Jazz Recommendations – 2017 releases

Gorgeous when viewed as a whole as well as when focusing on the details, this quartet session from drummer Julian Erdem offers up all kinds of tranquility in all kinds of different ways.  “Die Wanderung” walks a now common path, where the melody is front and center, the tempo works to draw out its beauty ever so slowly, and the everlasting influence of the Esbjorn Svensson Trio on the modern scene continues to reverberate.  It’s spots like this where pianist Can Olgun‘s delicate precision when crafting a melody shines strongest.  The interactions bassist Thomas Morgan takes with piano and drums creates a nifty punctuated stagger on “Endstation,” and adds some kick to an album that typically would prefer to drift.  One of the particularly fascinating qualities of Little Flower are those moments, like on  “Flower II,” when guitarist Keisuke Matsuno transforms melodic lines into wavering squiggles, and impersonates the sound of electronic effects.  That said, when he adds a little twang on “Oasis,” the music is just as personable, changed though it may be.

There are two oddball tracks; One works far better than the other.  The album finale “Free #2” counteracts the album’s prevailing adherence to structure with a fully improvised piece, but its moody demeanor falls right in line with everything that preceded it.  On the other hand, sitting dead center of the album is “Deep Water Current,” and the way it shouts and shrieks is really out of place on an album that is devoted to contemplative tones, tranquil ambiance and enchanting melodies.  But that’s a small weakness, and greatly outweighed by the album’s massively captivating beauty.

Your album personnel:  Julian Erdem (drums), Can Olgun (piano), Keisuke Matsuno (guitar) and Thomas Morgan (bass).

Released on Unit Records.

Listen to more of the album at the artist’s Bandcamp page.

Music from Berlin, Germany.

Available at:  Bandcamp | Amazon | eMusic

There’s a dreamy presence to the debut by Gonçalo Leonardo.  Whether it’s the thick blues of “Just a Folk Song,” the soulful “Easy Going” or the Portuguese folk song “Ó Que Calma Vai Caindo,” the bassist crafts the melody so that it floats ethereally across the length of each piece.  It’s a lovely effect under normal conditions, but the approach really shows its value on a completely improvised piece like “Train Talk” and how the frenetic chatter still possesses the tonal qualities of something more tranquil.  That said, “Spring Beat” and “Which Way” front the magnetism of a pop song while going about the nuanced complexities of a modern jazz tune, and everything about how the quartet rolls those tracks out speaks to the heart of the album.

The guitar of André Matos goes a long way to pulling it all off, but the Fender Rhodes of Yago Vazquez plays no small part in the mechanics, as with the rhythmic approach applied by drummer Tommy Crane.  With East 97th, there’s some edge and some kick, and its greatest use is as context for the enchanting way this album drifts peaceably along.

Your album personnel: Gonçalo Leonardo (bass), André Matos (guitar), Yago Vazquez (piano, Fender Rhodes) and Tommy Crane (drums).

Released on Robalo Music.

Listen to more of the album on the artist’s Bandcamp page.

Music from Lisbon, Portugal.

Available at:  Bandcamp | Amazon

If there’s one musician who most completely embodies the true hopelessness of nailing down the qualities in music I most enjoy, it’s Han-earl Park.  My first encounter with the guitarist’s music was long ago, in my role as the Download of the Day editor for the AllAboutJazz site.  My initial reaction to the guitarist’s music was what the fuck.  And it still is, even today, after many many years of familiarization with his particular style.  His music is messy.  The thoughts seem scattered.  The ideas, unfocused or, perhaps, simply manic.  His music is aggressive and acerbic and gets in your face and won’t back down.  And that he’s able to pull all that off with two notes or two thousand or two million is the proof that this music sources from a musician who has successfully tapped into that creative well and developed a personal method for transforming the ineffable into a form of communication.

All of those messily scattered manic ideas impart a meaning in its message, and I know this is true, because time and again my immediate recoil reaction to Park’s music slowly changes to a detached fascination.  Somehow, time and again, despite his music presenting all of the qualities that would typically get me to hit the pause button, instead, it engages me to the very end.  There are not many musicians who consistently display the ability to instigate such a quick turnaround within the span of one song.  Han-earl Park is one such musician, and no better example exists than his new release Sirene 1009.

Sirene 1009 is a soundtrack for a seizure.  It’s spasmodic and flails about wildly.  The music is disconcerting.  But it enters these fugue states of focused intensity that border on meditative, and it is the most powerful sensation to experience even the tiniest hint of serenity at the center of so much chaos.  It’s unsurprising to discover that the three-part “Cliodynamics” suite was recorded live.  Even via the recorded medium, there’s a palpable electricity transmitted by this music, and its voltage isn’t the least bit muffled for not having been there in person.  That it was recorded at Cafe OTO is also perfectly logical, as the London venue has been the scene for all kinds of wildly unconventional, singularly original music.

Mostly, Caroline Pugh‘s vocals are of the wordless variety, and so dramatic are her renderings of human sounds that it’s not inconceivable she created an alternate lexicon specifically for this recording.  Park’s guitar style can be the sonic representation of slash-and-go rush hour traffic, and of significance to the success of this session is how he simultaneously captures the immediacy of individual cars in motion and the oddly hypnotic flow of mass traffic viewed from an isolated location.  On bass, Dominic Lash slings out notes like stones across the surface of water.  There’s a sudden burst of velocity and a magnetic patter of rhythm, and with one action, the bassist adds both melodic and rhythmic textures to a canvas that might not otherwise keep its brushstrokes contained.  That said, when Lash breaks into a passage of bass arco and maintains that as his sole interest for a time, the music certainly doesn’t suffer for his abandonment of a rhythmic role.  Besides, drummer Mark Sanders does a remarkable job all on his own at providing definition to music that is never clear-cut and direction to musicians capable of moving everywhere all at once.

This album is brilliant.  This album is insane.

Your album personnel:  Han-earl Park (guitar), Dominic Lash (double bass), Mark Sanders (drums) and Caroline Pugh (voice, tape recorder).

Released on Park’s label Buster & Friends.

Listen to more of the album at the artist’s Bandcamp page.

Music from Cork, Ireland.

Available at:  Bandcamp