John Carter, Echoes from Rudolph's, 1976-77

I was introduced to the music of clarinetist John Carter, as many of us were, via several excellent albums featuring himself and Bobby Bradford in a quartet. They were thoroughgoingly advanced and most unequivocally themselves. Later John went on his own with solo and group efforts that gave us an even deeper appreciation of his special world.

There was a trio album Echoes from Rudolph's that came out on an Ibedon LP that was especially fine. It has become quite rare these days, but No Business has come to a rescue with a CD reissue of the 1977 album and a full CD's worth of unreleased tracks from the sessions that produced the album--resulting in a new two-CD set (No Business NBCD 80-81).

It is John on clarinet and soprano, Stanley Carter on bass and William Jeffrey on drums doing a program of Carter compositions and giving us an excellent free-wheeling experience.

The level of music does not at all lag on the second CD of unreleased tracks. It is more state-of-the-art music from the band.

Stanley Carter and William Jeffrey are very much in form and equal to the challenge of playing with John Carter at a peak. They burst forward with a rolling, tumbling excellence that is fascinating and worthwhile in itself. But then John sounds just fabulous on both clarinet AND soprano here, reminding us of how beautiful a player he was, how original, how soulful and creative.

Anyone who has not spent much time with the late Carter's music needs to do so. This album set is an excellent place to start. And of course those who know John's music will want to get a hold of this set, too. He was one of the most important stylists on clarinet in the flowering of the avant garde (along with Perry Robinson). Echoes from Rudolph's provides you with a generous amount of his music in peak form.

Get it if you can!

Satoko Fujii Tobira, Yamiyo Ni Karasu

Here we have another engaging album by pianist-composer Satoko Fujii, in this case with her new trio, who recorded Spring Storm several years ago (see my review here by typing the title into the search box above), and went on to tour extensively, with or without the addition of her partner Natsuki Tamura on trumpet. For the new recording Yamiyo Ni Karasu (Libra 204-038) she includes Tamura and redubs the group Satoko Fujii Tobira. Tobira is Japanese for "door." The idea is that the group utilizes the door "to bring some fresh air into the music," in her words, to keep an open stance.

So we have Satoko, Natsuki, plus Todd Nicholson on bass and Takashi Itani on drums in a program of seven Fujii originals. As is often the case with Ms. Fujii's music the compositions are landmarks, frameworks which the artists then freely respond to and against, showing marked thematic elements and inspired improvisatory dialogs. Natsuki jumps into the band at key spots. The trio often works on their own for the rest of the program. And that all works out well.

The ensemble makes for an excellent confluence of spirit and inventive poise. This is music of three- and four-way freedom with Satoko playing some excellent piano and giving us compositions of substance. Nicholson, Itani and Tamura come through as well with integrated looseness and inspiration. To hear what they do inside and outside the compositional foundation is to hear superlative creative mastery in play.

Satoko Fujii has been remarkably prolific in her recorded output. This one is especially good. Those new to Satoko's music could quite profitably begin here. Those who know Ms. Fujii's music will find this one an excellent addition, an essential release in the small group mode.

Satoko Fujii is one of the world's avant jazz treasures! Hear this one to understand part of why that is so.

I understand she will be touring Australia January 14-19 and Japan January 23-30 with her band KAZE. Check the internet if you are interested.

Bobby Bradford / Frode Gjerstad Quartet, The Delaware River

On the docket today is a very together recording of the Bobby Bradford / Frode Gjerstad Quartet live in Philadelphia called The Delaware River (No Business NBLP 87). The quartet includes Bobby Bradford on cornet, Frode Gjerstad on alto sax and Bb clarinet, Ingebrigt Håker Flaten on bass, and Frank Rosaly on drums. which not surprisingly is a very game proposition.

In the tradition of No Business's keen appreciation for the avant jazz music scene, this is a first-rate window onto the quartet's world that night in March of 2014. The rhythm section is, as you'd expect, completely focused on the music at hand, giving the front line a very creative wash of free momentum that Bobby and Frode draw from as a catalyst. For anyone who knows the work of Bradford and Gjerstad, it will come as no surprise that the two are well suited to work together. Frode has held his own for years as a very important reed presence in free jazz Europe and of course Bobby Bradford is a legend in the US for his association with Ornette Coleman and his partnership with the late John Carter in a landmark quartet.

But of course no one can be sure of what an outcome might turn out as until the hearing. This set is a confirmation of the rightness of this quartet, of the continued creative excellence of Bobby Bradford, the equally inventive Frode Gjerstad in a non-compromising "new thing" world, and the righteous chemistry of the quartet as a full-bloomed entity.

This is music with space for all. Bradford and Gjerstad get some remarkable interplay together with their simultaneous two-way soloing, each clearly hearing one another and responding with parallel ideas. Their space openings for the rhythm team are judicious as well. Ingebrigt and Frank are two of the liveliest artists in their own right these days and they know how to extend the music accordingly with good ideas and open support as well as independance.

So as the Delaware River flows so does this quartet. It is not a floodtide of histrionics nor is it in a drought condition of narrow trickling. This is the quartet like the river in steady-state continuity. And so the program gives us a fascinating earful of these four in productive and fruitful togetherness.

It is a nice addition to the discography of all four artists. It satisfies. I am clapping enthusiastically with these words. Listen to this one.

AKA Balkan Moon, AlefBa Double Live

Music can do what politics and endless battalions of soldiers seemingly cannot, that is, take the musical commonalities of adjacent and at times opposing cultural groups and make (in the right hands) for a peaceful coexistence or even a mutual flourishing. AKA Balkan Moon is such a musical force. On their two-CD set AlefBa Double Live (Outhere/Instinct 657) they show us how to make a very vibrant music combining Mid-Eastern, Baltic and jazz-rock influences and transforming them into something very vibrantly modern.

The core of the group is the trio of Fabrizio Cassol on alto saxophone, Michel Hatzigeorgiou on Fender Jazz bass, and Stephane Galland on drums. The core is joined by two different live congregations of musicians, basically distinct for each disk. Disk one adds a more Baltic-Western instrumentation of vocals, violin. kaval, piano, soprano saxophone, tupan drum and morsing. Disk two features a Mid-Eastern oriented instrumentation of vocals, flute, ouds, trumpet, santur, violin, darbuka and guitar.

And they do what ISIS would most certainly despise, that is, find musical grounds for a pan-regional solidarity, a peace of musical understanding. But as that goes it does so with some really engaging music, a fusion of jazz-rock elements with world Mid-Eastern/Baltic intricacies.

It does so with really superb arrangements and performances, world-class with original brilliance. As the old ad slogan had it (at least around New York) when I was a kid, "You don't have to be Jewish to Love Levy's." So also you don't have to be Mid-Eastern or Baltic to love Balkan Moon! This is music so accomplished and engaging you can appreciate it even if you are not part of the cultural complexes that make such a wonderful hybrid music possible.

It is some extraordinary music. It is the music of peace! But it is the music of excellence, too. Hear this one, by all means.

Steve Swell's Kende Dreams, Hommage a Bartok

Some projects come about in ways that have an important impact on the final result. Take today's album by Steve Swell's Kende Dreams, Hommage a Bartok (Silkheart 160). It all started when Lars-Olaf Gustavsson, producer and director of Silkheart Records, encountered Steve Swell during the Vision Festival in 2014. Lars-Olaf brought up the possibility of doing a kind of Bela Bartok tribute album (as most will know, an important modern composer from Hungary in the last century). Steve jumped at the chance and Lars-Olaf suggested some of his favorite Bartok works that Steve might use as a springboard, including Bartok's "Microcosmos" piano works and the String Quartets. An excellent set of choices, there. Lee Konitz did some arrangements, fairly literal, of three "Mikrokosmos" pieces for his album Peacemeal many years ago, so there was a nice precedent.

But precedent does not equal duplication, for Steve's approach is a good deal more oblique. Anyone who knows Steve's creative presence on the new jazz scene would not expect anything not ultra-creative. And that's what we get. Steve immersed himself in the works, did some research on the history of Bartok's Hungarian homeland, and discovered in the first years of the local federation of groups that later became the Hungarian nation per se, very long ago, that as various Magyar tribes gathered together they divided their governing bodies into the military and the spiritual, the latter known as Kende. In time the military powers predominated and the Kende were in effect disenfranchised. As Steve states in the liners, this seemed to him an example of how humanity in general can get off the track of what constitutes their essence, of what makes them unique and generative beings, the Kende realm. We know this directly in our time, as the endless wars continue and it seems increasingly to be at the expense of what nourishes our inner beings. Music of course is a vital part of that. It is for this reason that Steve calls his project band Kende Dreams.

At any rate Steve dove into a Bartokian preoccupation, listening and examining the music closely. In the end Swell fashioned seven compositions that were informed and inspired by Bartok, that were faithful to the composer's musical outlook and intent, but were not by any means a literal re-arrangement of Bartok's music.

Steve assembled a quintet that consisted of some of his very favorite musicians. It so happens that they are also some of the very best of the best in the new jazz. After several rehearsals they went into the studio with Lars-Olaf Gustavvson heading the production.

The results are available as Hommage a Bartok. The sextet, collectively and individually, sound as wonderful on this album as they ever have. William Parker on bass is a magnetic dynamo of power, playing his role as only he can do. There is great soul and intelligence to everything he does, whether it is a matter of sounding the compositional ostinato riffs and other pre-prepared lines, driving the music forward with dramatic force, or soloing with great ideas, he is central to how this music is made to come alive.

Drummer Chad Taylor makes for an ideal rhythm teammate in the way he works with William and catapults the band forward with drumming that exemplifies smarts, feeling and subtle drive.

Connie Crothers is exceptionally inspired with some of her breathtaking best on piano. As an ensemble member she opens up the music rhythmically and harmonically and in her solo spots she literally stops the clock with some fabulous statements that fit in totally with the modernist hommage yet are very much personal, very much Connie in all her most concentratedly intense glory.

Rob Brown on alto is ever directionally himself, which means he can quickly get to the core of a solo statement and work inside and outside thematic elements of the music at hand for some of the most challengingly great performances on new jazz alto today.

And then of course Steve Swell on trombone. Clearly the compositional intricacies and the intense beauty of his bandmate's involvement inspire him to some of the best trombone soloing out there. Not a note is wasted, there is nothing inessential, all is most surely Kende.

The seven compositions are wonders of concision and advanced modern movement in ways very true to what Bartok stands for. It is hommage not so much by rote re-presentation, but rather by sympathetic parallel-drawing, by fashioning an analog in the new jazz mode of what he was in the classical mode. So it is all about the intricate line drawing and part interlocking, the harmonically edgy, the linear consciousness of newness, and all acting as superb springboards for the sextet in full bloom.

These may be some of Steve's favorite musical friends, but they are the collective listener's boon aural companions as well. They are players of infinite talent, of the present-day refusal of Kende to be silenced, of Kende to triumph with music of total commitment, of the flourishing of the creative spirit against all odds. It is music like this that will push the world forward into a new age of humanity as their best collective selves. Not violent, viable, violets in fresh and striking bloom, vibrations of the human soul at its best. That is what the music is for me.

Needless to say, this is music of a startling excellence, something to play for anyone who asks, "so what is great about the contemporary scene?" This is. An album to be reckoned with, a wondrous tribute to Bartok and a tribute to the exceptional musicality of Steve Swell and this formidable sextet.

Get this one if you only buy ONE album this year. Can I make any stronger case here? That is my happy feeling and I surely suspect it will be yours.

Caroline Davis, Doors: Chicago Storyline

Chicago-associated alto Caroline Davis gives us her second album, Doors: Chicago Storyline (eyes & ears ee:15-o39). It alternates Caroline's advanced jazz compositions as played by her regular band with spoken dialogs from local musicians on the Chicago jazz scene from the '80s to the present day, roughly.

The dialogs tell the story of the clubs, the players, the ups and downs. The music gives us modern new mainstream jazz of a worthy sort. Caroline is joined by Mike Allemana on guitar, Matt Ferguson, bass, Jeremy Cunningham on drums, plus guest Russ Johnson on trumpet for most of the album, and cameo appearances by Ron Perrillo on piano and Katinka Kleijn on cello.

Caroline has a rather lush, darkish tone and well-executed, very good ideas on alto. The band is very much a together thing thanks to what I take is a lengthy collaboration. Strong soloing is going on throughout and the compositions are memorable.

The dialogs have a real sense of history and anecdotal we-were-there authenticity.

And the music is first-rate, top-notch, a testament to Caroline's strong musicianship and the cohesive talents of her band. At times the compositions have an almost Dukish-Strayhornesque classicism. Other times they sound hip and contemporary.

I missed her first album but this second finds me enthusiastic. She is someone to hear, surely, and this is a fine way to get introduced. Good music and another excellent example of the Chicago scene! Recommended.

Amina Figarova, Blue Whisper

Amina Figarova keeps putting out some beautiful contemporary jazz. The pianist-composer originally from Azerbaijan gives us her 13th album with Blue Whisper (In + Out 77128-2), a fine collection of ten Amina originals played by her regular sextet plus guests. So we have of course Ms. Figarova on piano, Bart Platteau on flutes, Alex Pope Norris on trumpet and flugel (spelled on one number by Ernie Hammes), Wayne Escoffery on tenor, sharing the chair with Marc Mommaas, Luques Curtis on bass, spelled by Yasushi Nakamura, Jason Brown on drums, Anthony Wilson on guitar for a number, with a touching statement on the senseless violence over the world from Salhiya and Shamiyl Bilal Tumba, and an appearance on one number by vocalist Sarah Elisabeth Charles.

The music is a further development in the lyrical post-Blue-Note voicings and compositional acumen of Ms. Figarova, along with her formidable pianism and the clout of first-rate soloists.

It is a ravishing set, well burnished and filled with the ultra-musical sensibilities which Amina consistently brings to us in abundance. She as always has clear direction and great ideas at her fingertips and in her mind's eye. She gets her horn ensemble arrangements to sing as much as ever, and the rhythm-plus-Amina block goes forward with plenty of fire and drive.

Amina Figarova is a master of swinging, contentful contemporary sophistication and soul. This is surely one of her very best examples and you should hear it!! Nice, nice, nice!