2023 was a tumultuous year, both in the world and in my household. Events seemed to conspire to keep me from listening and writing for this blog as much as I (and the publicists who send me music) would have liked. And yet, in what was also a very busy year for new releases, there was quite a variety of new music to discuss and recommend. Hence this three-part post of very brief reviews of some releases I couldn’t find the energy to get to in a timely fashion.
Successful free improvisation needs the participants to be compatible and equally fearless. The duo of Ivo Perelman & Elliott Sharp definitely fits the bill. On Artificial Intelligence, tenor saxophonist Perelman and guitarist Sharp, playing a Strandberg Boden 8-string instrument plus electronics, match wits with an air of casual intensity. Squeaks, squeals, and funny noises of all sorts abound, and at times it’s hard to tell who’s doing what. But that’s part of the fun to be had soaking up the unusual pathways the duo provides. There’s nothing artificial about Artificial Intelligence. This is the real thing, music made by real people in real time. I loved every second! Mahakala Music MAHA-054; Ivo Perelman (ts) Elliott Sharp (Strandberg Boden 8-string guitar, elec); Brooklyn NY, January 2022; Parts 1-4; 57:58. mahakalamusic.com
John Coltrane, among many other musical innovators, didn’t want liner notes on his albums, letting the music speak for itself. Poets and film directors have taken a similar stance, saying that if they could have told you what it meant, there wouldn’t have to be a poem or a movie. Creative individuals tell you who they are by their works. Pianist extraordinaire Matthew Shipp gives the best indication of his inner life on the totally absorbing The Intrinsic Nature of Shipp, a solo set. Echoes of Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Cecil Taylor and many others mingle and coalesce in Shipp’s musical world. Shipp once wrote an essay on what he calls “Black Mystery School Pianists,”an investigation into what he describes in his liner notes for a Hasaan Ibn Ali release as “a line of iconoclastic pianists that descended from Thelonious Monk who used an alternate set of parameters in their nomenclature and attitude that was different than the usual mainstream jazz.” I think it’s safe to say, some 37 years after his first appearance on record (Sonic Explorations, a duo with altoist Rob Brown on Cadence Jazz Records), that Shipp has assured his place in that lineage of innovators with the many remarkable releases as both leader and sideman in that time. And if you don’t know his 1990 trio album Circular Temple, it’s just been reissued by ESP-Disk. As NY poet and novelist John Farris concluded his liner notes for the original release, “Whose language are we speaking? The answer to that question is at one and the same time both easy and complex: the language of the trio. Matt Shipp’s language. If you want to understand, you simply have to listen. Dig?” These many years later, I’m still listening, and still digging it.
Intrinsic Nature : Mahakala Music MAHA-061; Matthew Shipp (p); Brooklyn, NY, March 4, 2023; The Intrinsic Nature of Shipp/ Crystal Structures/ That Vibration/ The/ Jazz Emotions/ The Essence/ Jazz Frequency/ Tune Into It/ The Bulldozer Poetics/ Essence Of Silence; 50:15. mahakalamusic.com
Circular Temple : ESP-Disk’ ESP4082; Matthew Shipp (p) William Parker (b) Whit Dickey (d); NYC, October 16, 1990; Circular Temple #1/ Circular Temple #2 (Monk’s Nightmare)/ Circular Temple #3/Circular Temple #4; 46:19. www.espdisk.com
Veteran pianist Billy Childs assembled a dynamite quartet for The Winds of Change, with trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire, bassist Scott Colley, and drummer Brian Blade. Childs writes intricate compositions, full of dynamic changes, tempo shifts and surprising yet inevitable seeming melodic progressions. The quartet more than rises to the occasion, imbuing their performances with deep feeling and irresistible rhythmic vitality. Childs and company also pay homage to a pair of influential pianists, with a soothing reading of Crystal Silence, by the late Chick Corea, and an uptempo version of The Black Angel, a tune by the still-active Kenny Barron. This composition was introduced as the title track of a 1969 Freddie Hubbard album on Atlantic. Childs played in Hubbard’s band for six years in the Seventies, making the song’s inclusion here a double tribute. The exquisite trumpet stylings of Akinmusire are beautifully displayed in the quartet setting, making for some truly compelling listening. While I’m partial to the spirited exploration of the 10-minute long title track, as well as Master of the Game, a Childs original with an optimism that’s evoked by the melody, to tell the truth, there isn’t a dull second on this winning collection. Mack Avenue MAC 1200; Ambrose Akinmusire (tpt) Billy Childs (p) Scott Colley (b) Brian Blade (d); Hollywood, CA, May 14-16, 2022; The Great Western Loop/ The Winds of Change/ The End of Innocence/ Master of the Game/ Crystal Silence / The Black Angel/ I Thought I Knew; 52:36. mackavenue.com
And speaking of Ambrose Akinmusire, he surprised just about everyone with the release of Beauty Is Enough, an absolutely gorgeous solo trumpet album, recorded in the vast reverberant space of Église Saint-Eustache. In a photo of this church, in Paris’ 1e arrondissemont, it appears to tower over the surrounding trees and buildings. Completed in 1632 after a century of work, the lively echoing and re-echoing from the stone gives a performer essentially a steady partner for his improvisations. Over sixteen tracks that generally last between 2 and 4 minutes each, Akinmusire uses his horn and the room to explore a world of pure sound. The man’s imagination seems to have no boundaries, and over the 48 minutes of this recital, we get to overhear his musical musings. It’s as if we have all been invited to listen to his unmediated experimentation with the myriad timbral and manipulative possibilities of the trumpet. The multi-instrumentalist and composer Anthony Braxton was a pioneer of solo improvising. Back in 1979, in his prescient liner notes for Alto Saxophone Improvisations 1979, he wrote about “the forming of a new kind of creative musician - whose activity transcends any one criterion and whose scope cannot be limited by superficial boundaries ... In actual terms we can now experience a spectrum of solo musics involving every kind of instrument ...” In Akinmusire’s capable hands, the future is now. Origami Harvest; Ambrose Akinmusire (tpt); Paris, France, no dates indicated; To: Taymoor/ 2->1<-/ Carvin./ Turns/ Launchpad/ Olusiji SR/ Off the ledge/ To: Shabnam/ Achilles/ Boots and Jewels/ Wallace/ -Ann_/ Rio/ Self-Portrait/ Sunknees/ To: Cora Campbell; 48:41. origamiharvest.bandcamp.com
Another spectacular solo brass release in 2023 was The Howland Sessions by the accomplished trombonist Joe Fiedler. Named for the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon, NY, where the music was recorded, the release is dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the innovative trombone master Albert Mangelsdorff’s audacious solo performance in Munich as part of Joachim-Ernst Berendt’s Solo Now festival. Fiedler, who named his Multiphonics Music label after Mangelsdorff’s trademark innovation, is a truly awesome performer. Using a panoply of extended techniques, he has immense control over his instrument and his breathing (check out that circular breathing on The Long No, for one instance). A gifted composer, he’s got the imaginative range of melody and emotion to put all that technique to use. Decidedly not designed for casual listening, the music of The Howland Sessions demands your attention. You’ll be repaid with a surfeit of beauty, and music to return to again and again. Multiphonics Music MM07; Joe Fiedler (tbn); Beacon, NY, April 26-27, 2022; The Jack Rabbit/ Otter Cam/ Fiedlowitz Manor/ The Long No/ Singer/ Empire Trail/ Sisyphean/ ‘72; 52:15. joefiedler.com
