CD Review: The New World Jazz Composers Octet - "Breaking News"

Year: 2011

Style: Jazz

Label: Big and Phat Jazz Productions

Musicians: Daniel Ian Smith - Soprano/alto/tenor/baritone saxophones, flute; Felipe Salles - tenor saxophone, flute; Ken Cervenka - trumpet/flugelhorn; Walter Platt - trumpet/flugelhorn; Tim Ray - piano; Keala Kaumeheiwa - acoustic bass; Mark Walker - drumset; Ernesto Diaz - percussion.

Special Guest - Catherine Hazel Smith - spoken word.



The New World Jazz Composers Octet





CD Review: 'Breaking News' usually suggests a release of information that is supposed to be sensational, dramatic, exciting, developing, sometimes titillating, usually minus all the facts, and often acutely negative. In most instances, the impetus driving disclosure is bragging rights and who reports a story first. These events are, to a large degree, best ignored.

The New World Jazz Composers Octet, with the release of their third CD, shows what is real "Breaking News." Admittedly, their music is sensational, dramatic and definitely exciting. On the other hand, all the facts are in, no time is wasted on titillation, it is entirely positive, the driving impetus is supreme musical talent mixed with passion, diversity and versatility, that are impossible to ignore. As for bragging rights, that is left entirely to the discretion of the listener.

The band is officially defined as a medium-sized jazz ensemble on paper; on the bandstand, they are a different animal; they morph into a power house of burning swing, with a mixed-martial-arts compositional execution and abandon, that take the sweet science of jazz to a level of gritty funk that bands twice their size never achieve.

The band breaks out with a straight swinger (Poco Picasso), that features a splendid, breezy trumpet solo from Walter Platt; some extremely electrifying drum work from Mark Walker, and culminates with a Felipe Salles tenor solo that can only be described as brutishly searing. The front line of the ensemble is made up of very accomplished multi-instrumentalists who endow it with striking versatility on (Wishful Thinking), a provocative, pleading lament heard in the Tim Ray's piano, from out of the octet's horns and then in Felipe Salles' flute (Children's Waltz). It decidedly puts power and swing in abeyance in deference to grace, a quality not often displayed by such aggregations, but which shows the confidence, sensitivity and understanding of leader Daniel Ian Smith in giving voice to the 'breaking news' of youth through his young daughter, Catherine Hazel Smith with the elegant recitation of Paul Haines' poem (Song Sung Long).

However, it is riotous swing and towering power that exemplify the bona fides of The New World Jazz Composers Octet (Breaking News), with its hard-bop feel fueled by torrid solos from trumpeter Walter Platt and Daniel Smith's scorching baritone saxophone; but for pure no-holds-barred, phat, bone-jarring rhythm-a-thing (Warp 7, Now) breaks the sound barrier: And as Charles Mingus used to say, "I'm telling you right now," that's real "breaking news!" The horns splatter sound around like Picasso with bucket of cubist, impressionist paint, drummer Mark Walker and bassist Keala Kaumeheiwa drive the rhythm section like impatient, harried passengers muscling their way onto a packed train at rush hour. Finally, Ernesto Diaz gets into the act and whips up serious Afro-Cuban percussion agony on the congas, igniting the fiercest rhythmic firestorm on the date.

 The CD ends with a trilogy of compositions by composer Ted Pease, Distinguished Professor of Jazz Composition at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston, and represents the third recording collaboration between Pease and bandleader Smith. Pease dedicates the work to three of his favorite composers: First showcasing the long powerful chord technique of the under appreciated trumpeter Thad Jones (Thad's Pad), a harmonically sophisticated trumpeter/cornetist who performed superbly in the William "Count" Basie orchestra, and with the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis juggernaut.

The centerpiece of the trilogy features the urbane, refined tastes of Billy "Sweet Pea" Strayhorn (Strays). Smith does an admirable job on alto saxophone of reprising the soaring, lyrical dulcitude in the unmatched sound of Johnny "Rabbit" Hodges. The band collectively rises to the occasion to paint smooth, reassuring colors, and that dependable, lush-life mood, that was the genius of Strayhorn.

The third tine on the fork of the triptych captures a condensed, ruggedly-swinging chart (Willis) reminiscent of those once written by composer/arranger/conductor/saxophonist/songwriter Willis Leonard Holman for the Charley Barnet and Stan Kenton orchestras.

The New World Jazz Composers Octet, with the release of "Breaking News," proves that the real breaking news musically is that they are diverse, ultra talented, dedicated to their calling and leaders in their genre. The next 'breaking news' will occur when they release their fourth CD.

Track Listing: Poco Picasso; Wishful Thinking; Breaking News; Children's Waltz; Warp 7, Now!; Song Sung Long; Trilogy: Thad's Pad - Strays - Willis.   

Recorded at the Fraser Performance Studio, WGBH Boston, MA

Engineer: Alan Mattes

Mastered by Jonathan Wyner at M-Works Studios, Cambridge, MA

Produced by Ted Pease and Daniel Ian Smith.

CD Review: Danny Fox Trio - "The One Constant."

Year: 2011

Style: Jazz

Label: Songlines Recordings

Musicians: Danny Fox - piano; Max Goldman - drums; Chris Van Voorst Van Beest - bass.

CD Review: More and more in contemporary jazz circles, I hear the great, late William Kennedy "Duke" Ellington's famous quote on music, being reprised like an anthem: "There are two kinds of music. Good music, and the other kind." The Danny Fox Trio's debut CD - The One Constant, falls squarely into the realm of "Good" music. Fox also has in common with Ellington, that he is a very talented pianist, a gifted composer, and is not kindly disposed towards, "...the other kind" of music.

The other two members of the Danny Fox Trio, are drummer Max Goldman and bassist Chris Van Voorst Van Beest. New Yorker Fox, is well rounded academically and artistically, he received his B. A. in psychology cum laude from Harvard University where he was also awarded the John McCord Prize for excellence in art. As a performer, he is quite peripatetic, having worked with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, the Big Apple Circus, and the Max Weinberg Big Band alongside Bruce Springsteen. He has worked as the accompanist for Catherine Gallant Dance, has performed for various theater and burlesque productions, and with all this, still found time to compose music for film and TV. To say that Danny Fox is comfortable in a wide variety of musical settings, is to be culpable of gross understatement.

Bassist Van Beest, a native of Maine, is a graduate of the University of New Hampshire. He has performed with saxophonists Joe Lovano, Chris Potter, and the irrepressible master trumpeter/flugelhornist Clark Terry. He is accomplished on both acoustic and electric bass. Van Beest adds variety, depth and multi-flavored bass lines to the trio.

Touring Europe, the US and Canada takes up a lot of Drummer Max Goldman's time. He is in great demand, and has done stellar work with saxophonist Tim Berne, The Elan Mehler Group, Midnight Magic, Jessica 6, Basement Magic, Old Time Musketry, and Aella. He contributes considerable percussive elan to the group's sound and dynamism.

Fox is a pianist who displays an agile ability to employ force in his compositions with great effect. He is also quite adept at creating and releasing tension. He delivers 12 intricate, original compositions; the one constant present is searching improvisational intensity; the main ingredients being, a pungent mixture of liveliness, technique and impetus. The trio emerges from noticeable eclectic influences, toting a catalog replete with 'Monkish' rhythms, dark classical harmonics, and flavorings of 60s baseline funk. This hybridization of genres instructs the freshness, familiarity and surprise of Fox's improvisational prowess.

Fox asserts his classical tone and proclivity for creating space, generating/releasing tension, filling the appropriate measure of dark/light colors and suspenseful sound effects at the outset of the first track (Next Chapter). It is from this mist of improvisational complexity that Fox emerges to deliver the dark, lugubrious (Trudge), accentuating its dense melancholy with haunting variations of force, out of which a hypnotic tenderness prevails.

The trio never gets ahead of itself: Ideas flow logically, and are executed with a form of democratic communication that maintain cohesiveness and amazing control of artistic enthusiasm. As a result, the unit achieves subtle balance and precision that salvage unbridled passion and expresses it with acuity, no matter the tempo (Easily Distracted; Fable's End; Sadbeard).

Max Goldman's drumming throughout the CD is a study in understated elegance, control of power, and mastery of different styles; on (Sadbeard) his brush work is impeccable; he rides the cymbals (Fable's End) with the cool panache of a seasoned professional, producing complex catacombs of intricate rhythms (Roquette) that Fox's piano dances around like swarms of fireflies at twilight. He employs multi-style, R&B 60's funk on (The Icebox), and with Van Beest's jazz-rock afrobeat churning underneath, barely concealing his own mastery, turns this track into very danceable music.Generally, Van Beest's bass is round and deeply grounded. It has the effect of encircling the trio in a capacious wall of sound that Fox's piano finds perfect for the transmutation of ideas into exaltation by alchemy of golden classical jazz.

The trio boldly crosses the boulevard of jazz and lingers at the intersection of the classical (Bad Houseguest), but the piece is not staid or inaccessible. Instead Goldman and Van Beest simply match Fox's fertile imagination with surprising artistic agility and, in the end, guide the track firmly back onto the boulevard of jazz. Then changing the mood dramatically, the trio pivots gracefully on Van Beest's beautifully doleful bowing, and Fox's signature deliberate pianism to capture the root of melancholy (Even Tempered) with a haunting simplicity that reveals another silent strength of the trio; the ability to change moods and tempos without strain, and play well 'slowly,' which, according to Thelonious Sphere Monk, is a hallmark of good musicianship.

Dark angularity amid sparkling melodic passages populate (Drama King), a track that seems to reflect the individual talents of the players in one steady ascending arc and culminates with Fox's piano drawing the listener into a light embrace with a whimsical repeating pattern at the end. But it is the circling, foreboding, capricious, film-noir dark suspense (Room 120), that seals the imagination into a state of stunned awe, then  releases its sinister grip with the friendly, almost jazzy feel of (The One Constant), finally receding into the sound of silence, like an arresting, dying sunset, to end this uncommonly intriguing collection of compositions, played by a phenomenal trio of musicians, that, as a group, evidences its own aural identity, yet each player is able to maintain a distinguishing sonic footprint; distinguishing themselves much like Ellington: "Beyond category."

Track Listing: Next Chapter; Trudge; Easily Distracted; Fable's End; Sadbeard; The Icebox; Bad Houseguest; Even Tempered; Drama King; Roquette; Room 120; The One Constant.

Website: http://www.dannyfoxmusic.com/
Songlines Recordings: http://www.songlines.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Dannyfoxtrio






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CD Review: Andrew Cyrille & Haitian Fascination - Route De Freres

Year: 2011

Style: Haitian Music/Jazz

Label: TUM Records

Musicians: Hamiet Bluiett - baritone saxophone; Alix Pascal - acoustic guitar; Lisle Atkinson - double bass; Andrew Cyrille - drums; Frisner Augustin - percussion and vocals. 

 

Andrew Cyrille &
Haitian Fascination
"Route de Freres" CD cover

CD Review: Now and then a CD's cover design and graphic art are so aesthetically arresting as to require comment. Such is the case with TUM Records art work and photographs displayed on Andrew Cyrille & Haitian Fascination - "Route De Freres" debut CD. The jacket design by Juha Lokstrom of art work photographed by Jussi Tiainen, courtesy of Finnish artist Paul Ostipow/Gallery Riis, speaks eloquently and presciently through the abstract red and blue hues from the Haitian flag, mixed quietly with the gold and green tones of its coat of arms, thoughtfully depicting the elegantly vibrant 'collective spirit' contained in the beautiful music of this recording. In addition, poet Amiri Baraka's liner notes are insightful and inspiring; and the musicians' biographies contained in the CD booklet, provide a level of information that adds significantly to listening pleasure.


 A debut album naturally accrues certain expectations; originality and modernity at least; innovation and a fair amount of excitement to be sure. In the case of Andrew Cyrille and Haitian Fascination, these expectations are heightened considerably by a sense of restless anticipation upon review of his career resume, that of baritone saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett, and bassist Lisle Atkinson.

Drummer Andrew Cyrille

Cyrille is generally regarded as "one of the most versatile drummers in modern jazz." His musical footprints indelibly track back to the heyday of saxophone masters Coleman Hawkins, Illinois Jacquet, Roland Kirk, trumpeter Kenny Dorham, the influential pianist Mary Lou Williams, and were sunk deeply in avant-garde jazz during his stature-building decade (1960s and early 1970s) performing with the ground breaking, freely improvising pianist Cecil Taylor. Cyrille is very comfortable working in a modern mainstream setting or with more complex avant-garde music, he is currently a faculty member of The New School of Jazz in New York City.

Hamiet Bluiett has worked with the incomparable bassist Charles Mingus, saxophonist Sam Rivers, Soul Queen Aretha Franklin, R&B giant Marvin Gaye, pianist Abdullah Ibrahim (Dollar Brand), and is co-founder of the respected World Saxophone Quartet.

Bassist Lisle Atkinson

Bassist Lisle Atkinson has done impressive work with acclaimed vocalists Betty Carter, Nina Simone, Billy Eckstine, Joe Williams, Nancy Wilson, preeminent trumpeter Clark Terry, be-bop co-founder Dizzy Gillespie, and pianist extraordinaire Wynton Kelly. Throughout "Route de Freres," Atkinson's bass reaches down into the rhythm of the drums and percussion and cavorts melodically, with clear, strainless, resonant, highs and lows, that are the hallmarks of a master musician.

Intended or not, this "debut" album possesses an undeniable, fascinating subtitle that is as explicit as its theme, "Road of the Brothers." It is indeed, also a captivating representative of a "Road Traversed By Giants."

Baritone saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett

The CD is in essence, a musical coming home for Cyrille, to the country of his parents. As he describes it, "it is a cultural odyssey dedicated to the island country of Haiti, rich in music and culture, but plagued by poverty and environmental disaster." It opens with an expression of the roots of folk and vodou traditions (Marinet) with the 'spirit descending' through the ritual maman drumming and singing of master drummer Frisner Augustin. Bluiett's baritone saxophone applies an iridescent burst of swirling musical colors to the ceremonial rhythms of the drums like a large multi-hued dancing sea, encircling an island nation.

Since there is such inherent richness about Haitian music on the whole, having its expressions accented with the dynamism, spontaneity, and innovation of the jazz idiom, opens several appealing musical possibilities in terms of versatility, stylistic range, imagination, lyricism and energy. A sense of urgency is evident in the combined lyricism of Blueitt's saxophone and Alix Pascal's acoustic guitar (Deblozay) remonstrating "Haitians to speak out their frustrations against the chaotic situation in Haiti." The hope being that this beautiful, wounded country will "prosper in all aspects of its humanity" (Hope Springs Eternal).                                                                  
                                                                               
Even in chaos and hopelessness, or better, in spite of these debilitating conditions, love in its deepest form manages to exist and blossom, and it flows through the stylistic range of Pascal's guitar (Isaura), echoing the sensual tone of Brazil's legendary guitarist Laurindo Almeida, and the seductive majesty of Haitian classical guitarist Frantz Casseus.

Guitarist Alix Pascal

The centerpiece of the work is the triptych "Routes de Freres" ("Road of the Brothers"). A three-part composition by Cyrille that traces his Haitian legacy, seeking to capture his experiences and remembrances from his first visit to the island as a seven-year-old; exploring images of later visits with his family; and finally painting a musical composite of what "Manhattan could have felt like" musically, when his parents landed (by boat) in the United States in the early 1920s.

What appears on the surface, to be an individualistic cultural look backward, becomes instead a conscious search for life's landmarks and guideposts (Route de Freres, Part 1 - Hills of Anjubeau); with bouts of nostalgia resurfacing from deeply formed childhood memories (Route de Freres, Part 2 - Memories of Port-au-Prince Afternoons); finding exhilarating surprises in the cultural gap between an island nation and a continent, over which Cyrille constructs a musical bridge (Route de Freres, Part 3 - Manhattan Swing), running counter to the predominant theory that "you can't go home again." In the triptych, Cyrille's true genius extends backward from his versatile drums, through the wondering lens of a seven-year-old, free of polluting biases, to produce music that, at its core is so pristinely, wonderfully uncontaminated, as to be almost perfect. Essentially, Cyrille succeeds in clearing a 'spirit path' for his accompanying players to add their own experiences and remembrances that imbue the music with an added richness of jazz and authentic Haitian rhythms, that is hard to describe.

Drummer/percussionist Frisner Augustin

The band collectively displays a broad stylistic range, incorporating jazz, Latin and Caribbean rhythms on bassist Lisle Atkinson's melodic composition (C'mon Baby), changing the tempo with increased rhythmic drumming and percussive energy on Bluiett's freely improvising, thought-composing, avant-garde composition (Sankofo), then effortlessly executing the less harmonically complex Cyrille composition (Spirit Music). The climax of this exciting sequence of styles comes as Cyrille and percussionist Frisner Augustin engage in a heated percussion and drums exchange on their composition (Mais). Overall, Andrew Cyrille & Haitian Fascination  not only display a extremely high caliber of musicianship, but they are also excellent composers and arrangers who have compiled an album of exciting, appealing music with the potential to become landmark in the genre.

Track Listing: Marinet; Deblozay; Hope Springs Eternal; Isaura; Route de Freres, Part 1 - Hills of Anjubeau; Route de Freres, Part 2 - Memories of Port-au-Prince Afternoons; Route de Freres, Part 3 - Manhattan Swing); C'mon Baby; Sankofa; Spirit Music; Mais (Percussion Duo); Ti Kawol.

Recorded by Robert Musso at Clinton Studios, New York City
Assistant Engineer: Justin Kessler
Mixed and Mastered by Henrik Otto Donner, Esa Santonen and Janne Malen at DER in Tammisaari, Finland

Produced by Petri Haussila

Andrew Cyrille uses Ludwig drums and Zildjian cymbals.

Email: info@tumrecords.com
http://www.tumrecords.com/