Jul 13 2017
The Whistler Bandcamp page is amazing
Chicago bar and club The Whistler has its own Bandcamp page, and it’s pretty damn amazing. The Logan Square joint does food, drinks and local music. They’re also establishing an extra retail avenue for the artists who perform on their stage. They release a “Weekly Free” of music recorded on their turf, and it’s priced Free or Name Your Price (NYP) on their very own Bandcamp page, and any money you choose to pay for the music goes to the artists 100%.
It’s a great opportunity to check out some amazing musicians, and also to hear them in a live setting. Today’s column will give you a brief rundown on the local jazz musicians that have a slot on the Whistler Bandcamp page.
But first, a quick note about Name Your Price etiquette: Whether marked Free or Name Your Price, this music is free for you to download. You should. The musicians want you to have it in your music library to enjoy. But if you’re reading this site, no matter how diverse your backgrounds and experiences and lives may be, I’m completely certain that you all give a damn about the musicians who make your lives better with their creative pursuits, and you’d like to support them. So, for those of you who don’t have a lot of familiarity with the Bandcamp NYP/Free models, here’s some approaches people commonly take:
- Download the album, entering $0.00 as the price (for the Name Your Price), and if you like the music, you go back to download it again and this time enter a dollar amount that you think is fair; and if you don’t like the album, pay nothing.
- Download the album, entering $0.00 as the price, and if you like the music, you go check out their proper studio recordings and buy one of those instead.
- Download the album, entering $0.00 as the price, and if you like the live album, you go buy a ticket to one of their shows and check them out live, and maybe shoot them an email or social media comment letting them know their Bandcamp free album compelled you to support their show.
Obviously, any funds these musicians raise is gonna get invested in making more music, so it’s in everyone’s best interests that we financially support the musicians who build the creative supports that we rely upon to get through life and to remind us how beautiful life can be.
Anyways, I just wanted to get that out there. Now, about this music… let’s begin.
Meridian Trio – Andromeda EP
Three tracks from the trio of alto saxophonist Nick Mazzarella, bassist Matt Ulery and drummer Jeremy Cunningham: one bop, one blues and one that has that weary but transcendent soul of a deep spiritual jazz tune. All three of these names should ring familiar to readers of this site and my eMusic, Wondering Sound and Bandcamp columns. In the instance of Ulery and Cunningham, they’ve each received a slot on this site’s various Best Of lists: Ulery with his 2012 release By a Little Light and Cunningham with his 2016 release re: Dawn (from afar). And of particular note on Mazzarella, he’s got a new album, Triangulum, out on Clean Feed Records with this same Meridian Trio.
Artist site | Listen & Download on Bandcamp
Matt Ulery’s Loom – The Queen
It was Matt Ulery‘s 2011 release Flora.Fauna.Fervor. that first introduced me to the bassist’s predilection for fascinating, unusual music. While a world apart in terms of overall sound, Ulery’s music reminded me of some of Bill Frisell’s stranger output… something otherworldly, alien, but possessing a melodic beauty that makes everything comforting and familiar. The song “The Queen” sources from that 2011 album, and it’s accompanied by two remixes on this EP. Ulery’s Loom ensemble is comprised of pianist Rob Clearfield, trumpeter Thad Franklin, tenor saxophonist Tim Heideman, violinist Zach Brock, vibraphonist Katie Wiegman and drummer Jon Deitemyer.
Go and follow this link to check out more of Ulery’s music on this site.
Artist site | Listen & Download on Bandcamp
Stirrup – Super Seeded
The quartet Stirrup get right in your face and don’t back off. The thing is, while the music often comes off as intense, even angry, all of that aggression has an oddly friendly bearing. Bassist Nick Macri, drummer Charles Rumback, trumpeter Russ Johnson and cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm are your musicians for this track. They were a trio back when they first hit my radar with the 2013 release Sewn, and their music hasn’t grown any calmer or normal since Johnson joined up. Edgy modern jazz, ferocious rock, untamed electronics and any other ingredients they can find in the cupboard go into the mix for what they serve up on a recording. If you like this track, go check out their live album A Man Can’t Ride On One, which was also recorded at the Whistler.
Artist site | Listen & Download on Bandcamp
Dave McDonnell Group – Vox Orion
I first became familiar with the Dave McDonnell Group with their 2014 release The Dragon and the Griffin. Comprised of all-stars from the Chicago scene, the saxophonist’s particular voicing of the post-bop sound had an airy melodicism to pair with its unrepentant edge. McDonnell has moved from Chicago to Cincinnati, and the personnel have shifted around, too, but that particular free-grounded dichotomy is still there. Joining him on this set are vibraphonist Jason Adasiewicz, bassist Joshua Abrams and drummer Quin Kirchner.
In addition to checking out that 2014 release (linked above), also take a spin with his 2016 release Eidetic, which features this same quartet and was also recorded at The Whistler. In fact, many of the compositions on the live album were also featured on the 2014 studio recording. (Go check it out).
Artist site | Listen & Download on Bandcamp
Makaya McCraven & Shane Parish – Spooky Action at a Distance
Drummer Makaya McCraven and guitarist Shane Parish had never performed together prior to this one-off show at the Whistler as part of their Stars Align series… a monthly concert & podcast presentation. McCraven’s name has been cropping up with increasing frequency among my various recommendations columns. This frenetic, jazz-rock-avant garde-etc piece shows his talent doesn’t pay attention to genre borders and that his creative dexterity is likely to appeal to quite a few of the musicians who have made an appearance on this site.
Want to hear more of McCraven’s expansive sound? Check out his 2015 release In the Moment.
Artist site | Listen & Download on Bandcamp
And those are only just some of the tracks featured on
Be sure to dig into the rest and follow those other links to more music by these artists.
In a current jazz environment where an emphasis is placed on explicit compositions and complex presentations, it’s refreshing to encounter a recording that builds around catchy melodic hooks and foot-tapping cadences. There’s plenty on drummer Jeremy Cunningham‘s debut re: dawn (from afar) that makes available an immediate cerebral connection, but this is a recording that’s all about its feel. It’s got modern grooves with old-school tones. A melody gets served up with action at heart, and it could be anything from a drive through the city to the cheerful electricity of a backyard party to the slow motion of late night moonlight and all the romance that comes along with it. Joined by guitarist Jeff Parker, bassist Matt Ulery, and alto saxophonist Josh Johnson, Cunningham’s quartet is something old breathed out like something new, not unlike a soundtrack for returning to the old neighborhood for the first time.
A Best Of album has to hit me right in my heart and provoke a strong emotional reaction. A Best Of album has to engage my head and elicit a cerebral connection. Give me some intrigue. Show me some personality. Extra points awarded for doing something different. I want to hear music that embraces the best qualities of creativity. Strong musicianship alone is not enough. Many excellent albums fall short of earning a slot on this list. It literally pains me when I see some of the albums that aren’t included on my Best Of lists. But I listen to a lot of music, and one of the rare downsides to encountering so much great Jazz is that some of it won’t receive the recognition it deserves. So there you have it.
The very first reaction I had to this album was anger. And it was directed at Taylor Ho Bynum.
Burnt Hibiscus should probably be my album of the year. I always struggle with the decision. Typically it’s a toss-up between my top two albums, but this year, the real contenders are doubled. Even now, as I type this, I’m tempted to tinker with the order of things. The newest from multi-instrumentalist Jon Armstrong unites Indian classical music, chamber jazz and surrealist poetry into a potent work that is delightfully tuneful and seriously enchanting. The crux of this project is Armstong’s collaboration with Sheela Bringi, whose fluttering vocals bring the poetry to life. That she and Armstrong were able to mesh a 10-piece chamber jazz ensemble with traditional Indian ragas is impressive in its own right. But instead of complex music with an impenetrable core, Burnt Hibiscus is as easy to connect with as a children’s lullaby. Traditional instruments like clarinet, trombone and sax snap into place with harmonium, harp and bansuri flute. The melodies provoke a simple, crisp lyricism… a quality the ensemble exploits to launch into intricate rhythmic passages and harmonic excursions that stretch far out from the song’s opening moments. Massively creative at both conception and conclusion, and one of the very best albums to come out in 2016. Perhaps, the very best.
Prehistoric Jazz Vol.3: Three Places in New England should probably be my album of the year. I always struggle with the decision. Typically it’s a toss-up between my top two albums, but this year, the real contenders are doubled. Even now, as I type this, I’m tempted to tinker with the order of things. Eric Hofbauer‘s reinterpretation of Charles Ives’ “Three Places in New England” has all the inventive melodic shaping, toying with tempo, and tonal shifts between edgy dissonance and cerebral post-bop that one would expect from a work crafted in the modern jazz environment. But Hofbauer’s quintet frames it in the context of the source material, and the whimsical bursts of martial candences, introspective takes on down-home folk, and classical music passages intentionally warped and blurred and deconstructed infuse the album with a dual personality that is seriously intriguing. What brings out the fullness of those two sides, uniting past and present, is that the blues informs every bit of motion and melody… even when it comes out sounding anything but traditional. It’s a seriously impressive feat to create cutting-edge music that puts its tangled roots front and center, but for Hofbauer’s quintet, this isn’t a new thing. The third installment of Hofbauer’s Prehistoric Jazz series is the most impressive yet… which is a considerable accomplishment when viewed in the context that the first two volumes were amazing in their own right. Joining the guitarist are trumpeter Jerry Sabatini, clarinetist Todd Brunel, cellist Junko Fujiwara, and drummer-percussionist Curt Newton.
Fulfillment should probably be my album of the year. I always struggle with the decision. Typically it’s a toss-up between my top two albums, but this year, the real contenders are doubled. Even now, as I type this, I’m tempted to tinker with the order of things. Saxophonist Michael Blake‘s 2016 release is astonishing, exploding with intricate details and unleashing one grand statement after the other. It seems none of its countless pieces snap into place… they all just huddle close together, in tight and moving en masse, with the grace and elegance of a kettle of hawks soaring overhead, with the raw power of rain drops slamming down upon the earth. Everything about this album indicates a sound and vision steps ahead of the music of today. For the better part of a year, I’ve been captivated by this album. It is pure enchantment. It’s getting the #4 slot on this year’s list, but in the grander scheme of things, of the music that matters and embodies the best qualities of creativity, Fulfillment sits atop a plateau all its own.
There’s a fascinating interplay between the motion of the individual parts of Moving Still and how they each relate to the overall flow of the recording. The pieces that comprise trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson‘s 2016 release rarely move in anything resembling a straight line, but the music’s perpetual forward momentum often gives that impression. Sometimes it’s because furtive rhythmic action creates an image blur that behaves as the rough approximation of lateral movement, and sometimes it’s a melodic abstraction that results in the sensation of cyclical patterns growing ever more concentrated. And then there’s the contextual bookends of the contemplative nature of “Between Moves” and the sudden sharp melodic focus of “Space And.” It all contributes to a series of captivating moments that seem to go on forever and then end too soon. Joining Finlayson is an all-star cast of pianist Matt Mitchell, bassist John Hébert, drummer Craig Weinrib and guitarist Miles Okazaki.
The strange and beautiful lyricism of multi-instrumentalist Laurent Rochelle has a potent charisma. His talents at shaping melodies and setting them in motion posses a particular allure, magnetic even, and the resulting music would be described as dreamlike were it not for the crispness of the imagery. On this excellent session, Rochelle spends most of the time on bass clarinet, which in itself is a hell of treat. His expressions have a keen precision and provide a lovely counterbalance to the instrument’s soulful drawl. Joined by the OKIDOKI Quartet, they serve up a modern European-style jazz that Rochelle immediately begins to transform into something less swinging and more story-like. All of the albums that earn a slot in the Top Ten of any year’s Best Of list are going to be bursting with personality… Rochelle’s Si tu regardes is no different. What is notable, however, is just how distinctly he draws it out and how clearly he expresses it. As much as this album plays out like an epic tale, the clarity with which it’s delivered brings into focus its base elements, and leads to a greater appreciation of just how strange and beautiful the album truly is.
This music is wildly over-the-top, and its exuberance is positively addictive. The debut from Moonbow has, at its core, a modern European jazz foundation. But that’s just the starting point. From there, the septet mixes in different influences, pushing the boundaries of what can conceivably be considered modern jazz before it has to be given a brand new name. And all of it, every euphoric shout and maniacal shaping of melody and combustion of rhythm is as crazily expressed as anything that came out in 2016. There’s plenty of ferocity in this music, but all of it is delivered with a joyfulness that is as thrilling as it is infectious. This is an album with a big heart, beating strong, and every single sound on this album is served up with an enthusiasm that holds nothing back. This is what unbounded creativity sounds like.
At first blush, it would seem like something out of the blue for a jazz ensemble to perform a rendition of Brian Eno’s classic ambient drone recording Music for Airports. But when that album originally came out four decades ago, Miles Davis was pushing boundaries along the jazz rock divide that led to the ambient music tranquility of In a Silent Way, so that Eno might become a focal point on the modern jazz scene isn’t completely inexplicable. That said, the Chris Schlarb ensemble Psychic Temple perform not one, but two inspired, distinct takes, and the way each honor the original while expanding the vision into modern jazz and a throwback jazz-rock fusion is a jaw-dropping accomplishment. In addition, Schlarb sandwiches those two renditions around a modern piece that behaves as an updated version of the Miles Davis fusion period when tranquility wasn’t the desired effect, and where funky grooves and joyful solos all had motion in mind. Psychic Temple consists of artists who travel music territories beyond those that demarcate the borders of jazz, and that ability to cross over to all kinds of expressions serves this music well. Everything about this album is seriously inspired, and it’s the kind of project that possesses a certain logic that can leave a person wondering how come it’s only now that someone thought to do it.
It’s notable how impressively trumpeter Ian Carey is able to keep Interview Music sounding unbound and free even within a meticulous framework of compositions, and how the ensemble doesn’t leave its fingerprints on the transitions between planned and improvisational sections. But what really elevates this session to something special is how much fun they have playing with a straight-ahead sound. It’s the suddenness of wind instruments exploding with the grace and speed of a murmuration of starlings, and how bass & drums attempt to break the sound barrier while trumpet patiently sighs out a melody, and how a sing-song melody snaps into place with harmony that is all about contemplation, and how the wind instruments take angles and bend curvatures that brush up against the expected change in direction without actually taking it. It’s all of these unexpected traits, accents and differentiations, that has the cumulative effect of transforming the album’s entire world.
The debut album from drummer Stijn Demuynck is a very specific vision, a solitary image captured in time that hints at the existence of a multitude of details below the surface. With only the comforting chatter of drums, the murmur of woodwinds and bass, and the occasional harmony of a choir, Pouancé exists in a state of serenity, and the only transformations that occur are those that reflect its different facets. There is the impression of a snow globe. Within it, a city skyline. It exists in an entirely different world. And even from the turbulence of being shaken, that city and all of its hidden inhabitants, remain unmoved, a tranquil presence as the water grows more still and the snow falls down upon it. That is how I’ve viewed Pouancé for the better part of the year I’ve been listening to it. It remains one of the most beautiful things I’ve heard in 2016.
Using rhythmic phrases of legendary jazz drummers as conversation starters, Dan Weiss launches off into an innovative jazz orchestration project that echoes the experimental works of Archie Shepp’s 1970s spiritual jazz-protest music hybrid and the spiritual jazz work of Alice Coltrane, where the use of electronics and non-traditional jazz instrumentation fit like a glove. Nothing about Sixteen: Drummers Suite sounds normal. The electronic blips trading jabs with piano and percussion, the wind instruments that apply a strange geometry to the shape of the melodies, the dreamlike chorus of voices that shift between serenity and nightmare, and the tempos that often possess the same ephemeral nature. Yet even with all of those odd characteristics, Weiss maintains a flow throughout, a forward momentum that streamlines the unconventional qualities and, much the same way passing scenery begins to bleed imagery the higher the rate of speed, so, too, does Weiss play with the senses. A work this wildly experimental that is also friendly and approachable, that’s something pretty damn special.
Well, if Bird is the Worm were to name an annual Musician of the Year as part of the year-end wrap-up, Allison Miller would likely earn the title for 2016. The drummer put out an excellent new album with her Honey Ear Trio (
There’s something incredibly rewarding about following an artist, in any medium, and witnessing their creative development through snapshots of events and projects and finished pieces. Jasper Høiby is one of the premier bassists on the scene. He and his trio Phronesis have earned their accolades as being one of the most exciting things in modern jazz. And over the last fifteen years, Høiby’s contributions to the trio project Malija, the Kairos 4tet, and Rory Simmons’ insanely good Fringe Magnetic ensemble are just some of the high points. It leads one to the conclusion that remarkable work is something to be expected of him, always. But even in that context, his fantastic new Fellow Creatures shows that even high expectations fall short of the plateau he’s capable of achieving. In how the compositions shine individually and as interlocking facets of a singular whole, Høiby displays a clarity of vision and a grand confidence to shape the album that is jaw-dropping impressive. These are songs that reflect an intelligence that values the abstract, and these are also songs that transmit their message with a directness that keeps the introspection in check.
Of all the albums to land on this year’s Best Of list, it’s the 2016 release from the quintet Moker that reflects the wildest personality. That personality, multifaceted and unpredictable, manifests as free improv pieces that send notes scattering like marbles at the epicenter of an earthquake, whimsical post-bop conversations that serve as a precursor to ultra-serious ambient jazz reveries, detours into rustic folk-jazz tranquility, and ominous ballads that speak to the heartbreak hanging over every love story and jazz-rock passages that imitate that same heart shattering into a thousand pieces. And more. So much more. The quintet of guitarist (and alto horn player) Mathias Van de Wiele, multi-reedist Jordi Grognard, trumpeter Bart Maris, bassist Lieven Van Pee, and drummer Giovanni Barcella are now five albums into their Moker collaboration, and this fascinating, fun session shows they’re nowhere close to peaking anytime soon.
Just combining the music influences of modern post-bop, Japanese traditional and classical is an intriguing proposition. And this isn’t the first time trumpeter Natsuko Sugao has undertaken this kind of project. Her 
What began as an impromptu recording session between percussionist extraordinaire Cyro Baptista, cellist Vincent Segal, bassist Ira Coleman and percussionist Tim Keiper eventually grew into the expansive BlueFly, an album that includes upwards of twenty guest musicians and instruments as diverse as shahi baaja, Fender Rhodes, surdos, samples, clarinet, Kamale ngoni, mandolin, cello and laptop. That initial recording session, which happened during a tour stopover, became the core of the album. From that starting point, Baptista sent out requests to musicians to perform something with the initial pieces. Baptista added and edited and made his collage of music contributions. This process, in combination with his nature to incorporate folk musics from around the world and let them bleed into a jazz framework led to this fascinating, unclassifiable 2016 release. Percussion is always going to be where Baptista is going to lay the groundwork for a project, but the crafting of melodies on BlueFly and how they flow into the dialog of the rhythm is what leads to many of the jaw-dropping moments of beauty.
The Alexis Cuadrado project POÈTICA is brilliant on many levels. The bassist’s ensemble brings together multilingual poetry, Flamenco and both modern straight-ahead and Latin Jazz for glimpses into the challenges of immigrants new to America. I’ve written about this fantastic recording quite recently (
The 12-piece band Skadedyr is out doing its own thing, and there’s really nobody else that comes close to sounding like them. That said, they’re not all alone. Arguably, they could be considered the Nordic counterparts to the jazz inventiveness of NYC musicians Todd Sickafoose and Chris Lightcap. On the wildly expressive Culturen, Skadedyr mixes in psychedelic pop music, ambient electronica, indie-rock, Nordic folk and anything else that seemed like a good ingredient at the time. But the point isn’t so much the ingredients as it is the determined process of using whatever tools available to forge a raw tunefulness out of misshapen melodies. The grumble and growl of “Bie” leads into a raucous chorus bordering on euphoria. “Datavirus” wobbles between states of post-bop and post-jazz. Or how about the way that “Trålertrall” transforms from an acerbic dissonance to waves of gorgeous harmonies. There’s nothing conventional about the means or the methods employed by the ensemble, and yet it’s made to coalesce in kaleidoscopic imagery that almost seems logical.
The large ensemble AfroFree tethers Carpathia to the folk music traditions of Central Europe, and by incorporating Afro-Jazz rhythms and modern jazz improvisations, it results in music that is strangely hypnotic and immensely tuneful. A large regiment of wind instruments opens up all kinds of harmonic possibilities, and the ensemble takes advantage of every single one of them. Potent melodies run throughout the session, and the way that AfroFree uses them as launching points for some lovely harmonic passages is just one of this album’s winning characteristics. The casual way trombonist Tomasz Ożóg is able to dance a melody through a talkative rhythmic landscape and break from the abiding melodic direction is emblematic of how open and free this music behaves in the complex environment the ensemble set for itself. There are some moments of stunning beauty here.
Last year, alto saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa earned one of the top slots on the 
Latin American Songbook are the memories from Edward Simon‘s childhood. The pianist grew up listening to these songs in his native Venezuela, and now, much older and living in New York City, he performs his own renditions, bringing together the nostalgia from the memories and the reality of how he hears these pieces in the present day. The result is a mix of faithful renditions and inventive recreations. Simon has always displayed a nifty talent for developing an active chatter on piano while also being patiently expressive, and that quality is in full display on his 2016 release. Bassist Joe Martin and drummer Adam Cruz round on the trio on this excellent session.
Julian Shore provides an endless supply of distractions on Which Way Now? The rhythmic pitter-patter trade of nuance between piano and drums, the soft whispers of cymbals blending in with the hush of saxophone harmonies, the swirling piano lines circling the soaring contrails of saxophone solos, the deep voice of bass sometimes as an undercurrent of piano’s melodic incursions and sometimes as the driving force of guitar’s lyrical expansions… all of it contributes to this album’s kaleidoscopic beauty. And much like the kaleidoscope, there’s a clockwork precision in play here, evidence that the unfolding beauty is the result of fluid logic and planning. Shore complements his core sextet with guest musicians on instruments as diverse as pedal steel and dobro, bass clarinet and a string section, adding more textures to an album drowning in ’em.
There’s an undeniable magic to the way pianist Giovanni Guidi and trombonist Gianluca Petrella shape the melodies of Ida Lupino before launching their afterimages deep into improvisations. This quartet date with clarinetist Louis Sclavis and drummer Gerald Cleaver brings out one beautiful tune after the next… and they maintain a sense of song throughout, even though they go about exploring the different avenues and detours each composition affords them. Both Guidi and Petrella can sink their teeth into a melody, but it’s how their complementary approaches provide a fullness to the expression that’s particularly rewarding. Guidi works a melody like the breeze creating ripples on the water’s surface, seeking to use motion to accentuate the sparkle and shine of sunlight beaming down upon it. Petrella’s motion is more direct, and his lyricism has a strong gravitational pull as his trombone displays an innate lyricism… sometimes in a booming voice, sometimes as a peaceful cooing. And all of it is magical.
This series of duo collaborations is seriously absorbing. Saxophonist Joakim Berghäll has embarked on a four-part series of duets with his Finnish counterparts. The first installment centered on the pianists. The second, and current, project recording, Dialogues II, has him matched up with guitarists. As one might imagine, duets with ten different musicians is going to result in ten different conversations. What isn’t so likely to see coming is how fascinating each and every one of them are, and, inexplicably, that they all come together with something resembling album cohesion. The range of expressions are all over the map, from a jazz-rock edge to serene minimalism to avant-garde clashes of dissonance to Frisellian looping effects and over to a Finnish folk music influence. To enhance the range of possible expressions, Berghäll brings his alto, soprano, tenor & baritone saxophones and a bass clarinet, to boot. The imagery is strong and the diversity of sound expansive, but the nature of the duet invokes a sense of intimacy, and it’s why all of these dialogues present themselves with a certain disarming warmth… no matter how lovely and strange the music may get.
Islands is all about the imagery. The first image a song presents is never the last, and the transformations that occur over the duration of one song, and over the length of the recording, is never the same picture and it never takes the same path twice. But it always begins with the melody. Pianist Rob Clearfield is just as deft shaping a crisp melody as he is building up to a composite from individual facets, and on this trio session, both methods lead to a myriad of results. The winding trail of “With and Without” is fraught with cutbacks and sudden detours, while at the other end of that spectrum, “Ralph Towner” dives into the details of a melodic fragment and doesn’t come up for air until the final vision is complete. Even the tunefulness and warmth of the title-track is deceptively simple, which becomes increasingly apparent with each melodic turn of phrase. The formation of patterns here and there help provide a sense of album, but this recording eschews cohesiveness for a massively immersive experience, one that occurs moment to moment… which is exactly how the album should be enjoyed.
It’s not an everyday occurrence to encounter harp in a jazz setting. It’s pretty damn infrequent, actually. So, aside from being an incredibly strong album reflecting a seriously creative perspective, what’s most impressive about Wax & Wane is how much this very different sound connects like everyday people music. Brandee Younger locks in with the lineage of jazz harp by including compositions by bop-era harpist Dorothy Ashby and spiritual jazz harpist Alice Coltrane. And she connects with the modern day scene with an electro-acoustic sound where melody and groove hold hands every step of the way. The echoes of the past bounce off the walls of Wax & Wane, but always in the context of music that breathes the air of today. It just can’t be overstated how much respect Younger earns for overcoming the difficulty for a harpist to find her place on the modern jazz scene while simultaneously carving out of a piece of it that only she occupies, just Younger, her harp and her unique sound.
Through the Badlands is an authoritative statement on the range that the unified influences of jazz, country and rock can aspire to. This isn’t the first example of a musician getting the sway of country and the edge of rock and swing of jazz to snap cleanly into place. What’s particularly notable about the debut of drummer 
The self-titled album from the trio Sawa challenges the perception of what gets defined as unconventional. The first obstacle it overcomes is the presumption that something different will be difficult to connect with. And yet the Arabic vocals of Alya Al-Sultani matched with the European jazz of pianist Clemens Christian Poetzsch and the chamber music of cellist Shirley Smart presents itself with a simplicity that rivals its stunning beauty. Al-Sultani’s vocals lend equal care to provide both melodic intent and rhythmic support. Poetzsch employs the rare fluid piano on many tracks, and its ability to shift out of standard tuning adds a dimension to the music that ratchets up the textures exponentially. And Smart’s role on cello isn’t some vanilla harmonic device… instead, she often shadows the piano’s rhythmic approach before suddenly coalescing into Al-Sultani’s melodic path. This ain’t your normal jazz trio session, but that Sawa comes pretty damn close to being just as easy to embrace is yet one more impressive quality of this impressive album.
Considering that Polemos is built on a foundation of improvisation, it’s remarkable that the range of lyricism attained by the sextet of bassist Paraskevas Kitsos falls cohesively into place. Whether they bring a moody intensity or a wild explosiveness, each song radiates its own unique personality while finding its particular role in the development of the overarching vision. Key to this approach is having tracks like “Prologos” incorporate both the beauty of “Fovos” and the violence of “Via,” thus serving as a binding agent of seemingly incongruous perspectives. This way, everything is ridiculously evocative no matter how crazily the tone fluctuates from song to song. It’s an album that flew way under the radar; Be sure it lands on yours.
So, it’s happening again. Tonight, Tuesday (11/22/2016), I’m returning as a guest on the Louisville-based 
2. Laurent Rochelle – “Passages”
3. Laurent Rochelle Okidoki – “Morgen”
4. Cyro Baptista – “Trovao”
5. Nova Express – “Meresin”
6. Matt Ulery’s Loom/Large – “Hubble”
7. Moonbow – “And the Skies”
8. Rooms Trio – “Monolith”
9. Jasmine Lovell-Smith’s Towering Poppies – “The Pillow Book”
10. Brian Adler – “Windy Path”
11. Christophe Panzani – “Traduire Eschyle”
12. Natsuko Sugao – “Ryukyu”
13. Amirtha Kidambi Elder Ones – “Dvapara-Yuga (For Eric Garner)”
14. Never Enough Hope – “You Are A Gift To Me”
15. So!triO – “Coming From You”
Sep 18 2017
The Round-up: Each door opens to the same circle
Here is some very good new music.
Kenny Warren Quartet – Thank You For Coming To Life (Whirlwind Recordings)
There’s an impenetrable nature to this music that takes some getting used to. Some combination of composition and improvisation makes it so that the development of a song occurs like building blocks of an efficiently functional and stunningly ornate fortress. The best route to acclimation are those moments when the thick veneer falls away and an embraceable bit of melody peeks on through. There’s the beautiful dance of Noah Garabedian‘s bass and the piano of JP Schlegelmilch on “Huge Knees” and the cheerful blues generated by Warren’s trumpet and Satoshi Takeishi on drums on “Hala Hala,” and then how the quartet decides to close the album with an entire song that wears its heart on its sleeve. And when the album closes itself off? That’s a good time to appreciate the solid musicianship displayed by some of the stronger musicians on the modern scene. The solos are all well and good, but the group interactions are where this quartet shines.
Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp – Amazon
Black Diamond – Mandala (Shifting Paradigm Records)
This music is best when the quartet slows things down. At the forefront of the quartet Black Diamond are the twin tenors of Artie Black and Hunter Diamond, and when they offer up gentle sighs of melody that break away and then intertwine about one another, that’s when the personality of this album reveals itself. Because it’s about more than what goes down when the saxophones have their say. The rhythm section of bassist Matt Ulery and drummer Neil Hemphill generate all kinds of chatter, and when given the room to snap into place with the shape of things, there emerges a wonderful state of unity from what initially appears to be contradicting elements.
Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp – Amazon
João Mortágua – Mirrors (PortaJazz)
All kinds of interesting facets to this live set from the 2016 Guimarães Jazz fest. The quintet of saxophonist João Mortágua, trumpeter Ricardo Formoso, guitarist Virxilio da Silva, electric bassist Felix Barth and drummer Iago Fernandez cycle through a spectrum of modern jazz expressions, and give each their own quirky personality. The electricity of the live setting comes through pretty strong on the recorded medium, which is always a bonus. Plenty here to like. Also, worth nothing that Mortágua had another release over the summer, AXES, which has been recommended previously (go check it out).
Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp
René Gatica Quinteto – Rana (Discos ICM)
There’s an appealing laid-back feel to this modern jazz set from the quintet of drummer René Gatica, saxophonist Andrés Hayes, guitarist Enrique Peña, pianist Nicolás Boccanera and bassist Juan Bayón. They lead out with a melody, but keep it just vague enough so that they can bend it at will during solos and not give the sense of straying far from the song’s opening notes. There’s a little narration woven into the music, and this adds some nice texture along with the interludes scattered throughout. Nothing groundbreaking here, but just plenty easy to enjoy. Also, it’s a nice glimpse into the Buenos Aires, Argentina scene.
Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp
Sean Alexander Collins – Family and Friend (Self-Produced)
The album’s liner notes state that this recording session began late at night and ended early in the morning, and everything about the music backs that claim up. This is serene music that suddenly comes to life and then settles back down into a peaceful calm. There is something nocturnal about the music’s liveliness and when it gets tranquil, it’s like those moments just as the sun begins to rise. It’s Sean Alexander Collins on vibraharp, Brandon Sherman on trumpet and Josh Collins on acoustic guitar, and everything about the music gives the impression that they were locked into the creative visions of one another. A nifty release from the Reno, Nevada scene. Also, a bargain at just three bucks.
Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp
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By davesumner • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2017 releases • 0 • Tags: The Round-Up