Keith Jarrett: Staircase (ECM 1090/91)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 1090-91

Keith Jarrett
Staircase

Keith Jarrett piano
Recorded May 1976 at Davout Studio, Paris
Engineer: Roger Roche
Produced by Manfred Eicher

Staircase is Keith Jarrett’s fourth solo piano album for ECM, and his first after the previous year’s Köln Concert. In contrast to his earlier studio effort, Facing You, Jarrett elides romantic titles in favor of four singly marked suites in this entirely improvised studio session. Like every carefully chosen word of a William Carlos Williams verse, Jarrett’s equally lyrical insights plough to the heart of the matter like no others.

The title work gives special insight into the pianist’s improvisational process. Atop a foundation of steady syncopation, he constructs a helical tower. Rather than expanding it into a broader sound palette, however, he works his way into every crevice. Ever the master builder, he approaches melodies as if they were bricks to be laid. Upon these he takes careful steps, taking care to rest his fingers upon ivory like toes upon stone. And though he may stumble, there is always a counterbalancing action waiting in the wings, swooping down like an owl from the rafters, pulling a thread in its break to that final microscopic strand.

While Jarrett often works wonders with variations, in the first part of “Hourglass” we also experience the reverse. With great vibrancy, he rolls through its spiritual-infused fields like a child tumbler. Yet this is only a prelude to Part II, in which the ecstasy of elegy blinds us with its 14-minute plenitude. Jarrett’s crisp yet fluid arpeggios run across the keyboard with the fullness of a life that has much to give still. Every note in the left hand is a feather tested by the heavy air of the right. And as every utterance floats ever so gently to the waters below, it traces a zigzag of arcs in the winds of our slumber.

Like the angled shadow of its eponymous timepiece, Part I of “Sundial” appears still when we look at it directly, and only seems to move when we do not. It is at once frozen and highly animate, pulling existence forward with every intangible revolution. Jarrett sings with a genuine croon, holding his breath through the keys. This music is his respiration, and he concludes it on a forgiving sigh.

The three-part “Sand” rises in large handfuls before being thrown into the air. We listen, enthralled, as Jarrett scours the landscape, picking up every last grain. He places them into the hourglass, which he rests on a nearby sundial before ascending the staircase out of sight.

Though difficult to spot in the shadows of other many fine solo outings, there is an essential quality to Staircase that one rarely finds in the confines of a studio. Jarrett accomplishes something much greater than music here, flushing out details like a biological organism developing in reverse, so that by the end we return to the music’s infancy, where the corruptions of a nurturing world fail to wreak havoc on a tender mind. There is a method to his seeming lack thereof, and its name is “now.”

<< Egberto Gismonti: Dança Das Cabeças (ECM 1089)
>> The Gary Burton Quartet with Eberhard Weber: Passengers (ECM 1092)

Edward Vesala: Satu (ECM 1088)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 1088

Edward Vesala
Satu

Edward Vesala drums
Tomasz Stanko trumpet
Palle Mikkelborg trumpet
Juhani Aaltonen saxophone
Tomasz Szukalski saxophone
Knut Riisnaes saxophone
Rolf Malm bass clarinet
Torbjørn Sunde trombone
Terje Rypdal guitar
Palle Danielsson double-bass
Recorded October 1976 at Talent Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

Edward Vesala is one of those rare treasures whose every recorded move seems to ooze with profundity. Flanked by an all-star cast of mostly Scandinavian talent, he and his collective visions have produced some of the most inestimable highpoints of the ECM discography. On Satu, it’s as if he has stumbled into an old radio program, the signal of which has only now reached us. As in a community of mystics squinting into the morning sun, it brightens with the golden light of selfless realization. The thrumming bass of Palle Danielsson vibrates like an inner voice in the title cut, an earthen call to wordless action. Terje Rypdal cries into shape, carried along nocturnal routes into even darker destinations. Tomasz Stanko winds the band with his trumpet into a tight spring before loosing into unsuspecting ether. A droning call from Rolf Malm on bass clarinet grinds the edges of our expectations down to rounded barbs. The brass of “Ballade For San” threads through its vamp like a choir coloring in the constellations with nostalgia. Ecstatic interplay between Rypdal and his periphery pulls us into the album’s longest dives. “Star Flight” glows with more of Rypdal’s singing guitar, and with a screeching solo from Stanko, recorded as if in another time or place. Meanwhile, horns and drums reach an agreement, as guitar and trumpet continue their assault, unifying as the emergent voice of chaos and reason (here, one and the same). The ponderous “Komba” cradles a mind-altering soprano sax solo. It wails like a mourner in ecstasy and circulates through the bloodstream long after it fades. Vesala ends positively with “Together.” A lovely flute solo undresses before a blind observer, allowing synthetic thoughts from bass to plunk their way into the frame. And as Vesala dances circles around it, the flute gilds its edges with every color of the rainbow until only a white sheen is left.

While certainly more “accessible” than Vesala’s fine Nan Madol, this effort is no less enigmatic for all its inner details, each of which seems to compress a profound wealth of déjà vu into a single expulsion of breath, a tapping of cymbals, the grating flange of a guitar. Vesala’s music is an extension of a force unseen, but ever felt in the vast aptitude of its effects. While very much uprooted from discernible foundations, it is peppered with delicate obbligati that give us purchaase. These thematic statements take on a totemic quality in Vesala’s context, for his is an atmosphere that is supremely internal, throwing off the shackles of social order and plumbing the depths of an uncompromising will to power. Vesala’s music feels as if it has broken through a dimensional barrier to make itself known to us, and all we need to do to make the return flight is grab on and never let go.

<< Keith Jarrett: Hymns/Spheres (ECM 1086/87)
>> Egberto Gismonti: Dança Das Cabeças (ECM 1089)

Enrico Rava: The Plot (ECM 1078)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 1078 CD

Enrico Rava
The Plot

Enrico Rava trumpet
John Abercrombie electric and accoustic guitars
Palle Danielsson bass
Jon Christensen drums
Recorded August, 1976 at Talent Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

Like its cover, Enrico Rava’s The Plot is a storybook with much to delight our hungry eyes and ears. Its dramatis personae will be familiar to the ECM enthusiast: John Abercrombie as the guitarist, Palle Danielsson as the bassist, Jon Christensen as the drummer, and Rava himself as the trumpeter who leads them on a profoundly satisfying adventure. Our tale begins with the airy bass line of “Tribe.” Abercrombie’s restrained wails and Christensen’s splashing cymbals spread their arms wide in a loose net across the page. Rava spins outward from its center like a spider, checking every tether to make sure it is securely fastened to the surrounding flora. Only then does he jump off, held by a single lifeline, almost invisible in the air, as he soars in his improvised freefall. Rava then takes us “On The Red Side Of The Street,” where focused solos and curiosity comingle incognito. What begins as erratic reverie in “Amici” turns into a protracted groove in which Rava unleashes a most potent narrative omniscience. To this, Abercrombie adds own staccato punctuation. The next chapter introduces us to “Dr. Ra And Mr. Va.” These mysterious alter egos paint a world of black and white, but describe it with the most colorful language at their disposal. Rava’s brassy pirouettes bring lively energy to the climax, instigating an ecstatic call and response with Abercrombie. We then come to a sepia illustration, Rava’s “Foto Di Famiglia,” a duet for acoustic guitar and trumpet. A plaintive stroll through half-remembered places long since transformed by the passage of time and gentrification, it is the counterpart to “Parks” on 1975’s The Pilgrim And The Stars. A brief interlude, it is usurped by the 15-minute epilogue, from which the album gets its name. It eases into our hearts with a somber yet soulful trumpet solo against an awakening rhythm section. The synergy builds to a non-abrasive intensity, threaded by Abercrombie’s hieroglyphic chords before shifting to his fuzz box sound, careening through the night like some cosmic wayfarer whose only guides are the sounds of Rava’s winding paths. And as the final page turns to reveal its blank reverse, we want nothing more than to reread this forgotten classic immediately.

<< Edward Vesala: Nan Madol (ECM 1077)
>> Jack DeJohnette: Pictures (ECM 1079)

Art Lande: Rubisa Patrol (ECM 1081)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 1081

Art Lande
Rubisa Patrol

Art Lande piano
Mark Isham trumpet, fluegelhorn, soprano saxophone
Bill Douglass bass, flute, bamboo flute
Glenn Cronkhite drums, percussion
Recorded May 1976 at Talent Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

With Art Lande’s Rubisa Patrol, ECM took a step in a much-heralded direction, one that pushed the scope of its reach even farther. An album like this proves there is no one sound for the label, but only many through which both musicians and listeners develop deeply personal connections, recollections, and changing identities. The vibrancy of its moods remains as potent as it was three-and-a-half decades ago. With Lande at the keys, Mark Isham (very much in a Kenny Wheeler mode) on horns and soprano sax, Bill Douglass on bass and flutes, and Glenn Cronkhite on drums and percussion, the results can only be magical. The opening strains of “Celestial Guests–Many Chinas” introduce the dizi, a Chinese bamboo flute, to the ECM instrument bank. Its clarity cuts through our expectations and embraces us with its immediacy. From behind this arresting tonal horizon arises a blazing sun of percussion and lyrical horns. Lande makes things complete by dropping his own potent melodies into this auditory tincture. The veil is lifted with “Romany.” Watching like a pair of eyes scanning an empty landscape in hopes of movement, it discloses the inner trepidation of an unstable politic. Our allegiance is broken and reformed again with the klezmer-like inteisity of “Bulgarian Folk Tune.” Throughout its enthralling single minute, we cannot help but be moved by its tightly executed energies. “Corinthian Melodies” is another stunning reworking of traditional sources. Here, those resilient fibers are spun into even thicker cords, allowing Isham and Douglass more traction in their solos. Anyone missing the groovier side of things gets just that in the piano-bass interplay of “For Nancy,” in and out of which Isham weaves with the deftness of a hummingbird, sampling nectar where it may until it vanishes in a spray of raindrops. “Jaimi’s Birthday Song” and it reprise feature a duet of flute and piano in two relaxed Red Lanta-esque messages. The latter of these leads us to “A Monk In His Simple Room,” bicycling through thematic material with a leisurely panache in this lavish closer.

A magical album from start to finish, Rubisa is an exercise in atmosphere. Lande captivates on all levels and seems to bring out nothing short of the best in his fellow musicians. And while the label has no shortage of fine horn players, on this recording we get an especially fluid example of the craft through Isham’s unmitigated wanderings. With its nods to folk elements and host of other influences, this makes for a fitting companion for the more recent Kuára.

<< John Abercrombie/Ralph Towner: Sargasso Sea (ECM 1080)
>> Arild Andersen: Shimri (ECM 1082)

Julian Priester and Marine Intrusion: Polarization (ECM 1098)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 1098

Julian Priester and Marine Intrusion
Polarization

Julian Priester trombone, string ensemble
Ron Stallings tenor and soprano saxophones
Ray Obiedo electric and acoustic guitars
Curtis Clark piano
Heshima Mark Williams electric bass
Augusta Lee Collins drums
Recorded January 1977 at Tonstudio Bauer, Ludwigsburg
Engineer: Martin Wieland
Produced by Manfred Eicher

The trombone is the viola of the brass world. It is arid, languid, and also incredibly beautiful in its range and melodic honesty. And on Polarization, Julian Priester’s ECM follow-up to his 1973 Love, Love session, we get more of that gorgeous depth than we could ever ask for.

The first three tracks form a unified whole. “Polarization” (Priester) begins with two overdubbed trombones improvising in a lofty space. We get some wonderful staccato technique in the left channel, and a wealth of implied energy all around. As the right-hand trombone fades, we hear the slightest indication of drums at the cut’s tail end, of which “Rhythm Magnet” (Priester) fleshes out every audible detail. Synthesized strings lend expanse while bassist Heshima Mark Williams lays down a gorgeous, almost Bill Laswell-like mysticism, albeit with an added twang and sharper features. Ray Obiedo weaves a slack guitar into the mix, and as the horns settle in to their respective stations, the piano lets out a final exaltation. “Wind Dolphin” (Bruce Horiuchi) begins with a cluster of drums. From this, we get a flowing run from brass and flanged guitar. The band breaks into a powerful free-for-all, marked by a “laughing” trombone and piano. “Coincidence” (Obiedo) is a piece for trombone, acoustic guitar, and piano, as beautiful as it is short. “Scorpio Blue” (Curtis Clark) arises from a solo trombone as drums lift the piano skyward into rolling flights of fantasy. The final track, “Anatomy Of Longing” (Curtis Clark), aside from having one of the best titles I’ve encountered in a long time, brings on the funk with electric guitar ornamenting the already fine calligraphy of the brass. And just when you think the music is over, it drips into a simmering sax solo over a pellucid piano and cymbals before the bass line returns with its undeniable insistence. The sax reels while the electric guitar squeals in joy over the thematic reinstatement before hurtling itself forward into an enthralling solo of its own. A smooth nightcap to a phenomenal outing.

While not as consistent in texture as Priester’s earlier effort, Polarization delivers in its many moods and emotional travels. The musicians don’t so much feed off as feed into one another, nourishing a delicate conversation in which agreement is the norm. Their harmonies are tender, the synergy relaxed and intuitive, acute yet soft around the edges. The recording is superb, the resonance at once immediate and expansive.

Unlike its predecessor, this one is still out of print.

<< Pat Metheny: Watercolors (ECM 1097)
>> Taylor/Winstone/Wheeler: Azimuth (ECM 1099)

Steve Kuhn: Life’s Backward Glances – Solo and Quartet (ECM 2090-92)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 2090-92

Steve Kuhn
Life’s Backward Glances: Solo and Quartet

Steve Kuhn piano
Sheila Jordan voice
Steve Slagle soprano and alto saxophones, flute
Harvie Swartz double-bass
Michael Smith drums
Bob Moses drums

In an open boat at sea,
lights are darkened by a tree.
All the world is all I see.

Brooklyn-born pianist Steve Kuhn is one of the savviest interpreters of our time. On ECM, we have also been fortunate enough to know him as an equally engaging composer. For this entry in its Old & New Masters series, the label gathers another fine trio of out-of-print treasures, of which Motility and Playground make their digital debuts (ECSTASY having been made limitedly available in Japan).

ECM 1094

Motility (ECM 1094)

Recorded January 1977 at Tonstudio Bauer, Ludwigsburg
Engineer: Martin Wieland
Produced by Manfred Eicher

Entering Kuhn’s world is indeed like stepping into “The Rain Forest,” the first track on this phenomenal quartet recording. Not only is it visually resplendent and rich with life, but it also boasts distinct melodic qualities. Every last molecule has its role to play in the symphonic superstructure. Kuhn’s fingers navigate the forest’s ever-changing paths, arching lithely through overgrowth while Steve Slagle’s flute sings like an avian guide flitting from branch to branch: a thread of cognitive continuity between listener and the listened. The band’s sound really opens up in “Oceans In The Sky.” Like a waterfall in reverse, it returns to the cloud from which it was born, closing its eyes in a promise of clearer days. The private trajectories of “Catherine” intersect only briefly with our own, even as Harvie S.’s tenderest of bass solos pulls at the heart in muted song. “Bittersweet Passages” is a two-part journey, beginning in a swell of anticipation before fading into solemnity. The slightest movement becomes infinitely magnified, so that when the quartet returns in tutti, it bustles like a crowd of zealots flocking to their monument of worship. “Deep Tango” is driven by a braid of martial snare, bass, and soprano sax, beneath which Kuhn spreads carpet of fallen leaves. “Motility/The Child Is Gone” changes from elegy to ode in a blink. Kuhn lays on the expressivity, at once van Gogh and Monet, before delighting us with “A Danse For One,” in which one can almost hear his band mates lingering like a ghostly presence. Lastly is “Places I’ve Never Been,” another exciting tune replete with infectious grooves. Superb soloing from all, particularly in the diving flute, make this one a winner.

<< Jan Garbarek: Dis (ECM 1093)
>> Ralph Towner’s Solstice: Sound And Shadows (ECM 1095)

… . …

ECM 1159

Playground (ECM 1159)

Recorded July 1979 at Columbia Recording Studios, New York
Engineer: David Baker
Produced by Robert Hurwitz

In this album, we get an enlivening dose of Kuhn’s other brand of lyricism in the form of actual words. We had a taste of these in “Life’s Backward Glance” on 1974’s Trance. That selfsame tune makes a cameo here, also as a closer, only this time transformed by the throaty contralto of Sheila Jordan Kuhn, who turns everything she touches to melancholic gold. This is a markedly different album, not least because it is the latest of the three, and one that seems to have been consciously sandwiched between the others.

As Jordan turns verses in her lips in “Tomorrow’s Son,” she traces the undulations of bass and brushed drums, setting off the piano into a string of footnotes. Two adjacent pieces, “Gentle Thoughts” and “Poem For No. 15,” appear as the diptych “Thoughts of a Gentleman – The Sage of Harrison Crabfeathers” on ECSTASY. In their present incarnations, Kuhn’s pianism scintillates, his right hand so full that when his left hand comes in it sounds like another instrument entirely. The rhythm section is never enough to weigh him down. Rather, it seems to inspire him to ever-ecstatic heights. A personal favorite on this disc is “The Zoo,” a fantastic little slice of whimsy about communication, self-sufficiency, and delight in discovery. And one can hardly escape the allure of “Deep Tango,” which in this vocal version unfolds with even greater narrative potency.

Jordan’s voice strolls down memory lane as if it actually were a physical path to be strolled upon. Her constant vibrato lends a vulnerable sadness to the proceedings. The musicians feed off her presence tenfold, as evidenced in Kuhn’s transformation throughout from intimacy to fantasy.

<< Bill Connors: Swimming With A Hole In My Body (ECM 1158)
>> Steve Swallow: Home (ECM 1160)

… . …

ECM 1058

ECSTASY (ECM 1058)

Recorded November 1974 at Arne Bendiksen Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

This album was recorded one day following the Trance session, and revisits some of that same material in a solo setting. In spite of the density in which his playing often clothes itself, here he adopts a decidedly porous sound, breathing in and out like an organism that finds its invisible nourishment in notecraft alone. The present rendition of “Silver” is three times its original length on Trance, honed in reflections rather than shadows. An unexpected roll from the piano’s nether regions rises like oil from the ground, but never materializes into a full-blown breach, lapsing instead into a gentle trickle into the valley of resolution. Unique entries on this album include the entirely improvised “Prelude in G,” in which an increasingly frantic lead runs over a brooding ostinato, and “Ulla,” an emotional journey marked by careful pauses. Some insistent statements in the right hand lead one to believe there is far more to be said than what is being articulated in both. Kuhn ends again with “Life’s Backward Glance,” something of an iconic piece for him, here more erratic than its vocal counterpart. It reads like a critical self-assessment, born from years of improvisatory living, finding in the moment those truths with which we build an ever-changing concept of the self.

This is the darkest of the three albums, gilded in dissonant color schemes and more visceral reflections.

Kuhn thinks in voices, but speaks in images. His story is a book without pages. Oftentimes, he looks away, but always acknowledges us through its colors. One moment finds him courting Vince Guaraldi on steroids, while the next recalls Bill Evans on a rainy afternoon. With such a full sound, one wonders how other musicians could add anything, but add they do, and beautifully so. The only thing missing now is you, the constant listener.

<< Bill Connors: Theme To The Gaurdian (ECM 1057)
>> Arild Andersen: Clouds In My Head (ECM 1059)

Arild Andersen: Green In Blue – Early Quartets (ECM 2143-45)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 2143-45

Arild Andersen
Green In Blue: Early Quartets

Arild Andersen double-bass
Jon Balke piano
Knut Riisnaes tenor and soprano saxophones, flute
Pål Thowsen drums
Juhani Aaltonen tenor and soprano saxophones, flutes, percussion
Lars Jansson piano, Moog-synthesizer, string ensemble

I used to hear jazz through a diurnal lens: it was either night or day. I saw this reflected in many album covers, which could be bright (Milt Jackson’s Sunflower comes to mind) or deeply nocturnal (which pegs a good portion of the Blue Note catalogue). ECM has been unique in charting the in-between, those crepuscular moments of the genre in which transitions abound, and in fact define the parameters of the music. This fabulous collection of long out-of-print label efforts by Norwegian bassist Arild Andersen brings those transitions most clearly into focus. His music is firmly earthbound, yet at the same time so far beyond the stratosphere that seasons and times of day cease to matter. Such an approach allows us to come to the music as we are, absorbing it with the same spontaneity in which it is produced.

ECM 1059

Clouds In My Head (ECM 1059)

Recorded February 1975 at Arne Bendiksen Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

“305 W 18 St” is a breath of fresh air in even the freshest climate. The title refers to the bassist’s onetime home base, a New York apartment belonging to singer Sheila Jordan (who can be heard on Steve Kuhn’s Playground). I suspect these kinds of autobiographical details lie behind almost every title, some more inferable than others. Either way, Andersen’s gravid bass line and the lilting flute of Knut Riisnaes usher us into the album’s optimistic world, setting the pace for an exemplary thematic journey. There are plenty of breathtaking stops along the way, including the piano-driven “Outhouse,” with fine soloing to be had by all over a tight rhythm section headed by Pål Thowsen on drums; the sympathetic embrace of “Song For A Sad Day,” in which Riisnaes’s bone-tickling tenor tears our inhibitions to shreds; and the uplifting promises of the title cut. Neither can we pass up “The Sword Under His Wings,” a closer to end all closers. Lightning fast fingerwork from Andersen brings a live dynamism that practically begs for applause at every given opportunity. Not to be outdone, Jon Balke shows his chops as well, intimating what would become his own flowering career beyond the band. The album’s finest sax solo sparks a flare of virtuosity, snuffed too soon. A groove-oriented aesthetic dominates Clouds, but with enough downtempo diversions to soften the blow. Each theme is a springboard to fantastic leaps of intuition. Those of Riisnaes, whose resemblance to the early Garbarek is uncanny, are the farthest-reaching, variously filled with glorious hesitations and catharses.

<< Steve Kuhn: ECSTASY (ECM 1058)
>> Ralph Towner: Solstice (ECM 1060)

… . …

ECM 1082

Shimri (ECM 1082)

Recorded October 1976 at Talent Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

In its second outing, the Arild Andersen Quartet saw the replacement of Balke and Rissnæs with saxophonist Juhani Aaltonen (already heard to mind-blowing effect on Edward Vesala’s Nan Madol and soon to appear on Satu of the same) and pianist Lars Jansson (whose trio, of which Anders Jormin was an original member, remains one of Sweden’s great jazz outfits). Here, Andersen dons more overtly compositional clothing, and lays his heart bare. The mood is a little more relaxed, its sound more porous, its gestures more internal. Starting with some chromatic pianism and Aaltonen’s winged soprano in the title track, and working through the timeless beauties of “No Tears” and “Ways Of Days,” we encounter deeper mysteries in “Wood Song.” On the surface, its wooden flute and colorful percussion evoke an arid landscape populated by rattlesnakes and desert winds, yet on deeper inspection seeks to reveal the improvisational in the mundane. “Vaggvisa För Hanna” is a multifaceted little number that plays like Red Lanta with an added rhythm section. Tenor sax makes its triumphant return in “Dedication.” Jansson wanders into some incredibly lyrical asides, singing like Keith Jarrett (who was among his formative influences as a music student), but led back to the main path by Aaltonen every time. While it is unclear who or what this concluding track is a dedication to, I like to think it was made for the listener, whose very existence animates the creative process at hand. For as Andersen recedes, leaving Aaltonen alone, we are drawn into that final gasp of cymbals and toms like an acolyte into selflessness.

<< Art Lande: Rubisa Patrol (ECM 1081)
>> Terje Rypdal: After The Rain (ECM 1083)

… . …

ECM 1127

Green Shading Into Blue (ECM 1127)

Recorded April 1978 at Talent Studio
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

The final album of this set changes gears yet again, working itself into a highly refined configuration. Jansson expands his contributions with added electronics. Their presence, subtle as it is, unpacks the music’s histories with far greater visibility. From the laid-back groove of “Sole” to the staccato backing of “Radka’s Samba,” we are treated to a colorful array of songs without words. Stories are the primary driving forces here, such that “The Guitarist” is not about the instrument but about the trembling hands that cradle it. Like an intro that never materializes into a full-blown swing, it has more than enough to sustain itself. “Anima” is another smooth joint that offers some of Andersen’s most understated brilliance. Aaltonen’s legato tenor lends an illusory impermanence. The album’s remainder is like a garden of quiet beauty. The cultivated panache of the sax-heavy “Terhi” and the “organic” backing of the title track wander into Eberhard Weber territory with every step. “Jana” closes in all the lushness this quartet has to offer in a synth-infused groove, finishing with the exuberance of Aaltonen’s soprano flourishes.

Andersen is about as straightforward a musician as you are likely to encounter. His motivic acuity is engagingly bipolar, easily straddling funk and elegy in a single breath. His notes are powerful, sustained, and binding like glue. And in such fine company, the cumulative effects are unfathomable. Though his presence was vividly felt in a handful of early ECM releases, including Afric Pepperbird, Sart, and Triptykon, it was with these three albums that Andersen left his first inedible marks. What a joy it is to finally have them in the digital archive.

<< Art Ensemble of Chicago: Nice Guys (ECM 1126)
>> Jack DeJohnette: New Directions (ECM 1128)

Crystal Silence: The ECM Recordings 1972-79 (ECM 2036-39)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 2036-39Crystal Silence: The ECM Recordings 1972-79

Gary Burton vibraphone
Chick Corea piano

The vibraphone and piano combine to make one of jazz’s most potent instrumental combinations, and nowhere so invigorating than at the hands of Gary Burton and Chick Corea. To say that the possibilities between them are limitless is to ignore the immediacy of their abilities, in which we may now bask to the utmost content in this timely reissue. Jazz’s most singular duo in a set of three albums on four CDs. Now those are some positive integers.

1024 X

Crystal Silence (ECM 1024)

Recorded November 6, 1972 at Arne Bendiksen Studio, Oslo
Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Produced by Manfred Eicher

It all begins here, with Crystal Silence. The title says it all: silence crystallized into dazzling melodic gems, each its own prismatic doorway into improvisatory translucence. Corea offers a fine set of five compositions (the most notable being the slick opener “Señor Mouse”), along with three beautifully realized tunes by bassist Steve Swallow (“Arise, Her Eyes” being a personal favorite), and another by Mike Gibbs (the somber “Feelings And Things”). In spite of the variety of voices represented here, the album grows like one long, extended story, a dynamic that seems to shadow the musicians wherever they set foot. The title track, reprised and extended since its inaugural appearance on Return To Forever, is a subdued tour de force in style, presentation, and content. “Falling Grace” (Swallow) is one of the shorter pieces on tap, but what it lacks in time it makes up for in exhilaration. We end with an instrumental version of another Return classic, “What Game Shall We Play Today.” Each piece is rendered with such dynamic sensitivity that one can immediately recognize the effect Crystal Silence must have had when originally released, and no doubt continues to have to this day. Connected as they are by the same mellow fuse, these tunes need hardly a spark to set them to glowing.

This essential album constantly skirts the line between destitution and celebration, rebuilding as many structures as it tears down. The pianism soars, and one could never praise Burton enough for providing the intuitive right hand to Corea’s metronomic left. Above all, this is a masterful exhibition of improvisation around strong thematic material that breaks through its own generic conventions, and is another indispensable example of what ECM has done to enrich and enlarge the landscape of jazz music from day one.

<< Paul Bley: Open, To Love (ECM 1023)
>> Ralph Towner with Glen Moore: Trios/Solos (ECM 1025)

… . …

ECM 1140

Duet (ECM 1140)

Recorded October 23 – 25, 1978, at Delphian Foundation, Sheridan/Oregon
Engineer: Bernie Kirsh
Produced by Chick Corea and Gary Burton

If Crystal Silence is the Corea/Burton universe writ large, then the “Duet Suite” that opens this follow-up album is its densest galaxy. Buoyant grace, turn-on-a-dime syncopation, and an abiding sense of direction make every moment an experience to savor and relive as many times as a single lifetime will allow. More than a lasting mosaic of what either of these musicians is capable of, the suite overflows with so much energy that it could easily have gone on to fill the entire album. And in many ways, it does, being a meta-statement of all to come. The lovingly arranged selections from Corea’s Children’s Songs that follow expand fourfold the brief glimpse into this masterwork afforded us in the project’s debut. These otherwise intimate excursions sparkle like film stills sped into viable movement. The hip nostalgia of “Radio” (Swallow) plunges us into the past, even as it directs our eyes to the future, reeling through its motifs with head-tilting abandon. Burton’s staggered rhythms make for an ecstatic crosshatching of polyphony. At last, we come to Corea’s seminal “Song To Gayle.” Soon to be a staple in the outfit’s traveling songbook, this fluid conversation is almost blinding in its agreement. Duet is rounded out by the ever so exquisite “Never” (Swallow) and “La Fiesta,” a Corea original that brings the album’s most enthralling moments into focus.

<< Mick Goodrick: In Pas(s)ing (ECM 1139)
>> George Adams: Sound Suggestions (ECM 1141)

… . …

ECM 1182_83

In Concert, Zürich, October 28, 1979 (ECM 1182/83)

Recorded October 28, 1979 at Limmathaus, Zürich
Engineer: Martin Wieland
Produced by Manfred Eicher

The Zürich live album is the clear standout of this collection and a real treasure among many in the ECM catalogue. All the classics are here, gloriously reincarnated for new and veteran listeners alike: a sweeping rendition of “Crystal Silence” flows with the power of a river during spring thaw, “Falling Grace” becomes strangely uplifting, “Song To Gayle” sparkles, and Corea’s improvisational turns during a vivacious “Señor Mouse” have all the makings of a hallmark triumph. These actually outdo themselves in live form, plain and simple. But they are only half the fun. Lest we forget the wealth of other material in the set, the duo delights us with “Bud Powell,” Corea’s pitch-perfect tribute to the bebop pioneer. The man at the piano can’t help but sing along as he negotiates one fluid key change after another. We also get some mesmerizing virtuosity from Burton, which makes us want to join in the applause at home. Another high point is “Endless Trouble, Endless Pleasure” (Swallow), which ends the show with a spicy half-step glory. But the real treasures here are the onetime C-Sides making their ECM digital debut at last. Each gives the respective musician his moment alone. Burton’s tender evocations of the Swallow standards “I’m Your Pal” and “Hullo, Bolinas” flit like a ballerina across the stage, while a lush 15-minute interpretation by Corea of his own “Love Castle” pulls his pianism into utterly new territories.

Live energy brings inexpressible wonder to these pieces. With each listen, they show their colors by an increasingly visible logic, extending solos here and shortening graces there, until the whole picture begins to make intuitive sense.

Once in a great while, there are combinations that simply cannot fail. Chick Corea and Gary Burton embody one of them. Their supporting articulations are sometimes so delicately applied that one cannot help but become an extension of the other. They seem to find in each other a new vision of life, which they bring to every note. They also really know how to introduce a piece. Rather than lead us patronizingly into their sound-world, they drop us directly into its liquid center, so that while coming up for air we begin to understand the music from the inside out. These are two wirewalkers at the height of their creative talents, yet who have since forgone their balance bars in favor of more airborne travels. This is quite simply music for the ages.

<< Pat Metheny: 80/81 (ECM 1180/81)
>> Gary Burton Quartet: Easy As Pie (ECM 1184)

 

Enrico Rava: The Pilgrim And The Stars (1063)

| Tyran Grillo

ECM 1063

Enrico Rava
The Pilgrim And The Stars

Enrico Rava trumpet
John Abercrombie guitar
Palle Danielsson bass
Jon Christensen drums
Recorded June 1975 at Tonstudio Bauer, Ludwigsburg
Engineer: Martin Wieland
Produced by Manfred Eicher

In today’s wealth of commercially visible jazz trumpeters, one pines for vintage brass at the lips of musicians for whom “creativity” is more than just a brand. And while I’m the first to admit to having a soft spot for the likes of Chris Botti, there’s nothing like an Enrico Rava experience to wipe your slate of appreciation clean and start you on a fresh path. From the striking cover to the synergistic musicianship, Rava’s ECM debut is an album to return to time and again. Joined by a dream team of John Abercrombie on guitar, Palle Danielsson on bass, and Jon Christensen on drums, Rava reaches for the sky with this one, and succeeds.

The title track brings the album to life in raspy exhalation. This whisper turns into full-blown speech as Abercrombie takes the rhythmic wheel. He steers us into “Parks,” in which we find Rava at his most incisive. In a lively duet with acoustic guitar, he lays down a smooth melody filled with a nostalgia you never knew you had. This is a fantastic track, and one of Rava’s brightest moments. Next is “Bella,” which lays down a gentle groove before Rava flexes his lungs like wings, setting every note to flight. Christensen brings on the frenzy, to which Rava adds his own, yet with a delicacy that never leaves him. An intense guitar solo of soaring and piercing clarity follows. A rare whoop from Christensen knocks things up a rung or two, and a very present Danielsson cuts to the quick before ending on a glorious reinstatement of the theme from Rava. The lead melody of “Pesce Naufrago” coalesces out of the slow-motion big bangs that birth much of the band’s gravity. “Surprise Hotel” is a wilder affair, with energetic runs all around in a confined space. “By The Sea” offers wonderful reinforcement in the bass as Abercrombie circles overhead with distant cries. We end with “Blancasnow,” in which Rava floats his trumpet in the murky waters of his rhythm section. After a free and easy introduction, he pulls us toward even greater melodic destinations.

What’s amazing about these musicians in that they conduct so much creative electricity from such quiet musical circuits. Rava is, as per usual, variously a raging fire and a delicate flicker, straying as far from the wick as possible while remaining tethered by the thinnest of flames. The band is miked in a nice full spread, drums and trumpet at center, bass in the mid-right channel, and guitar anchored hard left. This leaves plenty of room for us to walk among them and enjoy the sounds as if they were our own.

<< Collin Walcott: Cloud Dance (ECM 1062)
>> Keith Jarrett: The Köln Concert (ECM 1064/65)