Kim Nazarian, Some Morning

With all the hoopla surrounding Frank Sinatra's 100th birthday we are reminded just how much the swinging jazz-inflected singing of "standards" and contemporary song remains very much alive. Of course Frank was a master artist and deserves remembrance regardless of what is stylish nowadays or no. But frankly there seem to be so many singers working within the standards jazz paradigm that I marvel at the current superabundance. So I hear a great deal of it in the course of my preliminary listens, but I only have the time and space to cover the very best of them.

And it perhaps all fits with the looking-back masterpiece series "Madmen," doesn't it? I watched with rapt attention as the paradoxical complexities of the era were re-presented to us. Why has to do perhaps with the shock of recognition: the past is very past by now, whatever it represented. Plus the bachelor pad phenom has come to our collective folk memory and vocal jazz fits in that mold often enough. I should not be surprised that a rethinking of the music of that era should be very much with us.

Kim Nazarian rises to the top of the many vocalists practicing today, and so I am happy to write about her album Some Morning (KIMG Music). This is Kim's first solo outing. She has been an integral member of New York Voices, whose music I've happily covered here. The album and Kim's beautiful vocal instrument is greatly aided by her full-band arrangements and the appearance of some notable sidemen, including Gary Burton, Paquito d'Rivera, John Pizzarelli, and Roger Humphries or my old Boston roomie Jamey Haddad on drums.

We get some fine standards in "Robbin's Nest" and "What'll I Do" and some things that stand out in the newer, original vein, such as the very lyrical "All in My Heart."

Kim's beautiful tone, impeccable phrasing, hip scatting and jazz immediacy carry the day. It is an album put together with great artistry and attention to detail. And so it no doubt serves as a model of how to do it right. Most importantly, though, it establishes Ms. Nazarian as at the forefront of mainstream jazz vocalists today. And it grabs you and enthralls you the more you listen. A breakthrough vocal talent and a very worthy album this represents!

Mack Goldsbury, Andreas Scotty Bottcher, Lou Grassi, Inner Cinema, 1997

From the netherworld of unreleased concert recordings emerges an unexpected gem in Inner Cinema, a 1997 date from Dresden. It features a very creative threesome in Mack Goldsbury on soprano, tenor and flute; Andreas Scotty Bottcher on piano, bass and synthesizer; and Lou Grassi on drums and percussion.

What is remarkable about the trio convergence is the wealth of invention generated by all concerned. Mack Goldsbury (who fruitfully teamed again with Grassi recently on The Last of the Beboppers; see the March 26, 2015 post here) fires up with beautiful sounds and much to say linearly in his solo space. Andreas Scotty Bottcher brings pianistic maelstroms of declamatory extroversion and then surprises with some very together bass/bass synth; Lou Grassi shows roots and freedom excellence as he swings, freely articulates and funks out (the latter for the final piece), all in ways that demonstrate his eminent vitality as one of the premiere nujazz drummers of our time.

There are seven spontaneous eruptions of instant composition to be heard here, not always in the free-jazz idiom in terms of notes, but always significant and art-creationist.

Goldsbury and Bottcher can explode with soulful fire at times while Grassi stokes the flames with powerful, exuberant swing and some considerably loose-taut and accomplished solo time as well.

This is a band caught in an especially lucid frozen moment. They are inspired and unpredictably original--moving from station-to-station with multi-stylistic force and cogency. There are some synth-bass and piano simultaneities that are nothing short of breathtaking, but then Lou is doing something exceptional in a free-quasi-Latin mode and Mack comes back in on soprano and the band travels further onward to other realms, moving from strength-to-strength.

This is free music in Sam Rivers' classic sense--they play what they feel is right at any point in time, disregarding anything save the necessity of doing what their musicality suggests in the moment. So it can get soulful, or go linear-tonal, can worry some phrases or rhythmic patterns, or just blaze ahead. The many shifting moods and inspirations are what cauterize the concert and keep your ears ready for whatever may come.

It is the complete freedom, and even freedom from the usual freedom, the ever-swerving barometer of musical direction and inspiration that mark this set as special for all three, singularly and collectively.

Yeah, man. Good music, this!

John Wetton and the Les Paul Trio, New York Minute, Live at the Irridium, New York, 2013

John Wetton is one of the iconic vocalists of our times. His work with King Crimson and UK, and later on his own, put him in that special original stylistic vocal place in prog along with Jon Anderson and Greg Lake. He appears in a slightly different context before us here in a live date at Irridium in New York, 2013, with the Les Paul Trio after Les had left us.

New York Minute (Primary Purpose 003) brings together Wetting in great vocal form with Nikki Parrott on bass, Rodney Holmes on piano and Lou Pallo on guitar. It is a program of modern standards from the rock and pop of the later 20th century and then a couple of Wetton songs for good measure.

This is not precisely jazz, nor is it precisely rock in the hard-hitting sense. It is a sincere effort to showcase some songs that Wetton has found transformative, as have many who lived in his times, including me. So we get Steely Dan's "Do It Again," Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On?", Brian Wilson's "God Only Knows," Winwood's "Can't Find My Way Back Home" and Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower," among others.

The combination of Wetton's clarion voice and the straightforward treatment of the well-known songs outside of Wetton's usual purvey may perhaps seem like something puzzling before you hear it. Once you do, well if you are like me, there you are. It is the power of Wetton's voice that carries it convincingly, along with a solid instrumental backing.

It came to me as a pleasant surprise. It rings true. It may not topple the applecarts of the establishment, but that's not what it is for. It's quite nice, I must say. And it leaves you feeling like you've heard something worthy. And so you come back to it again and feel again the pleasure of it. That's how it is. Check it out.

Mette Henriette

From Norway we experience today the music of young tenor saxophonist-composer Mette Henriette in a self-titled two-CD set of her chamber jazz (ECM).

The full complement of artists on the set are as follows--Mette Henriette: saxophone; Eivind Lønning: trumpet; Henrik Nørstebø: trombone; Andreas Rokseth: bandoneon; Johan Lindvall: piano; Sara Övinge: violin; Karin Hellqvist: violin; Odd Hannisdal: violin; Bendik Bjørnstad Foss: viola; Ingvild Nesdal Sandnes: violoncello: Katrine Schiøtt: violoncello; Per Zanussi: double bass; Per Oddvar Johansen: drums, saw.

The first disk features trio music with Mette, pianist Johan Lindvall and Katrine Schiøtt on cello for composed-improvised chamber jazz both at times very lyrical and other times quite dramatic. Disk two unveils the 13-piece ensemble for an ambitious music that straddles classical and modern jazz zones in ways that defy easy categorization.

Mette has a lucid, fluid, expressive tenor style that for this music is firmly a part of the whole yet stands out in original ways. It is the compositional confluence in the end that establishes Mette here as a new voice, however. This is at times music of a post-Weill, post-Carla Bley, post-Mantler strength, winding its way organically through intricate part writing, expressive moments of improvisational power with contrasting lyrical reflectiveness. It is the bi-polar arcs of mood and instrumental texture that define Mette Henriette as rooted in the modern yet determined to say her say as a voice of our times. In the end it goes beyond Weill-Bley-Mantler models in ways not easily defined, and that is great.

It is not music easily described because it does not sit comfortably in a single genre. It is avant and sound-color oriented, yet melodically singular when she chooses to evoke a tonal palette. There is ever a sure sense of direction, of strength and fragility, beauty and brashness.

If "third stream" were still a term that has cogency today I could evoke such a term. But in doing that it nonetheless does not do justice to the unexpectedness of Mette Henriette's vision.

Instead I would underscore the idea that we have a new voice of great promise to be heard on this set. Those who gravitate toward "serious" jazz-classical hybrids should most definitely hear this music several times. It is NEW with all the connotations that word has had for us over the years. And it is exceptionally so. I look forward to more of her in the coming years!

The Katie Bull Group Project, All Hot Bodies Radiate

I happen to believe that the hardest thing to get right in modern avant jazz is the vocals. Using the human voice as an expressive instrument is no simple matter. It calls for dexterity, imagination, and exceptional musicality. Katie Bull finds her own way on these often treacherous paths. Perhaps her very best effort just came out--The Katie Bull Group Project and All Hot Bodies Radiate (Ashokan Indie 101).

It's a band that coheres with Katie's compositions at the center. Joining her is a select group of players that can take things wherever they need to go. Landon Knobloch is on piano and electronics, George Schuller is on drums, Jeff Lederer on soprano and tenor, and Joe Fonda on bass. These are some of the most inventive on the New York scene today and they respond to Katie's music with a free propulsiveness and creative improvisational stance that puts it all together.

Other than the beautiful standard "If I Loved You" these are all Katie's compositions, with poetic immediacy and substance. The combination of the musically astute qualities of the band and Katie's unforced, natural, multitextured vocalizations is a winning one. She utilizes all the dictional and timbral resources that go into being herself. And she knows when, critically, to stretch into the outside realms and when to root herself in a jazz-noted rubato. It of course exemplifies her own personal, original approach to new jazz vocals. It is not the only way to go out there, but it is a way that establishes Ms. Bull as very musically herself.

Now beyond saying all this, there is something that clicks throughout the album, something beyond words, different enough that you may need to hear this a few times to get used to it. I did. And in the end I come away from this one with a clear sense of Katie Bull the artist. She is a poet, a finely honed instrument, a force in the improvisatory arts. And the band works with her to create something unified and strong, new and ahead yet rooted and structured.

She is a vocalist and artist of completion and broad horizons, a great phraser, a golden instrument and a poet-composer and bandleader that comes through here with beautiful artistry. She is at the top of her game. And it's a great game! I am glad to have this one and I think you will be, too.

Rich Halley 4, Eleven

Tenor stalwart Rich Halley and his quartet continue to grow and get the kind of togetherness that only happens over time. You can hear this especially on the latest by the Halley 4: Eleven (Pine Eagle 008). If I say it's one of the very best of his albums, it has to do with how the four have grown together. Trombonist Michael Vlatkovich is the newest member, but that was by now quite some time ago. The chemistry of Halley, Vlatkovich, Clyde Reed on bass and Rich's son Carson Halley on drums is becoming striking in its power and free discipline.

Vlatkovich is more and more an intertwining force in the front line with Rich, and they both sound terrific together and alone. Still rather young Carson has turned out to be a great drummer, in time and sound. And Clyde holds his own on bass in important ways.

Another factor, always critical to this band but ever more so is Rich's compositions. His "Reification Suite" and the eight other originals featured in the album run a gamut of possibilities and in the process create memorable matrices for the grooves and excellent soloing.

And then there is Rich's tenor, ever in an original zone that synthesizes the history of the music and makes of it something other. He sounds as inspired as ever here.

If you do not know the Halley 4 and crave some original jazz that reflects the new thing of Ornette and Archie Shepp and goes with that and high bop roots to get someplace different, Eleven is a great way to introduce you to the music. If you know some of the others, this one is an essential.

Kudos to the Rich Halley 4!

Super Hi-Fi, Yule Analog, Vol. II

For you last-minute holiday types, I just received a fun Christmas album by Super Hi-Fi, namely Yule Analog, Vol. II (superhifimusic). It is trombone reggae-dub versions of Christmas music all will know, plus "Please Santa Bring Me an Echoplex", an original.

You get the old Trojan Records dub sound in all its brashness, including echo of course. The band has plenty of trombone with Rick Parker and Curtis Fowlkes and a good rhythm section in Jon Lipscomb on electric guitar, Ezra Gales on bass (and a bit of vocal), Madhu Siddappa on drums and a few guests here and there.

It's all great fun as they blast their way through some seemingly unlikely chestnuts like "Silent Night," "O Come All Ye Faithful," "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies" and "What Child is This?" But it works and puts you in a rollicking mood that leaves you reaching for the eggnog.

It would not be the choice for those wishing to create a reverent sort of atmosphere, surely, but I think you might already figure that. It is a blast, though! A hoot! And at the end it gets pretty out there.