Dec 5 2015
Recommended: Cristian Hernandez – “A Strings Affair”
Guitarist Cristian Hernández approaches his jazz-classical music project with a chessboard vision. With all the pieces spread out before him, Hernández goes about illustrating all of the different potential moves that can be executed when you bring together elements of jazz and classical music together, and even though each adopt very different forms expression, there’s no room left for doubt that A Strings Affair all belong to the same vision.
There’s the gentle ambiance of “Autumn in Barcelona,” with its lazy day sway and finely shaped threads of melody. Hernández gives space for both his jazz guitar trio and the string quartet to get in some solos, and he keeps them steadied in the same focused vision, and that’s why each solo presents itself as a series of waves lapping up against the shore. It’s an arresting sort of tranquility, further evidenced by the way it still holds sway over the album even when subsequent track “Oreneta Coleman” breaks through with increasingly heavy dissonance and improvisation. Intriguingly, the squeak of strings comes off sounding like the chirping of birds, and even when the song enters into a state of high volatility, that little bit of a throwback to the seaside peacefulness of the previous track tamps down the potential for transition shock between the two songs.
Title-track “A Strings Affair” finds a middle ground between the two opening tracks. The invocation of tranquility isn’t a motivating factor, but, also, when they do let their voices rise up, the song maintains its tight focus on the expression of melody and the way its woven into the fabric of its own fragments. Both the jazz trio and the string quartet continue to act as one, sometimes in a seamless unison and sometimes as different parts so commingled as to make it difficult to differentiate between the individual parts. It’s the kind of thing that keeps the ear busy paying attention to many things at once, while simultaneously connecting with the unmissable observation that there is only one expression, just with many facets.
“The Giant” isn’t that far removed from its predecessor, but it does indulge the inclination to lean back and roar. In itself, it’s a fun track, but that it leads into the album finale “String Quartet for Béla Bartók,” which Hernández composed only for the string quartet to perform, it goes a long to showing just how daring this unassuming recording really is. Of particular interest is the way this song with the heavy classical influence doesn’t stray far from the effusiveness of the previous track, “The Giant,” which leaned far heavier on the jazz influence. It’s yet one more sign of how this septet manages to vary their expressiveness widely while never straying far from the same patch of turf.
A seriously enjoyable recording, and a nice little find as the year comes to a close.
Your album personnel: Cristian Hernández (guitar), Xavi Castillo (double bass), Josep Cordobés (drums), Mireia Vila (violin), Apel·les Carod (violin), Elena Martínez (viola) and Marta Pons (cello).
The album is Self-Produced.
Listen to more of the album at the artist’s Bandcamp page.
Jazz from the Barcelona scene.
Available at: Bandcamp
Dec 6 2015
Recommended: Greg Foat Group – “The Dancers at the Edge of Time”
With their latest album, the Greg Foat Group took a huge step up. Their debut Girl and Robot with Flowers was a plenty enjoyable mix of electro-acoustic space-jazz and throwback psychedelic jazz-blues, providing equal attention to both thick melodies and thicker grooves. But there were too many times when the music came out sounding thin, lacking some emphasis to the punch and some depth to the vision. Their sophomore release, the live performance album Live at the Playboy Club, London kept the same ingredients, but exuded a much stronger presence, and the album brought out elements of their sound that weren’t completely sussed out on their debut. And then there’s how a song like “Blue Melody” provided a strong hint on what was coming next.
What came next is The Dancers at the Edge of Time, and it represents a much fuller, more concrete expression of the sound that carried so much promise on their previous recordings. The most noticeable advancement? Even though their vision rings with a greater clarity and cohesion, the flow of ideas sounds looser, less fussy. Songs like the dreamy “Door Into Summer” and “Dancers Waltz” express the melody with the right dose of patience, and just lets it hang out there and linger for those few extra ticks of the clock to allow the notes to fully resonate before taking them in new directions with a series of lovely solos. This holds true even on a track like “Eye of Horus,” when the temperature spikes from all the heat, and, conversely, “Riff for Raff,” with its blues drawl and sing-song cadence.
But even more to the point of the band’s greater presence are tracks like “Hygiea” and “Love Theme,” which excel in how the combination of melodic fragments, a subtle rhythmic patter, and foggy harmonic fronts maintain a strong form and clear voice as they drift from first note to last.
How strong are the ties that bind this excellent recording together? Exhibit A is “Rocken End,” a song that has a bit of drone and melodic introversion to accompany what amounts to a very long track of nothing but the sound of ocean waves crashing against the shore… and it works remarkably well. So much of the music that preceded it, for all of its emotional punch and diverse influences, there was always an abiding serenity, and, really, the sound of waves crashing against the shore is simply another facet of this album’s potently tranquil personality. Exhibit B would be “The Hunt” and how it sits at the polar opposite of “Rocken End” with its furious saxophone solo and explosive rhythmic attack, yet sits plumb with it and every other track on this outstanding work.
One of the better things you’ll hear all year.
Your album personnel: Greg Foat (grand piano, church organ), Simon Keates (cello), Phil Achille (double bass, electric bass), Liam Danby (electric bass, glockenspiel), Simon Spanner (flute), Warren “Woz” Hampshire (guitar, glockenspiel, organ), Rob Mach (tenor & baritone saxes), Andy Hicks (viola), Bob Brace (vioiin) and guests: Charlie Harris (cabasa), Jamie Thorpe (cabasa, guitar), Trevor Walker (trumpet, flugelhorn), Dave Champion (guitar) and Ben Dabell (soundscaping).
Released on Jazzman Records.
Listen to more of the album at the artist’s Bandcamp page.
Jazz from the London, UK scene.
Available at: Bandcamp | eMusic | Amazon
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By davesumner • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2015 Releases • 0