KARIN PLATO SHOWS STAYING POWER WITH LATEST RELEASE
Jazz singer Plato’s melancholy sound wows critics and fans
Since she decided to seriously pursue a career as a jazz singer, Vancouver-based Karin Plato quickly established herself as an exciting artist with the kind of phrasing and tone that grab a listener’s ears.
From her collection of jazz standards titled Pastiche to her swinging Christmas recording Snowflake Season, she has hit increasingly higher standards.
Nominated for Canadian Jazz Vocalist of the Year at both the 2003 and 2004 National Jazz Awards, Plato has also received Juno and West Coast Music Award nods and played every major festival in the country.
As well as her performing and recording work, Plato teaches jazz to children and adult students at the Moveable Music School.
This week, she releases her seventh album, This Could Be the One.
Here are five things to know about the recording:
1. BEGIN WITH THE BEATLES
Jazz singers have done a lot of things with the music of Lennon and McCartney, some good and some not. Plato reworks I’ve Just Seen a Face into a swinging Latin-tinged workout. The song really gives her talented quintet room to shine, particularly drummer Joe Poole, who is rim-shot crazy, and pianist Chris Gestrin, who pairs off with Plato for some lovely melodic interplay.
2. JULY
Arguably the standout track of the 11 songs on the album, this atmospheric blues musing on doing “absolutely nothing/because it’s July,” is spectacular. Clarinetist James Danderfer winds his lines around the slow, moody and swampy tune. This must be a show-stopper live.
3. WHAT CAME BEFORE
Nobody disputes that Jim Byrnes is a fine singer. But it’s not that often you hear him dueting on a romantic jazz ballad. He and Plato’s backand-forth on this tune is classic. Rebecca Choichet joins in on Sorrow for another tasty pairing. 4. MELANCHOLY MOOD Overall, This Could Be the One conveys a sense of reserved melancholy. Even Heart and Soul — a song most consider a bouncy ditty — is stretched out and turned into a slow-burner of a ballad. Thanks to the absolutely impeccable production, there is a lot of wide-open space in the sound. That further reinforces a sense that this is an album about looking toward the future by remembering the best of days past.
5. RECORD RELEASES
The Karin Plato Quintet will play two shows to release This Could Be the One: Sept. 7 at 8 p.m.|in Pyatt Hall at the VSO School of Music, 834 Seymour St. and Sept. 14 at 7 p.m. at Blue Frog Studios, 1328 Johnston Rd., White Rock. Tickets and info: $30 eventbrite.ca
ALSO OUT THIS WEEK Automatisme: Transit
(Constellation): Glitch electronic music producer William Jourdain offers up another set of twitchy experimentation with his latest. Some might find the frenetic buzzing loops of noise that start almost immediately in opening track Bureau 0 jarring. But by the time you get to Bureau 3, you’ve been lulled into a kind of soothing trance. At one point in
Bateau 1, you almost think something recognizably dub style is developing, but then it gets totally washed away in Bateau 2. Delgres: Mo Jodi (PIAS):
Guitarist Pascal Danaë brings elements of African, French Caribbean and New Orleans jazz and blues into his trio’s powerful debut. Named after Louis Delgrès, a Creole office who died in Guadeloupe in 1802 fighting against Napoleon’s army sent to the French West Indies to reestablish slavery, Mo Jodi (I’ll Die Today) is sung in Creole and English. The subject matter of slamming boogie tracks, such as the opener Respecté nou or the seductive shuffle Ti mamzel, veers from politics to the personal and never loses the groove. Extra points for bringing tuba back in as the bass. La Chinga: Beyond the Sky (Small Stone Records):
Album No. 3 from this Vancouver power trio doesn’t mess with the formula established on its other records: Keep it loud. Keep it fast. Don’t fear the guitar solos. From the Deep Purple in Rock vibe of Wings of Fire to the Humble Pie slide Keep On Rollin’, this is classic rock meant to be played at 11. You may want to break out a pair of GWG wide legs and whip out your air guitar. Kalyna Rakel: Before & After You (kalynarakel.com):
This album would deserve some notice for the 24-page comic book that accompanies the record, but it’s just a bonus. The dozen originals on Before & After You announce a new roots rock voice has arrived. Whether she’s tearing up the highway on Yellow-Blue or crooning like a mix of Amy Winehouse and Rickie Lee Jones on My First Love Song, Rakel sounds completely in control of her voice and message. With big honking horns, occasional orchestration and some tasty guitar, the arrangements are bigger than you would expect from an indie release.