Mary Halvorson

Jan 28 2020

Best of 2019 #29: Nate Wooley – “Columbia Icefield”

 

The idea of being one with nature has an ubiquitous presence in society, ranging from philosophical reveries by sharp thinkers to superficial representations in pop culture.  But it is often expressed as some idealistic state of being, a plateau of achievement reflecting a rightness in the way of life.  It almost always overlooks the reality that nature is fearsome, and that it can kill, and it does so with a perspective entirely alien to collective society’s norms and systems.  Nature is as imposing and dangerous as it is majestic.  It is as alien as it is symbiotic.  On his February 2019 release, Nate Wooley captures these conflicting dimensions of our relationship with nature through his own contemplation on his relationship with the Columbia Icefield.  And with the help of guitarist Mary Halvorson, pedal steel guitarist Susan Alcorn, and drummer Ryan Sawyer, the trumpeter has released one of the more compelling, epic works of 2019.

Your album personnel:  Nate Wooley (trumpet), Mary Halvorson (guitar), Susan Alcorn (pedal steel), and Ryan Sawyer (drums).

Released on Northern Spy Records.

Music from Brooklyn, NY.

Listen | Read more | Available at:  Bandcamp – Amazon

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Jan 24 2020

Best of 2019 #45: Tomeka Reid Quartet – “Old New”

 

The words old and new may be given equal billing in the album’s title, but a cursory listen to the recording will reveal the album skews far more to the latter than former.  But that’s more of a measure of the levels of dissonance and tangled cadences that grace the Tomeka Reid Quartet’s 2019 release.  But all creativity is more than just the math of the medium’s characteristics and stats.  There’s the intent.  There’s the artist herself at the center of things, channeling everything inside, past, present and dreams of the future.  Reid is a musician of today.  Her music is going to reflect the diverse settings and kaleidoscopic influences, musical or otherwise, that shape the person, the cellist, who stepped into the recording studio.  Traditional music is a part of that composite.  The blues, swing, folk are as much a part of her as the oxygen she breathes.  And so they all emerge from Old New, in a new way, as Reid is today.  The blues manifest like a fond memory, and the swing is a photograph, vivid in its recall, timeless in its nature, but transformed by the undeniable passing of time.  This kind of experience, shared by the artist, is everything.

Your album personnel:  Tomeka Reid (cello), Mary Halvorson (guitar), Jason Roebke (bass), and Tomas Fujiwara (drums).

Released on Cuneiform Records.

Music from Chicago, IL.

I wrote about this album for The Bandcamp Daily.

Listen | Read more | Available at: Bandcamp – Amazon

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Apr 25 2019

Thumbscrew at Big Ears Festival 2019: This is really happening

 

I adore Thumbscrew‘s 2018 double release Ours and Theirs.  It earned this site’s Best of 2018 #4 slot, and garnered a mention in my Best Bandcamp Jazz in 2018 column.  The trio of guitarist Mary Halvorson, bassist Michael Formanek and drummer Tomas Fujiwara possess a cryptic sound, something that incorporates each musician’s distinct individual form of expression that, also, somehow, almost unexpectedly, meshes perfectly into a single, crisp perspective.  And it’s an equation whose success proves out whether they’re composing their own odd sonic machinations or covering works from jazz legends of a wayback era.  It’s quite magical.

And seeing it happen live…?  It was surreal.

Thumbscrew’s Saturday afternoon show at The Standard was pretty straight-forward.  The trio nested themselves on the stage behind their music stands and just played along to whatever was written down in front of them.  Held up to the electricity flowing between musicians and audience from the Fire! trio on that same stage the night before, this performance was tame by comparison.  But just seeing the trio recreate the music of Ours and Theirs in the moment was like peeking behind the face of the universe at the clockwork mechanisms within.  It was riveting.  There is something almost alien about Thumbscrew’s sound, even when it radiates an unmissable familiarity, that to witness the human beings responsible for it… and to see proof that, yes, it’s three beating hearts and three calculating minds that set that strange and alluring music in motion, it hit me with the sensation of The Big Reveal.

Some or all of that might not make any sense.  Obviously I never doubted the music of Ours and Theirs was created by human beings.  But so much of our interface with the music we connect with on a daily basis is through the impersonal mediums of digital files and CDs and vinyl, and it’s not difficult to lose sight of the humanity behind it all.  This sort of detachment is further compounded by the personalization triggered by and in each of us, as we attach meaning and imagery and consequence to everything we hear as part of the process of making the music a part of who we are.  It’s why seeing this music live is so invaluable.  Because on top of the wonderful surprises and fascinating deviations that inevitably result from a live performance, and the sensory mainline of experiencing the music live and feeling it as much as hearing it… there’s also the communal nature of the concert, of reconnecting the music to the artists creating it while simultaneously tethering that connection to all of the people in the audience doing the exact same thing at the exact same time.

And we take that back home with us.  That sense of community and connection are revived when next listen to that music again on our stereos, alone and in the privacy of our homes, but not quite the solitary act it once was.

The music of Thumbscrew is no less strange and enchanting than when first I heard it, but having seen and heard it in Knoxville at the Big Ears Festival 2019, that magic resonates on a much more human level than it once did.

Be sure to check out Thumbscrew’s excellent 2018 double release Ours and Theirs, released on Cuneiform Records.

I wrote about this album for The Bandcamp Daily.

Available at: (Ours) Bandcamp | Amazon and (Theirs) Bandcamp | Amazon

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Jan 20 2019

Best of 2018 #4: Thumbscrew – “Ours” and “Theirs”

 

The Thumbscrew trio of guitarist Mary Halvorson, drummer Tomas Fujiwara, and double bassist Michael Formanek had two simultaneous releases in 2018, but for all intents and purposes, they should be viewed as a single recording.  Ours consists solely of compositions from the trio members, while Theirs features compositions by jazz giants Wayne Shorter, Herbie Nichols, Jimmy Rowles, and Misha Mengelberg.  However, Theirs is Ours, too, because these three musicians, each with their own striking personal voice, bring that same individuality as a trio to that music from a past jazz age and make it sound as brand new as tomorrow’s sunrise.  The language of jazz is passed on down through the generations, and in that way each successive generation is shaped by the environment they are born to, they give new shape to the music language they’ve inherited.  Thumbscrew is a priceless example of how old and new can sound nothing alike and yet still exist in a state of unity like one slow exhalation of the most enchanting sound ever.  Jazz never dies.  It evolves.  And then there are those instances, like Theirs and Ours, when sometimes, instead, it is an act of reincarnation.  These are the tiny miracles that music can convey upon our lives.  Be sure to celebrate them.

Released on Cuneiform Records.

Music from New York City.

I wrote about this album for The Bandcamp Daily.

Available at: (Ours) Bandcamp | Amazon and (Theirs) Bandcamp | Amazon

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Jan 5 2019

Best of 2018 #41: Saunier, Halvorson, Miles – “New American Songbooks, Volume 1”

 

This is a conceptual Great American Songbook.  It is a collection of music that frames us as a country and defines our character in the same passing moments that it shapes us in return.  It’s with that thought in mind that the trio of cornetist Ron Miles, guitarist Mary Halvorson, and drummer Greg Saunier reinterpret works by Elliott Smith, the Beach Boys, the Partridge Family, Fiona Apple, and John L. Williams, and give a present day voice to music that situates itself as the modern collection of Tin Pan Alley tunes.  There isn’t a moment on this recording that doesn’t deal in fascination and reverence.

Released on Sound American.

I wrote about the album for The Bandcamp Daily.

Music from New York City and Denver, CO.

Available at:  Bandcamp | Amazon

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