Release: January 25th
If you think you already know all sorts of unusual and unusual combinations of instruments and styles, you can now – for fun at least – think for a minute: have you ever heard of an album by trumpet and e-zither? The idea may seem a bit oblique at first glance. Translated by Lorenz Raab and Christof Dienz, however, it sounds as conclusive as it is exciting.
Tamara Lukasheva is considered beyond her generation as one of the outstanding voices of German jazz. Her unusually agile vocal expressiveness, which has been precisely refined over the past 15 years, not only leaves a deep impression on the jazz-savvy audience. Lukasheva’s music is independent and variable, moving in the field of tension of strong melodies, Eastern European influences, dynamic improvisation and emphasis.
Fourth recording from young saxophonist and the leader of Norwegian quartet Hanna Paulsberg, brings some new inspirations. To me equally interesting is a dedication of the record to Pharoah Hatshepsut, which these days when the world is ruled by weak and false male hypocrites and the women need to fight for their rights again, has a special meaning.
Like them back in time Hatshepsut had to fight for her independence and respect, what sadly shows that despite so called civilisation the humanity goes in circles over and over through the same gender wars. But let’s get back to the music.
Paulsberg’s inspirations, unlike most of the other Scandinavian players are not taking that much from the folklore but heading back towards an American source and as a natural extension, back to their African roots. This project in particular shows that concept.
An opening Scent of Soil starts with a lovely intro, doubled with the harmony created by the choir of musicians in short choruses. Leadingbass line and holding melody piano are both creating a canvas for that slowly opening piece, where Hanna together with the special guest, trumpeter Magnus Broo holding the melody together solo or in lovely unisons. It brings the intensity of the late Alice Coltrane recordings with a spiritual twist hidden between the lines, but also with very vivid trumpeter’s solos a contemplative nature, Jon Hassel alike.
Another track, Serriana has similar harmonic richness but with more figurative appearance of the brass, audible when melody is passed by from one musician to another and then held back in circles.
Little Big Saxophone coming after is a different creation. Piano and rhythm section is waving the framework for high brass flights. Here is where intense double lines from sax and trumpet are dialoguing with percussive piano chops. Again, Broo’s presence seems to be a great idea giving a band departure from the sound which we are remembering them for from the past recordings. This Brass Fantasy brings to the memories Lester Bowie’s conversations with Hamiet Bluiett, but in a different register of course.
Hemulen Tar Ferie is my favourite piece from that recording, possibly because it comes in its onomatopoeic approach as close to my beloved an Art Ensemble of Chicago or AACM sound in general. It is most intuitive track with a lot of invention developed from all the band members and holding into simple and beautiful melody in the same time.
Title tune is the One about her. It has that nomadic feeling, with the drummer creating a Caravan alike feeling on rides with bassist chopping intervals and laying the groove in the same time. Sax lines are very pretty here, very Coltrane-esque in their simplicity and they had been executed. Lovely straight notes, not a lot of thrill, which had been left for trumpet to bring. Duets of both instruments are brushing a clear view for the subject with no doubts or foggy feeling.
Closing Bouncing with Flower Buds, is again bringing a post AACM aesthetics with lots of freedom given to the rhythm and articulation allowing musicians to elevate their voice in the mutual tissue into a different level of the conversation. Lovely piece which I admire a lot. Phenomenal recording all together.
The Moskus is not your typical piano trio as it looks on the paper. It still contains some of the elements that are typical for piano trio music, but not a lot. First of all, using different electronic keyboards, Hammond organs or upright piano, which seems to be additionally prepared de-tours from harmonies that usual trio fan is familiar with, secondly it is the way they do communicate.
The language is super simple. Almost pictorial. There is not a lot of tunes, neither some regularity of the patterns, It is a bit like a soundtrack to an old cartoon, Something sketchy about it, that makes it easier to visualise as if drawn for me rather than a score on paper.
Sometimes seriousness of the piano phrase is contradicted by the complete lapidaries of the instrument it is dialogue with, like the saw in a piece with no tittle, but a crazy mark like that one (**.), which with short movement lasts no longer in your ear that afterimage on your retina.
An obvious function of the instruments in trio had been dropped. It doesn’t work that way with them. Instead there is a constant will audible to prevent communication on very basic level, with such a straight feeling of temporality that tomorrow is looking almost like a far distant future. Structures are like butterflies, staying in air just for a blink of an eye and in the same time there is an instantly following feeling of suspension that the next step might not be certain either. That creates very quirky sense of balance and plays with the sense of gravity.
The music seems to be incredibly light, even if the groove from organs is constantly present and anchoring composition firmly the sense of its body is not that obvious at all. Perhaps this is the biggest achievement they made as a trio that is exists just like an illusion. Nothing firm one could hold on to. A floating energy which communicates, sparks, feeds and then disappears once it had been discharged. The fact that the description of that music is so physical rather than laying in a lyrical term makes it sort of Mechanique.
It might sound silly but once listened to it, this becomes more understandable. The simplicity is almost intuitive, like with children playing together on the playground and simply using what’s laying around to fit the purpose and fulfil the imagination. That feeling of randomness is most present part of their style to me. Percussivity becomes a second nature when life calls for it. Roughness changes places with finesse. And that one is not the Belle Époque kind either. Everything swings around in this improvised dance and now one seems to know who is leading it but they do not step on their feet either.
But such is a life inside the piano trio which doesn’t particularly need to use a piano at all.
It is a strange feeling to me to write about this music as it is not jazz by any meaning but in the same time I can feel with all pores of my skin where it drew an inspiration from and those roots are purely jazzy. So that makes a sort of a hyperbole, bringing non-jazzy children to the world from most jazzy possible parents and grandparents. So even if the music is not a Jazz per se it contains a whole lot of Jazz DNA in its heritage.
Here we got then the band of twelve Norwegian musicians performing their own six, most of the twisted composition I recently came across. An opening tittle piece Musikk! is striking from the first notes. It comes a very dance mix which contains in it ingredients like those from Sun Ra’s kitchen, but also a lot of spices that are typical for an Art Ensemble of Chicago, or for a AACM flavour in general. To that one can add Alice Coltrane’s modal experiments as well as psychedelic trips like those which Deavid Allen used to make with his Gong, Soft Machine or Banana Moon.
Deeper into woodlands it becomes even more exciting. Take the next one called Frampek. It doesn’t drop at all what they bought on the table at the beginning but to that it yet adds a sounds like a Mongolian throat singing, or para- theatrical vocal expressions which are not designed to walk together with the music, but more like Meredith Monk’s attempts, are hung in the air creating confusion and forcing listener to find the key to that intellectual expression.
Next one – Kallet, is one of my favourite there. The cacophonic illusion builds around simple fount clearly originating from the folk tune with its call and response function and lapidary motif repeated in chorales, between improvised and more congested sections. It has some silliness in it, call it provocative infantilism, which comes to the surface to push the pompous emphasis out of the pedestal.
Following Festen is a fast walking through the blues scales, bringing a bit of Arto Lindsay, a bit of AEoC, but also a lot of funky- punky tunes which are sounding to my ears like some known motifs, which I however can not identify. But I have a gut feeling that this pulp is again bought here for the reason, to realise an existential tension and point that life doesn’t have to be serious at all. Looping some sounding Circus alike orchestral culminations into the outro kind of roots this feeling even deeper into my head.
Following Portrett, in similar style uses descriptive nature of instruments to sketch in your imagination like in the book. Rain I hear in the background and stepping piano are making it all more nostalgic. Lovely trumpet solo in the back ground, occasionally joined by tuba create wonderful brassy tissue which feels dreamy and cloudy but entertains with the edgy culminations coming from band’s tutties.
This music runs away from definitions and more importantly sounds just as fresh no matter how often one keeps returning to listen to it. Now, together with ongoing heatwave it makes me levitate and I hate when it stops.
Henriksen’s latest project started as a commissioned work for the city of Hull, UK and it is sort of a tribute to Scandinavia and England’s long lasting inter-sea relationship. Given the fact that two long time collaborators and probably the most intriguing Norwegian guitarist are part of the project brings back memories of fantastic sessions like Chiaroscuro or Place or Worship, which I both do admire and quite often am listening too.
On English side the Hull based sound artist Jez Riley French contributes with electronic tissue which contains filed recordings and samples, further looped into the composition. On top of it there is also Choir and Orchestra of the Opera North who supplies some Symphonic lines and the Vocalises co-building this unusual project.
When it comes to some uncommon projects nobody would fit better with their challenging personalities like those three extraordinary musicians. Therefore, the stamp of these personalities is quite feel-able to anybody familiar with their Art, like myself.
The mood is very mystic and highly spiritual. Addition of the Orchestra and Choir reminds the same pillars of communication which the trumpeter already created during his long-time collaboration with Trio Mediaeval, but compositions are even more lacy then usual even by Arve’s standards. The fact that the music came to fit the purpose might be responsible for it. Either then that it contains all what makes Henriksen’s music as we know it. The dialogue between the past and the present handled with an incredible sensitivity and almost intuitive shifts between moods, styles and cultural backgrounds.
In fact,the trumpeter’s flawlessness is clearly making these boarders disappear or at least blending to the point that it becomes more and more difficult to trace an inspirations and origins, but without losing and easiness of his message.
That is something that makes you think about the parallel nature of the human experience, despite of distance, climate or believing. Patterns alone and human desire to express that, no matter how originally one feels it, on the end the emotional intelligence is always putting an equal mark between them.
Listening to this music is like a flight over the misty river with a key of cranes, in the fresh air, straight into a day which is just awaking in some warming rays of the morning Sun. You do not know yet what it is going to bring you, but the openness of the space and calmness of the sounds surrounding you in this spectacle are sort of assuring that it is going to be a wonderful day. It must have been a wonderful experience to walk over the Humber Bridge, wearing headphones with that music in your head. No surprise that project had been rewarded with an overwhelming popularity and one more iconic work in already exceptional artists’ portfolio.
Release: November 23rd
The guitarist, composer and performer Kim Myhr, whose previous Hubro release, ‘You | me’, received the accolade of a shortlist nomination for the prestigious Nordic Music Prize, composed the extraordinary music and text piece ‘pressing clouds passing crowds’ as a commission for the 2016 FIMAV-festival (Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville) in Quebec, Canada. It features Myhr on 12-string acoustic guitar alongside an expanded version of the celebrated Montreal-based string quartet Quatour Bozzini with percussionist Ingar Zach (Huntsville, Dans les Arbres) and the voice of the poet Caroline Bergvall, reading her own text.
Polish/Italian/Danish trio Il Sogno’s debut recording simply called Birthday brings up indeed into the world of Dreams. Whatever they are soothing, or nightmares depends on the listeners only. Ten titles it contains, except famous Morricone’s Cheyenne, are band’s originals with two out of them credited exclusively to the bassist and pianist.
The trio appears to be continuing a sophisticated tradition of the European Jazz piano trios, with their emotional touch and philosophical mood, but here things seems to be done all in slightly different way. First of all is stands out that even if compositions had been written, or at least the main lines had been provided, there is no intention to close them into sculptured form, but rather keep the flow and open ideas exchange bringing both musicians and listeners to the unavoidable culmination.
The Paintfall, written by bassist comes as an invitation into this amazing spectacle. It is a very energetic piece, starting with piano introduction followed by disturbing rhythm served by the maracas. There is wonderful tension in this music sitting on the bass core and its twisted lines bringing some sense of suspense to the tissue, amplified by an obtrusively repetitive piano chord. And the feeling builds just on that. It makes an excellent framework as well to introduce a Spaghetti Western classic, as that was something that Great Ennio Morricone mastered all his life – the anxiety which makes you shiver, but in the same time keeps you away from running by promising the joy of unexpected. The same what Hitchcock introduced into the movie. Their Cheyenne is more Dancy but keeps the mood of the original.
Further we go deeper into imaginative structure. With Il Giorno the same pattern based on a dialogue of piano and drums are creating the mood. Bassist’s Arco looped into the conversation makes it feel like a blood pulsing at the temples.
Following miniature called Sonar lasts only slightly over a minute but it is Jacobson’s peak of the recording. The articulation and richness of his woody sounding Double Bass reminds me the best of Michael Formanek, and clearly indicates that Polish bassist spent significant amount of time studying it.
It makes natural intro for an upcoming Pavane, which sits here in lower registers, with melody served by the bass spiced with cymbals splashes wrapping it occasionally and only accenting chords left in the pianist hands, which are played with a long decay and living their life in the same Universe as Laumann’s percussive invasion. What strikes here is a freedom of the conversation and the shift of the natural leadership one would expect. Double Bass becomes piano, percussion takes over the bass, when piano serves rhythmical accents more often that is serving a harmony.
Not just instrumental functions of the trio are in a constant move but also the rhythm, The section does everything else but keep it. In that regard we are experiencing the freedom of conversation and articulation which belongs more to the free jazz and improvised music world than to the typical piano trio vocabulary. But, this isn’t your usual Piano Trio – prepare yourself for a surprise. Brilliant debut. I wish it would last longer than just over half an hour.
The second recording from Norwegian trumpeter Hilde Marie Holsen differs vastly from her phenomenal ARA debut which hit the world in 2015. Different is also a subject, which now refers to artist’s collaboration with painter Tyra Fure Brandsæter and gives new meaning to the core inspiration for those soundscapes. Four titles on the CD are all named after metamorphic minerals needed to create pigments for the paints: Orpiment, Eskolaite, Lapis and Lazuli are used respectively for: orange-yellow, green, blue and so called “sacred blue”.
Knowing that might make your imagination seeing the sonic landscapes in completely new way.
She had from the beginning her own voice and autonomy, which is not easy when you come from the country having already such greats as Nils Petter Molvaer and Arve Henriksen present on the trumpet firmament. When ARA was more about articulation, breath control and looking for the new ways how to express the trumpet through electronica, Lazuli is more focused. Both are equally short, which might indicate the fact that she likes to operate in tight time shells. Unlike on ARA when it takes long time for first trumpet notes to come, here it comes straight forward. One needs a brush to paint as they say, but does he really?
On Orpiment the sound is warm and immersive. Long notes extended even more with post-processing. It lasts hardly three minutes and introduces repetitive simple melody line overlapping apocryphal groovy sound hanging in an air with various intensity. As such it makes great intro to the recording and sets up a contemplative mood and sonically opens the gates for your imagination to step further.
Following Eskolaite is much faster and rolling forward with a different mood. The trumpet plays notes even longer and more delayed, deliberately distorted by software. Percussive tissue in the background sounds very organic and kind of describe the rocky nature of the mineral, one can almost imagine somebody crumbling and grinding it to get what he demands. Floating trumpet loops are definitely in the crowns of the trees, where the wind lives as apposite to definitively root-y character of electronic artefacts holding most of the gravity. This is very wide-angle view to me, foggy and humid with lots of horizontal layers.
The fact it lasts longer makes this feeling of an immersion even bigger and wider.
Going towards blue, takes us as expected to the minor scales. Purity of the trumpet notes here are almost angelic. With lots of air and decay. This extension comes a higher purity of the trumpet sounds, which are now more descriptive. Entire landscape is covered with shades of blue of different provenience and one can feel it in everything, even in blacks. The melody is pure, and the tune leads you into the air, so you see the pictures from the bird’s point of view now. Perspective becomes more vertical and eternal character of the composition takes over.
Closing Lazuli is the longest one, almost as long as preceding ones, if not physically – it feels like that anyway. The waves of sound are coming here like a tight, with the brutal force and dominant presence, like something absolute. The Universe. Undependable power. The momentum builds higher and higher with each next wave coming. That almost pushes you into the worship, buy its density and concentration. On that landscape, long extended solo introduced in the middle of the tune brings something absolute to the imagination and it makes it almost impossible to describe the feeling. To sum it up I must say she progressed 200% percent for me with that development of the new language and did prove that her voice matured seriously since I heard her debut. Incredibly pure and high-quality recording, which
I must admire, is notorious for Hubro makes it a pure debauchery fest for your ears and eyes.
