as self-evident, and it's worth every ounce of patience spent. That, or it just gives you the right kind of goosebumps. Would that some of the new music (and some of its fans) could rid itself of its own awareness. Don't let it distract you that some of today's music is so conscious of its own supposed social and philosophical implications. And when music discussions here go off the deep end and finally come to rest with a childish last word, remind yourself that there's more to it than that. You just have to remember why you ever realized how much you love music in the first place.

Shoup/Makihara/Arnold - Confluxus

Wally Shoup / Toshi Makihara / Brent Arnold
Confluxus
Leo 399

There’s something about the sound of an alto sax and cello. I don’t know which Julius Hemphill record I first heard that matched him up with cellist Abdul Wadud; Dogon A.D. (with drummer Philip Wilson) on those wonderfully plentiful Arista Freedom LP’s in the 70’s, or Raw Materials and Residuals on Black Saint with JAH looking like a badass Mr. Clean and Famoudou Don Moye on drums. Either way, after hearing those monsters the hook was set; anything that had that combination was grabbed up quickly. Tim Berne and Hank Roberts Cause and Reflect, got it; David Eyges, Byard Lancaster & Sunny Murray on Crossroads, bingo; Clusone Trio, whoa baby!!

Sixty year old saxist Wally Shoup has been active in numerous free jazz scenes since 1970, beginning in Colorado (where he was determined to forcibly shake some atonal life into the John Denver scene) , and ultimately moving to Seattle in 1985. He and cellist Brent Arnold were members of Part W, a trio which received critical acclaim following its self-titled release on the Apraxia label in 1996. Subsequently, he received a higher degree of exposure through performances with Thurston Moore, including Hurricane Floyd in 2000 with drummer Toshi Makihara.

This trio, captured live on Sonarchy Radio in the Pacific Northwest on July 26, 2003, is a challenging and entertaining mix of collaborative efforts. The songs range from full blown cacophony, but with a discernible germ of logical structure buried within (“Two Breaths Away” and “Joyride”), to plaintive explorations through understated themes (“Inside Straight”) that are far more than mere resting places from which to gather strength for the next sensory assault (“Convergence for Three”). And that’s just the first four songs!! Although this is the trio’s first recorded effort they obviously work and play together very well. Sax and cello fans get thee hence!

~Steve Griffith

The Ink Spots - Anthology (MCA)

In memoriam, Lee Milazzo (1942 - 2004).

This CD was the last Christmas gift I ever gave my father (2003), and he received it in some wonder. He had no idea that I remembered his fond reminiscences (the few he had of his earliest childhood years, most them being set in the hot, clangorous polio wards of Scottish Rite hospital here in Dallas) of this vocal group, and he certainly did not think that any such compilation existed. Though I prefer Jimmy Ricks and the Ravens, or even the Mills Brothers, something about the "original" Bill Kenney / Decca Ink Spots spoke to my father, who otherwise would rather have been listening to the Vienna Philharmonic. Or Jussi Björling.

I'm taking Anthology back with me now. I know he listened to it by the way the CD booklet was re-inserted into the case: rotated 180 degrees, as if to confuse browsers of his collection who were greedy enough to want to open the thing for a closer look. Sometimes I even still fall for that ruse and pull on the lid that swings up from the other side. It never fails to be an episode which tells several stories all at once.

I'm not sure how soon it will be before I am able to play these discs. Maybe I'll finally hear what it was that remarkable man heard in this music. I can only hope I will.

~ Joe Milazzo

Angharad Davies/Rhodri Davies/Phil Durrant/Mark Wastell - London Strings

Angharad Davies/Rhodri Davies/Phil Durrant/Mark Wastell
London Strings
Absinth
004

Marcus Liebig’s series marches on with the latest four-pack of mini-discs, this time a small survey of London-based string players. As before, the range covered is pretty wide with some variation in quality as well.

Angharad Davies’ work for prepared violin, “Tri Swn”, is in three sections, the first of which is stunningly beautiful, a delicate and ethereal evocation of ghost tones that, for all its restraint, is seething with passion. For myself, these several minutes alone are worth the price of entry. The remaining portions of her piece are grittier exercises in roughly bowed drone harmonics, still absorbing if not quite reaching the ecstatic extremes of that opening, though the closing moments nudge into a similar area. I’d be curious, with regard to this and the Durrant work, to get our own resident violinist Dan’s thoughts. This is the first I've heard of Ms. Davies and "Tri Swn" whets my appetite for more.

Angharad’s brother Rhodri presents “Perdereau” (translation, anyone? I can only find proper name referents), an apparently composed (or, at least, pre-designed) piece for one harp and eight hands, assisted here by John Wall, Taku Unami and Jonathan Dunstan. The need for the additional personnel is a bit hard to fathom. The first ten of the work’s 15 minutes consists of single, massed plucks (perhaps the number of strings excited requires the combined spans of four sets of hands!) allowed to reverberate until they disappear. The music takes on a dark, processional character, very blunt and pared down and quite moving in its single-mindedness. With nothing else to perceive one is cannily lured into considering all the complex elements that make up each booming thrum as it dissipates. Two thirds of the way in, Davies begins to wield an e-bow, lengthening the tones, stretching them out into an attenuated weave. There’s a touch of Lucier here, but far more concern shown for the somber beauty of the sound than for its physics. A lovely, deceptively simple piece.

The only disappointing round this time comes from Phil Durrant. He writes that his contribution, “almost” “focuses on ‘in between sounds’, sounds that are nearly there” and “the vulnerable qualities of the violin”, intriguing ideas that make it all the more dispiriting when the improvisation reads as merely a sequence of related technical exercises. In some sense, his playing isn’t in a vastly different place than Angharad Davies’ but where it counts, where the depth is to be found, Durrant’s conception is lacking, resulting in a list-like enumeration of marginally different approaches. Again, I’d be interested to hear Dan’s take on this one; I may easily be missing some technical facet that would elicit wonderment if I understood the instrument more keenly.

Happily, the best is saved for last (at least in the order I listened to them): Mark Wastell’s string bass and Nepalese singing bells concoction, “For John Entwistle 1944-2002”. Wastell, I’d been informed by Jon Abbey, is a massive Who fan, hence the otherwise surprising dedication. The work certainly reads as an elegy, all dark, thrumming, reverberant notes placed among the softly ringing bells. Much of it is based on a two-note figure that’s actually (check it out!) more than a little reminiscent of Charlie Haden’s wonderful introduction to Keith Jarrett’s “Prayer” from “Death and the Flower” as well as, more metaphorically, Entwistle’s heavy, propulsive sound, more than once conjuring up slightly comic images of a lumbering giant. It’s a wonderfully realized performance, unconcerned with fitting itself into any contemporary scene, simply nodding with respect and appreciation to an admired fellow musician.

Here’s hoping Mr. Liebig keeps ‘em coming.

(further info at: www.absinthRecords.com)

~ Brian Olewnick

Two from Creative Sources

Schwimmer
7 x 4 x 7
Creative Sources
CS 013

Ernesto Rodrigues/Manuel Mota/Gabriel Paiuk
Dorsal
Creative Sources
CS 012

Two releases from the intriguing Portuguese label Creative Sources, each with bits and pieces to recommend it, each with the sort of commonly found flaws one comes to expect in this area of music.

Schwimmer is a quartet comprised of Alessandro Bosetti (soprano sax), Michael Thieke (clarinets), Sabine Vogel (flute, bass flute, piccolo) and Michael Griener (percussion). The album title alludes not only to the seven tracks by the four musicians but also, one assumes, the 7-minute limit imposed on each improvisation. I’m a big fan, generally speaking, of the idea of “restricted” improv, where players must contend with certain rules or meta-musical conceits, but the notion of simple time limits strikes me as somewhat trivial. Bossetti is the only member whose work I’ve been fairly familiar with and, as before, I tend to find his approach a tad or two on the academic side for my taste. This dampens the enjoyment I otherwise derive from the sound developed by the three winds which, much like that heard on the Doerner/Kelley/Neumann/Rainey disc, “Thanks Cash”, is inherently appealing and simply fascinating to listen to. Indeed, I thought much of “7 x 4 x 7” would have been better served without Griener’s presence as his contributions, reminding me in some ways of Tony Oxley’s more delicate work, lend the tracks an air of British 60s free improv, a coloration that doesn’t particularly enhance the rest of the music. As one might expect, the improvisations are all rather quiet with plenty of breath-tones, flutters, bubblings, sputterings, etc. which is all well and good and, in fact, the pieces cohere fairly well. As pure sound, they’re enjoyable enough, as music that evinces any real passion to exist, they’re lacking, coming off as a bit dry, a little calculating. Not bad, not essential.

“Dorsal”, with its trio of viola, electric guitar and piano, is a more open affair, more relaxed with a greater amount of “air” between instruments, and has greater immediate charm. Quiet playing with scurrying undertones is the order of the day, again with more than a nod to past exemplars of the discipline like Iskra 1903. As with the Schwimmer disc, each track works fairly well if leaving little lasting impression (perhaps that’s an aspect of the group’s conception, who knows?) other than having heard three attentive musicians communicating (perhaps that’s enough!). An exception is the piece titled “Natural”, where a wispy continuum is maintained, a tenuous thread of gurgles and brushstrokes with the occasional plink and plonk that’s mysteriously absorbing, with a depth that the remaining pieces don’t quite achieve. Would that this pathway was more intently explored. Mota has a generally lovely attack, picking up the baton dropped by Sugimoto a couple of years back and both Rodrigues and Paiuk are pleasingly self-effacing. They appear to be scratching toward some rewarding areas and if they fall a wee bit short on this particular journey, I’m certainly interested to hear what develops. Of the two releases, this trio has the decidedly greater upside.

~ Brian Olewnick

Anthony Guerra/Paul Hood/Joel Stern - Low Resistance Group

Anthony Guerra/Paul Hood/Joel Stern
Low Resistance Group
Para
PACD012

Recorded in November 2002, the three fine Australian musicians responsible for this album have all progressed notably in the interim. Nonetheless, the six improvisations herein have their moments and, with the advantage of hindsight, lay something of the base for more recent activity. Guerra (on guitar), Hood (turntables, amplified objects, mixer) and Stern (field recordings, contact mics, electronics) are well positioned to construct dense sound assemblages, Guerra often (as is his tendency) providing some tonal leavening amongst the noise. The opening track, in fact, has a good deal in common with some of his solo work, backwards guitar (if I’m not mistaken), coursing through the gritty, debris-strewn soundscapes evoked by his colleagues. Along with the fifth track (all untitled), it’s the most strikingly successful, combining sonic richness with an implied propulsion. I’ve been a sucker for this direction before and I remain so. However, it’s the sort of music I prefer to enjoy on a longer scale. Here, the shorter improvisations cast a somewhat constrained feeling over the disc, lending it more the air of a sampler than of a cohesive statement, something that’s never been a problem with releases from the same group of musicians, in varying contexts, on their own Twothousandand label. Several of the remaining tracks are harsher and more fragmentary, for this listener’s taste an area where they’re a smidgen less effective, sounding not very distinguishable from the work of others in similar territory. I continue to have the impression that their underlying lyricism, however masked or buried, is one of the great strengths of this cadre of improvisers. This includes Stern’s choice of field recordings which often possess an uncanny and unsettling beauty akin to those of Toshiya Tsunoda. Any misgivings I have are not so much about the music itself, much of which is excellent, but simply that the musicians involved have moved on considerably in the relatively brief interval between recording session and release and I’m much more keen to hear what they’ve done this past summer than two years ago. Low Resistance Group (I’m unsure, incidentally, whether this is just the title of the disc or the working band name) is still worth hearing, however, even if the ground covered will be familiar to fans of the individuals involved.

~ Brian Olewnick

Axel Doerner/Greg Kelley/Andrea Neumann/Bhob Rainey - Thanks Cash

Axel Doerner/Greg Kelley/Andrea Neumann/Bhob Rainey
Thanks Cash
Sedimental
SEDCD036

Three performances culled from what the booklet describes as an “exhaustive” US tour in September 2001 find the nmperign duo in the company of Doerner and Neumann. It’s an instrumental configuration I find appealing, that of three winds (though Doerner doubles on laptop) operating with a “bed” of sorts provided by Neumann. Things are rarely that clean cut, of course, but there are touchpoints where this almost “traditional” element (winds over chordal/rhythmic accompaniment) is encountered that serve as small islands of comfort, stepping stones toward the quartet’s further reaches. One notable impression of the disc as a whole is how forceful much of the music is. Not necessarily loud (though portions are louder than one might expect), but almost non-stop urgent. You get the impression that maybe Rainey, in choosing these particular performances, was reacting a bit against the label of “reductionism” applied to much of his (and others’) work, a problematic issue he’d already raised in print.

One of the most attractive formal areas explored by this quartet is apparent from the opening seconds of the first track: three wind players exploring breath-tones simultaneously. It’s a great sound, at once linear and complex, allowing the listener to focus in on various aspects of the flux. When offset by Neumann’s skittering string work, there’s almost an embarrassment of riches, more threads than one can follow. There are any number of fine, dark passages, as when Doerner (on laptop) lays down a low rumble, with Kelley finding softly popping sounds and Neumann delicately plucking her innenklavier. It’s as moody, atmospheric and cinematic an effect as you’re likely to find in this area of music. The entire piece undulates with an eely naturalness that sustains strong dramatic tension even as one wants to concentrate on the pure sounds. Very effective. The second, longest, track picks up where the previous one left off, slowly developing a furious maelstrom of wind, breath and screams. Here, as occasionally elsewhere, Rainey allows his soprano to roam into relatively recognizable territory and it works quite well. It will be interesting to hear where reed players go after scouring their instrument’s nether regions for so long; a return, with newly acquired information, to more “normal” tonalities might be one outcome. There’s a marvelous moment, beginning about 15 minutes in, where Neumann (I’m guessing—perhaps Doerner on laptop), initiates a vast, downward-moving throb of sound. Accompanied by staticky detritus and quietly moaning horns, the effect is stunning, swerving into an area as unexpected as it is lusciously verdant. If the final track is a bit more distracted and less cohesive, it’s a small matter. The bulk of “Thanks Cash” is a very rewarding affair, a fine document of four musicians who one hopes will get together again.

~ Brian Olewnick

Cindy Blackman - A Lil' Somethin', Somethin' (32 Jazz)

Publicity is a precious commodity within the anemic niche that jazz occupies in the public consciousness. Perceived precedence is a draw, but it can also be a nuisance, particularly when it comes to gender. Drummer Susie Ibarra sometimes found press more interested in the politics of her femininity than her considerable talents behind a trap kit. Cindy Blackman, whose debut on disc predated Ibarras’s by nearly a decade, probably experienced ambivalence toward her skills on similar grounds. I first got hip to her existence watching a video for Lenny Kravitz’s retro fuzztone rocker “Are You Gonna Go My Way,” her trip-hammer beats fueling the jet-propulsion thrust of the song along a stratospheric trajectory. Even within the rigid dynamics of that context she showed a beguiling rhythmic charisma. Doing some legwork I discovered her four-album run on Muse (the best of purportedly collected here) and a well-nourished resume of gigs with a diverse assembly of employers including: Sam Rivers, Sonny Simmons, Michael Marcus, Frank Lowe’s Saxemble, Rachel Z and Patti Labelle. The material here pulls from a postbop mainstream bag. An almost even balance between standards and originals occupies nearly an hour of music, the latter portion evidencing a competent, if fairly derivative approach to hardbop tune-smithing. Rivers’ “Beatrice” joins more pedestrian fair like “’Round Midnight” and “Tune Up.” All of the cuts contain ample space for expressive playing. Then-young lions like Kenny Garrett and the Roney Brothers (Antoine and Wallace) alternate with graybeard royalty like Joe Henderson and Gary Bartz in Blackman’s various bands. The rhythm sections represented are also gold standard and include the likes of Kenny Barron, Ron Carter, Buster Williams and Jackie Terrasson. Blackman exercises welcome restraint on many of them, recognizing the value in abetting her colleagues with steady accents and asides rather than bowling them over with obvious and easy bombast. Plenty of drum gymnastics grace the set with solos allocated for nearly every tune. Standouts include the press roll extravaganza of “Spank” and the delicate brush ornaments of “Missing You.” Hearing Blackman put her kit through the paces it’s easy to wish that she would quit her current lucrative gig as drummer with British Soul diva Joss Stone and assemble another band of her own. The canyon-wide financial differential probably precludes such a move.

Dreamscape: Label Profile

When I contacted composer, multi-instrumentalist and Dreamscape front man (owner?) Hermann Bühler with some mundane questions about the label’s history and future plans, I received the following enigmatic response:

The label press states that “authentic” art is their MO, but the fragmentary dream images speak more to the music on offer than does all the more coherent hype. Dreamscape—the name of this Zurich-based label is apt in that it conjures both the solidity and durability of earthly structures and the fluidity of the dream state. The sounds on the five discs under discussion fall into that increasingly nebulous area known as “improvised” music, a topic to which Bühler has devoted a great deal of time and scholarly effort. Each disc defies simple jazz/classical/rock categorization, but more importantly, each performance self-consciously erodes the boundaries between aspects of itself, so that, when successful, each set of structural and sonic moments coheres to form wholes which, through surprise, exceed initial expectation.

Cristo Fontecilla’s quartet disc—the only project here which does not feature Bühler—is the “straightest” of the bunch. No disrespect is meant by this, as the players and tunes are absolutely top-notch, but it is the most easily categorizable, admirably fitting the mold of the guitar-based quartet. That said, a wealth of diverse influences is evident from the opening of the first track, where Fontecilla’s guitar sports some tasteful distortion. When he solos, impressive bebop runs and bent blues riffs surprise at every turn, and the other musicians are clearly his equal. The disc hops genres throughout, from beautifully sentimental ballads to raunchy funk and rock with the distortion cranked, but this post-modern ethos never seems forced or contrived. As would be expected from a Barcelona-based group, the Spanish influence is often palpable in timbre and mode choice, the liner notes even implying that Arabic scales have been employed. The brew is jazz, but it’s a multi-flavored mixture.

Sojourn has been filed in the "New Age" category, but this worn-out label does not do justice to a reflectively beautiful collection of clarinet and sarod soundscapes, sometimes accompanied by tabla and vocals. True, the mood is largely meditative, but as with Arve Henriksen’s recent Chiaroscuro, metric and timbral shifts bubble just below the surface to create an unsettling current beneath an otherwise smooth veneer. Bühler’s penchant for clarinet multiphonics is prevalent throughout the latter portion of the disc, where they ferment, often heterophonically, with Moskow’s sarod to create wonderfully jarring dissonances that bespeak familiarity and comfort with both modern classical idioms and world musics.

Multiphonics are the main building blocks on Alto Solo Bühler's introspective exploration of the alto saxophone. The textural and timbral play is here in abundance, in a much less subtle form than on Sojourn, but serially presented. Tempi, breathing, vibrato and articulation change almost from moment to moment; each piece has a one word title, almost as if a half-hearted attempt is being made to contain these ever-shifting parameters in a concise verbal appellation. Bühler is clearly paying homage to both Anthony Braxton and Evan Parker here, and his knowledge of the instrument’s capabilities is simultaneously encyclopedic and practical. Semitonal motivic fragments present in the earlier pieces on the disc return to create a cyclic whole, to Bühler’s further compositional credit, and the recording is mysteriously spacious and ambient.

Unfortunately, the most “composed” set of pieces achieves the most uniform and mundane results. Seven Pieces sports an elaborate compositional scheme in which every aspect is predetermined—group placement, time, tempo, vocal delivery, etc. Global coordinates determine much of what occurs here, but even given such an elaborate plan, the performance as a whole does little to spark long-term interest. Each instrumentalist certainly develops interesting rhythmic patterns with very sparse pitch material, but the net result is fragmented, the constituent parts seeming disconnected from each other as if the metric modulations of an Elliott Carter string quartet had gotten off-track. Even Bonnie Barnett’s vocal squeaks and rasps do not rise convincingly above the miasma. It is possible that another performance would yield better results if, as the score stipulates, a different set of instruments was used.

The other large-scale piece under discussion here, Earthbound, is possibly the pick of the litter. Another Bühler composition, this time focusing on Native American concerns, Earthbound builds and subsides in slow waves over the course of a single forty minute gesture. Fredy Studer’s well-timed but incredibly sparse percussion work opens the piece with vast stretches of silence out of which Bonnie Barnett’s vocals growl, squeak, moan and shudder. As in Berio’s Visage, the vocals are mainly emotive phonics, while Bühler manipulates pre-recorded vocal and percussion tracks over the live improvisational events. So seamless is the integration of live and recorded elements that they are indistinguishable when the piece builds to white-heat intensity. These flashes of lightning alternate with gorgeous expanses of stereophonically swirling drone. Classical, jazz and even post-rock are convincingly merged to create a disc truly representative of the Dreamscape moniker, even though it’s actually on For 4 Ears!

While Dreamscape has had many earlier CD-R releases, I look forward with keen anticipation to more catalog items from a promising roster of players and composers.

~ Marc Medwin

Charles Earland - Funk Fantastique

Prestige 11030-2

Originally an understudy of Jimmy McGriff, organist Charles Earland asserted a more open-eared approach than his mentor upon going solo. By the time of the 71’ to 73’ stretch revisited on this recent Prestige compilation his sound was in full flower drawing in funk, soul and even free jazz leanings with Larry Young a prime influence. The ten tracks herein offer a mélange of these styles. Sadly some of the wine has soured to vinegar with the aging process and several cuts come off as painfully dated. Others, particularly the two featuring a tentet with Lee Morgan, Billy Harper and Sonny Morgan (Sunny Murray’s old ESP running mate) on trumpet, tenor and conga respectively, crackle with barely bottled potency.

Sprawling at ten minutes plus, the title cut makes use of the talent pool beautifully. Deploying on a percolating rhythm the well-girthed band dispenses with a punchy head and defers to Morgan’s loquacious brass. Flautist Hubert Laws follows blowing gelid gusts as drummer Billy Cobham and Morgan keep the beat bouncing at a jaunty clip. Harper’s Trane-scented solo arrives next, ripping through short stack of keening choruses as Earland vamps with thick juicy slabs of notes. The leader’s statement slathers on the tension, contrasting a whirring harmonic drone with jabbing right hand arpeggios as Cobham’s tree-felling sticks punctuate the action.

The ensemble ends up taking a breather until the disc’s final two cuts. “Grab ‘Hole Dis!!” is pretty much out of a straight funk bag with a backbeat-stoked vamp supplying the ballast for another string of solos initiated by trumpeter Virgil Jones. Harper’s extemporization is greasier and less emphatic, but just as arresting as his opener. Earland ramps up another syncopated sustain-dyed solo in tandem with Cobham who then gets his own chance at impersonating the mighty Clyde Stubblefield as funky drummer par excellence. Curiously, Morgan and Harper are the only horns on the closing rundown of the trumpeter’s own “Speedball.”

The other two bands showcased are less impressive, both on paper and in aural evidence. “Don’t Le Me Lose This Dream” and “Never Can Say Goodbye” make use of a pared down septet with tenorist Houston Person and sax doubler Jimmy Vass joining the trumpet of Gary Chandler as horn section. Both tunes are rendered as unadventurous groovers with the former in particular showing its mothball-redolent age. The latter at rises a bit above its R&B staple origins with the help of a tight rhythm and a prickly solo from session guitarist Maynard Parker.

Four tracks employ a thirteen-piece ensemble. Eight horns dominate the group and include a returning Harper who shines on the modal “Charles III” amidst a rhythmic chaparral of teeming Brazilian style percussion. Earland’s switch to electric piano and the subtle acoustic guitar accents of Stuart Scharf embellish even more to the congenial island lounge vibe. The version of “My Favorite Things” feels half-baked and longwinded with an uncredited anemic soprano solo (presumably by Seldon Powell) further stymieing the works. Harper’s galloping tenor retort and a spate of combative comping by the leader are about the tune’s only saving graces. The trite posturings of “Auburn Delight” with bathetic lyrics that seem almost an insult to vocalist Joe Lee Wilson represent another misfire.

There’s a fair amount of chaff here along with the grist, but the keepers outweigh the castoffs. As an aperture exposing Earland’s art circa the early 70s this compilation succeeds.

~ Derek Taylor