Andy Biskin: Reed Basket

     I’ll admit that when Reed Basket arrived in my inbox, I was a bit apprehensively about the virtues of a clarinet quartet. But I needn’t have worried. Clarinet wizard Andy Biskin and Reed Basket, with fellow clarinetists Peter Hess, Mike McGinnis, and Sam Sadigursky, uncork a relatively broad range of sound generated by five different members of the clarinet family. Biskin composed every one of the odd numbered tracks, which alternate in the program with an astonishing range of covers by composers including Franz Schubert (Moment Musicaux #3), Horace Silver (Blue Silver), Jelly Roll Morton (Wolverine Blues), and the biggest surprise, Lou Reed (Walk on the Wild Side). The carefully detailed arrangements are brought to vibrant life by musicians that are marvelously attuned to the nuances of each other’s sound. And Biskin’s smart sequencing of the program provides an engaging flow to the project. If I were impelled to pick a favorite piece from this baker’s dozens of delicious performances, today it might be the group’s dissection of fellow clarinetist Pee Wee Russell’s Wailin' D.A. Blues. Tomorrow, Biskin’s own Yasmina, with it’s A-section of rapturous melody and stately mien and the B-section that gives it some lift, might just hit the spot, and the day after that, it could be the easy groove of the Horace Silver piece or the winsome and lively arrangement of the Lou Reed song, or ... You get the idea: not a wasted moment in over an hour of charming and captivating sounds, beautifully recorded and mixed by Marc Urselli. Improvised music is full of surprises; I like it when an album I was hesitant about knocks me out in the listening. Very happily recommended. 

Self-produced; Andy Biskin (Bb, bcl) Peter Hess (Bb, Eb, alto clarinet, bcl, contra-alto clarinet) Mike McGinnis (Bb, alto clarinet, bcl)/ Sam Sadigursky (Bb, Eb, bcl); NYC, May 17, 2024; 1.Easy Chair/ 2.Camelot/3. Yasmina/ 4. Moment Musicaux #3/ 5. New Fangle/ 6. Wailin' D.A. Blues/ 7. Old Self/ 8. Blue Silver/ 9. So Forth/ 10. Walk on the Wild Side / 11. If Time Allows/ 12. Wolverine Blues/ 13. Minotaur; 62:10. andybiskin.com

Andy Biskin: 16 Tons - Songs From The Alan Lomax Collection

Call me jaded, but it takes something really special to make me suspend my critical faculties for even a few minutes. Truth be told, after penning thousands of opinionated paragraphs over the years, I’ve learned that the way I listen to review material is qualitatively different from the purity of dialing right into the music that’s right in your face. Which brings us, happily, to clarinetist Andy Biskin and his new 16 Tons - Songs From The Alan Lomax Collection. Until the quintet launched into Sweet Betsy From Pike, I didn’t know that I’d been hungering for a collection of American folk songs performed by a unit of three trumpets, clarinet, and drums. Live and learn. As a new college graduate back in the Seventies, Biskin worked for the great song collector Lomax as a research assistant, a job that lasted two years. That’s the starting point of this project, and you can read all about it in Biskin’s informative liner essay. (It’s a little hard to read, set in small type in a three-panel booklet, but worth the effort.) Biskin defines his working method here as one of intercutting the songs with his own melodies and short improvisations by himself and the trio of trumpeters. There are also bits and pieces from the jazz tradition worked into the pieces, like the Monk riff that’s woven into the cheerful arrangement of Blue Tail Fly. These folk songs (and one folky original by Biskin) may seem like unlikely vehicles for improvisation, and Biskin notes that when he told people about his ideas for this material, he “got quizzical looks.” But canny arranger and conceptualist that he is, he gets everything to work much better than you might expect. Just about anyone who spends time with this disc will recognize at least a few of these songs. Many of them, after all, were learned and sung in elementary school, and that knowledge provides an internal hook for these renditions. The rest is up to Biskin and his focused group of collaborators. Drummer Rob Garcia acquits himself very well in this unconventional setup, playing with vigorous flair. From right to left in the stereo spectrum, the trumpet “choir” of Dave Smith, John Carlson, and Kenny Warren blends beautifully, a bright and supportive wall of brass that provides a contrast to Biskin’s woody clarinet and bass clarinet. 16 Tons is almost guaranteed to put a smile on your face. Happily recommended.
Andorfin Music ANDRF-007; John Carlson, Dave Smith, Kenny Warren (tp) Andy Biskin (cl, bcl) Rob Garcia (d); NYC, January 12, 2018; Sweet Betsy From Pike/ Grey Goose/ Blue Tail Fly/ Down in the Valley/ House Carpenter/ Go Fish/ Lily Munroe/ Tom Dooley/ Muskrat/ Knock John Booker/ Am I Born to Die?/ She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain/ Sweet Betsy From Pike; 54:54. andybiskin.com