Jazz Recommendations – 2013 Releases

Música Para un Dragon Dormido, the new release by Emilio Teubal is an album of boundless energy and dynamic rhythmic textures.  And yet, it’s the transcendent melodic warmth he brings to the percussive experience that marks this recording as something very special.  Reminiscent of a similar approach taken by fellow pianist Don Pullen during his later years with the African-Brazilian Connection, Teubal endows each song with a supreme loveliness that stands up to the album’s powerful rhythmic elements.

The result is a thrilling album that sounds so damn Big… a preeminent euphoria even when the musicians express themselves in subtle measured tones.

Your album personnel:  Emilio Teubal (piano, Korg SV-1), Sam Sadigursky (tenor & soprano saxes, clarinet, bass clarinet, flute), Moto Fukushima (6-string electric bass), Erik Friedlander (cello), John Hadfield (percussion), and Satoshi Takeishi (percussion, cajon).

Opening track “Un Simple Objeto” is a series of surging tides, an intermittent pulse that beats out increasing steps upward until, ultimately, launching itself out into space with long slow notes and drafting upon rhythmic currents.  It encapsulates the bigness of sound mentioned before, that such depth and detail could come from just this sextet.

“The Constant Reinventor” begins pensively with piano, the quiet drone of clarinet a match for its expressions of melancholia.  Eventually the chatter grows into something more affable, conjured up by the combo of Takeishi’s chippy percussion and the gurgle-blips of Fukushima’s bass.  But as is so typical of this album, the tide returns to its original state… piano grows pensive once again, this time bolstered by Friedlander’s long resonant cello notes.

“El Tema de Ludmila” begins up-tempo, but with a casual ease.  Sadigursky presents the melody repeatedly, builds up from it while percussion shifts beneath its feet.  Even when sax steps aside for Teubal’s piano section, there remains the sense of piano (and sax) surfing atop the churning waves of percussion.  The easily segmented textures working in cooperation results in a sound larger than its individual parts would normally indicate.  It’s a characteristic of this album that holds throughout.  It also makes this recording something special.

Fourth and fifth track “El Acrobata” and “Un Dragon Dormido” might well be considered the same composition.  It begins with silence, the merest peep from strings, a bit of percussion ideal for haunting, and keys ambling forlornly through space.  Time seems to stand still when cello strikes out on its own and takes center stage.  Suddenly, the music swells, cymbals crashing, sax crying out, keys humming resonantly, intensity rising.  And then, like so often on this recording, the rising intensity diffuses, and the most delicate expressions on sax and cello create a moment of great impact… bringing about a sea change of demeanor, from increasing power to restrained beauty… and the rest of the group falls into place.  Even near the song’s conclusion, when the intensity makes another go at achieving a higher plateau, the seeds planted by Friedlander and Sadigursky earlier on still resonate with a sublime majesty.

“La Espera” begins with a waltz elegance and a lullaby warmth.  Teubal stretches out for a nice section on piano, exceeded only, perhaps, by Fukushima’s lyrical display on bass.  The breakdown of this tune leads perfectly into the theme of subsequent track “Nikko.”  Built around the swirling patterns of repetition typical of Nik Bartsch’s Ronin, “Nikko” incites a resilient pace, speeding right along.  But not unlike the pattern of fast builds and sudden launches into space established in opening track “Un Simple Objeto,” Teubal restricts his use of Bartsch’s constructions to the intervals, allowing space for members of the sextet to stretch out… the repetition acting only as infrastructure.

“La Perla” begins sprightly on its toes.  Up-tempo, yet in possession of a buoyancy that transcends its cadence.

The album ends with “Milonga Para Terminar,” a whiling dervish of percussion, an unstoppable torrent of rhythm.  Led by Hadfield and Takeishi, it’s an odd ending to the album, but apparently a favorite composition of Teubal’s as signifier that, bam, the show is over.

Just an outstanding album.

Released on the Brooklyn Jazz Underground label.

Originally from Argentina, Teubal may now be residing in NYC.  This music is definitely informed by both locations.

Available at:  eMusic | CDBaby CD & Digital | Amazon MP3

The physical CD is also available at Teubal’s own site.

Interesting recording from guitarist Sean Moran, his first as session leader.  An album with its own personal geometry.  Tusk is music that approaches from unusual angles, and departs the same way.  Moran’s use of nylon string guitars gives the music an element that shifts things to something of a parallel universe of similar modern jazz recordings.

That the source material influences span across different genres only adds to the intrigue surrounding this music.  There is a chamber jazz ambiance to the recording, but that seems more as the inevitable result of the components Moran puts in play than any concrete plan going in.

This is music of perpetual changes in direction performed with the fluidity of leaves caught in the thrall of small wind flurries.  Though often pretty at times, the music is heavily indebted to its percussive qualities, and melodies behave as envious of their rhythmic counterparts, and skitter away in a formless reenactment.  Melodies are far more often felt than seen, and when seen, it’s typically only in glimpses.

Your album personnel:  Sean Moran (acoustic nylon string guitar), Harris Eisenstadt (drums), Chris Dingman (vibes), Michael McGinnis (clarinet, bass clarinet), and Reuben Radding (bass).

Opening track “Elliptical” presents itself as if coming strong with a melody, but in the act of unfolding, it becomes increasingly centered around a marching rhythm… a transition that creates a sense of deconstruction even as it becomes, in a way, more rigid.  The album presents other, similar incongruities to keep the ear entranced.

Some tracks aspire to a haunting presence, like “To the Edge of the World,” which offers sounds as unseen shapes looming just outside the periphery.  Others, though, offer a distant warmth… “Moon Reflected” rides the crest of McGinnis’s clarinet, a landmark of austere beauty that each of the other quintet members circle about and share in, like campers intermittently adding wood to the fire.  And “The Camel” has a folksy charm, leading out with Moran’s rustic sound on guitar, and accentuated by Eisenstadt on drums.

“Monkeytown” gets the pulse inching upward, buoyed primarily by Dingman’s vibes, and “Ten Mirrors” is a maelstrom of sound with Eisenstadt’s drums in midst of it all.  But for the most part, this is an album more acclimated to a hazy drift.

The footsteps of Radding’s bass on “Dream of Water” sends notes from McGinnis’s clarinet scattering in all directions. “Circle One, Two” is another tune that appears without structure, and is best to simply follow the path laid out by Dingman’s marvelous vibe-work.

An album where the listener follows the footsteps of percussion and not the path laid out by melody, yet still takes on an ethereal drift, and the incongruities of this unconventional album are the ingredients of its strange geometry.  Something a little bit different that goes a long way.

Released on the NCM East label.

Jazz from NYC.

You can stream the album, and purchase it, on the artist’s Bandcamp page.

Available at eMusic.  Available at Amazon: MP3

Worth mentioning that Moran is a member of the Four Bags outfit… a group I’ve liked for some time now, but other than a quick mention right when this site first began, haven’t really talked about them before.  Worth looking into.  Here’s a link to their Bandcamp page.

Nostalgia is a potent activator, and childhood memories a strong influence on the present.  As much as any other source, those connections at an early age with art form as strong a bond as anything, and they often manifest later with an emotional urgency that compels a person to communicate them to others.

So, it’s no wonder to read that the inspiration of bassist Nilson Matta in recording his new release Black Orpheus dates back to his childhood reaction at hearing the soundtrack to the play Orfeu da Conceição, by the playwright Vinicius de Moraes, and later, the music composed for Black Orpheus, the movie version of the play by Antonio Carlos Jobim (with lyrics by de Moraes).

This is uplifting music.  This is music light on its feet that takes to the sky with powerful flaps of wings.  There is a joy and celebration to this music that, when one considers the tragedy surrounding the original story of Orpheus & Eurydice and the film’s Orfeu & Eurydice, it seems disconnected from the music’s source material.  But keep in mind, this music is about an adult’s memory of childhood connections with music… a bond that transcends the original agendas of storytellers.  It becomes Matta’s story.  This type of transference is why stories never die.

Your album personnel:  Nilson Matta (bass), Guilherme Monteiro (guitar), Klaus Mueller (piano), Alex Kautz (drums), Fernando Saci (percussion), and guests:  Randy Brecker (trumpet); Anne Drummond (flute), Laura Metcalf (cello), Anat Cohen (clarinet), Kenny Barron (piano), Reinaldo Silva (percussion), Leny Andrade (vocals), Alfredo Cardim (piano), Erivelton Silva (drums), Jorjao Silva (percussion), and Gretchen Parlato (vocal).

The album begins with as powerful an opening statement as you’ll ever encounter.  An epic, yet restrained chorus that simmers with tension.  Strings, trumpet, piano, bass and flute create waves of striking beauty and warmth.  When the tempo transitions up a notch, it’s the grandeur of navigating a path over rolling hills across a sweeping landscape, and no less epic than the opening moments.

Much of this music has a festive attitude, jaunty even, but with melodies that take their time expressing themselves.  It imbues the music with a casual grace in the midst of rhythms that inspire motion.

A couple vocal tracks, each with a seaside sway, a cadence like waves gently slapping the shore.  Instrumental tracks have a linear shape to them, but some start out with a wandering solo without boundaries before the ensemble joins in and re-establishes the collective direction.

A strong rhythmic presence is balanced nicely by the velvety touch of strings.  And though he’s definitely a member of the tempo setting squad, Matta’s bass hits the higher registers with a lyricism that takes his sound up into melodic territory.

An outstanding album of striking beauty.  Matta did his inspiration proud.

Released on the Motema label.

The cool album cover is by Rebecca Meek.

Jazz from NYC, though the recording has some roots in Rio de Janeiro.

Available at eMusic.  Available at Amazon: CD | MP3

An atmospheric release from trumpeter Matt Holman, on his debut recording When Flooded.  And this is meant in the sense of formlessness, not airiness or a deficit of substance, as the word is more typically used these days in reviews.  The structure of this music reveals itself at well-placed moments, allowing the notes to flow freely, seemingly without direction.  The music doesn’t sound composed so much as it does shepherded.  It’s why the album’s beauty isn’t a consequence of some outward bloom or the sudden leap to a lofty plateau, but, instead, attained as a result of a confluence of its varied parts coming together as one, achieving a unison of sound that is lovely in that moment and that moment alone… a moment that could disperse suddenly and without warning, perhaps never to return.  A fleeting beauty.

Your album personnel:  Matt Holman (trumpet), Mike McGinnis (clarinet, bass clarinet), Christopher Hoffman (cello), Nate Radley (guitar), and Ziv Ravitz (drums, percussion).

The emotional charge is one of measured dispersal.

The opening two tracks, “Kindred Spirits” and “Tutti” open with lovely drifting harmonies, and gradually build strength.  Holman’s trumpet often takes a path that has it soaring mere feet over the pocked landscape developed by Ravitz and Radley on drums and guitar.  McGinnis’s clarinet is the perfect complementary fit for Hoffman’s cello on “Tutti,” together providing both the moonlight and the darkness, a mix of warmth and melancholy.

Whereas the title-track “When Flooded” does lift its voice up with force at intervals, it’s “Chain of Command” that serves as the first notable deviation from the established calm pace and tone.  It’s got a punchy cadence, grinds through a melody that sees instruments noisily entwined.

But most tracks are not so easily described or corralled.  “Tandem” is a bubbling cauldron of sound, with Hoffman’s cello a real highlight, first as accompaniment, but then as it asserts its presence in a lead role.  And “Earworm” spreads across the surface unevenly.  A dour expression of melody, followed by expansions that seem unconcerned about being associated with their original expression.  And “Between” starts out more upbeat, though expressed in a restrained tone.  Drums are atwitter.  Trumpet has a little bounce to it.  Some moments of drowsy languor, others of bursting energy.

The album ends on a note not unlike how it began.  On “Where the Tracks End,” McGinnis’s clarinet establishes a brooding tone atop Ravitz’s soulful percussion.  When Holman moves in on trumpet, he simply becomes part of the existing flow of sound, followed in the same way when Hoffman joins on cello.  “Syndrome” sees the album to its end, beginning with a gorgeous duo between cello and clarinet.  Trumpet adds an additional layer of heartbreak, before both drums and guitar add a brief surge before the song drifts away, disappearing, as if it were never truly there.

Released on the Brooklyn Jazz Underground label.

Jazz from the Brooklyn scene.

Available to stream and purchase at the artist’s bandcamp page.

Available at: eMusic | CDBaby CD&Digital | Amazon: CD MP3