Mary Halvorson Octet - Away With You

Mary Halvorson Octet

Away With You

Firehouse 12 Records

Jonathan Finlayson - trumpet
Jon Irabagon - alto saxophone
Ingrid Laubrock - tenor saxophone
Jacob Garchik - trombone
Mary Halvorson - guitar

Susan Alcorn - pedal steel guitar
John Hébert - bass
Ches Smith - drums

Just got through listening to Mary Halvorson’s amazing new album with her Octet, Away With You (Because of the letterspacing on the cover, at first I thought the title was A Way With You, which is a nice play on words if you think about it!) This recording hit me so hard that I had to come out of my blog retirement to comment on it.

No real dominant voice, everything is very well-balanced throughout, and it’s the ensemble sound that you notice. One unique quality to the arrangements is Susan Alcorn’s pedal steel, an instrument I generally steer clear of even though I was born in the South. Here, however, it blends remarkably well with the woodwinds and brass, as well as Ms. Halvorson’s guitar.

Away With You builds on Ms. Halvorson’s work on her previous Firehouse 12 group recording, Illusionary Sea; in fact, it’s the same group with the addition of Ms. Alcorn. Listening to Away With You brought to mind Michael Formanek’s The Distance, not in the specific sound but in the way each offers a fresh take on arranging for larger groups of instruments.

This is brilliant stuff. It releases on October 28, but you can pre-order at Firehouse 12’s Bandcamp page.

Max Johnson - The Prisoner

Max Johnson

The Prisoner

NoBusiness Records

Ingrid Laubrock - Tenor Saxophone 

Mat Maneri - Viola
Max Johnson - Bass
Tomas Fujiwara - Drums

I’ve never watched The Prisoner, the 1967-68 British TV series that starred Patrick McGoohan as a secret agent help captive by a mysterious organization, but I know it has reached iconic status over the years. Bassist Max Johnson, who recently released the excellent The Invisible Trio, has composed a tribute to the series that plays as an extended suite. 

It begins slowly, almost hesitantly, as if in a fog, with long tones from the bass and viola. Then Ingrid Laubrock sounds a siren, or perhaps a clarion call, and the first theme of the album emerges. 

The rest of The Prisoner alternates between composed and improvised sections, but even in the freer passages there’s always something anchoring the music - a rhythm, a bass line, a repeating figure - that provides some structure but doesn’t sacrifice the feeling that the musicians generate. There are some exciting passages where free-form explorations suddenly transition into theme statements with a swinging pulse, and then take a right turn in another direction. You never know what’s coming next, which from what little I know of the plot of the show is probably what is intended. 

This is a record that you can listen to one or twice and enjoy, but as you dig deeper more layers reveal themselves. Johnson constructs some interesting textures with just four instruments, and as you might expect everyone is stellar. Ingrid Laubrock can wax lyrically, reminding me of Mark Turner in spots, and then go totally abstract, utilizing extended techniques. Mat Maneri might be the most immediately recognizable string player around, and he and Johnson create a dense thicket of sound, possibly mirroring the confusion and uncertainty that plagued McGoohan’s character Number 6. Tomas Fujiwara has never been better, accenting the music perfectly and providing plenty of drive.

As I listen to The Prisoner, I get the feeling that the music is programmatic, tracking certain developments in the plot that I wish I knew. That’s one indication that The Prisoner is a success; the other is that the music stands on its own as a fascinating glimpse into the musical mind of one Max Johnson.

Sound samples and ordering information are available on Max’s Bandcamp page. 

Here's a video of the group playing this material live back in 2013:

Ingrid Laubrock & Tom Rainey Tour 2014

I was excited to read on Facebook that Ingrid Laubrock and Tom Rainey are touring in support of their new CD And Other Desert Towns on Relative Pitch. Here are the dates, some of which are still tentative:

05/15 Cleveland/Mahall's 20 Lanes

05/16 Ann Arbour/Kerrytown House Concerts

05/17 Chicago/Constellation

05/18 Milwaukee/Sugar Maple

05/20 St. Louis/New Music Circle

05/22 Nashville/Zeitgeist Gallery ('Indetermanacies' series concert + workshop at the Nashville Public Library)

05/23 Tuscaloosa/venue tba

05/24 New Orleans/Zeitgeist Multi-Disciplinary Arts Center

05/25 New Orleans/Cafe Istanbul

05/26 Houston/Avant Garden, "They Who Sound" series (duo + trio with bassist Damon Smith)

05/27 Austin/venue tba

05/30 Boulder/venue tba

06/01 Kansas City/The Record Bar

06/02 Minneapolis/The Icehouse (J T's Jazz Implosion series)

06/03 Madison/tbc

06/04 Fort Wayne/ venue tba (duo + trio with guitarist Phil Schurger)

The Top Jazz Releases of 2013

Here, in order, are my top 10 jazz releases of 2013. I kept my list to 10 in order to conform to the format established by Francis Davis, who graciously asked me to take part in his 8th annual jazz critics poll, hosted this year by NPR Music. For this blog I cheated and added an "Honorable Mention" list as well, below the list of my main choices.

My top 10 are:

Mary Halvorson Septet - Illusionary Sea (Firehouse 12)
Ms. Halvorson takes yet another step forward in an already remarkable career. In a lineage with Point of Departure.

Convergence Quartet – Slow & Steady (No Business)
Taylor Ho Bynum and Alexander Hawkins both figure again on this list, and along with Dominic Lash and Harris Eisenstadt, reinvent a traditional-sounding trumpet/piano/bass/drums lineup.

Taylor Ho Bynum Sextet & 7-tette – Navigation (Firehouse 12)
Fascinating to hear how he approaches recasting a set of materials over four performances outside of his work with Braxton.

Drew Gress – The Sky Inside (Pirouet)
Compelling compositions and arrangements from Gress, and compelling performances from his long-time collaborators. 

Craig Taborn – Chants (ECM)
A dark, complex record that with mysterious depths beneath the surface. 

Alexander Hawkins – Song Singular (Babel Label)
The record that puts Hawkins in the same league as Melford, Taborn, Fujii, etc. 

Ralph Alessi – Baida (ECM)
Alessi seems in total command of his horn and his approach, and he sounds like he’s having fun as well. 

Satoko Fujii Trio – Spring Storm (Libra)
Another winning trio record. 

Francois Houle/Havard Wiik – Aves (Songlines)
A beautiful dialogue between clarinet and piano.

Nate Wooley – (Sit In) The Throne of Friendship (Clean Feed)
Wooley has some pretty wild freer recordings, but I like him best when he balances composition with unique arrangements. 

Honorable mentions:

Ingrid Laubrock Anti-House - Strong Place (Intakt)

Gabriella Friedli Trio – Started (Intakt)

Samuel Blaser/Benoit Delbecq/Gerry Hemingway - Fourth Landscape (Nuscope)

Harris Eisenstadt – Golden State (Songlines)

Tim Berne's Snakeoil - Shadow Man (ECM)

Satoko Fujii – Gen Himmel (Libra)

Full results of Mr. Davis' poll will be posted in the coming days at www.nprmusic.org.

The Madness of Trios

Ingrid Laubrock Sleepthief,
The Madness of Crowds
Intakt Records
 
Ingrid Laubrock - Saxophones
Liam Noble - Piano
Tom Rainey - Drums
 
The madness of crowds is from Sleepthief, a cooperative trio of sax, piano and drums. This configuration appears to be all the rage these days: Ellery Eskelin, Ken Vandermark and Rob Brown all have recent albums out using this format.
 
Liam Noble is the new entity for me, although this trio has a prior release out on the same label. Noble occasionally uses a prepared piano effect that has a zither-type sound, a little of which goes a very long way. I mean, if I wanted to listen to frickin' Zamfir king of the pan flute I'd go buy his album off the telly, now wouldn't I?
 
On another track it sounds like someone's blowing bubbles underwater, which also doesn't add anything to the proceedings. Once they quit horsing around, though, at about track 3, things pick up nicely. There’s some great interplay between the three musicians, and Laubrock impresses on soprano as well as tenor, demonstrating a nice control on the smaller horn.
 
Ms. Laubrock is a frustrating artist to listen to in a way, because she seems to prefer free improv settings, but I'm not sure that's really her strength. A little structure or, dare I say it, melody, suits her better. Still, she's a star on the rise and it will be interesting to see where she goes from here.