Powerful statements
Joshua Jaswon’s intelligent debut album is brimful of talent and impeccably performed Joshua Jaswon Octet
Silent Sea
Anna Serierse (vocals), Joshua Jaswon,
Marc Doffey (saxophone), Miguel Gorodi (trumpet, flugelhorn), Jan Landowski (trombone), Johannes Mann (guitar), Sidney Werner (double bass), Aaron Castrillo (drums) Ubuntu Music UBU 0065
Today’s jazz musicians seem to be more socially aware than their forebears, tackling injustice and other big issues through their work. Young London saxophonist Joshua Jaswon has created music on themes of the environment and Brexit after reading Silent Sea, a poetry collection collated by Jackie Kay, Scotland’s makar.
The prosaic title for the pieces that form the core of this album – ‘Reduce/reuse/recycle Suite’ – suggests a dispiriting listen. But the six movements and their variations make for a thrilling and provocative programme. ‘Silent Sea’, based on a poem by Rachel Boast, introduces singer Anna Serierse, whose soprano lines sheer across the Octet’s surging sound. Segueing into ‘Extinction’, Serierse joins wailing brass soloists in giving voice to Kay’s angry rejection of populism and climate change denial.
Serierse also starts the two-part ‘Still Life with Sea Pinks and High Tides’, reciting and reworking the opening stanza of Maura Dooley’s poem, preparing the ground for the brass section to pick up and expand the pulse of the tune. It’s a powerful soundtrack for desperate times. ★★★★★
January round-up
What is it about Buddhism and jazz? Many of the greats have been students of Buddhism: think Wayne Shorter, Sonny Rollins, Charles Lloyd – and they’re just the saxophonists. Satori is the name of UK tenorist Josephine Davies’s trio and it’s a buddhist term for a moment of presence away from the clutter of thought. The group’s new album How Can We Wake is a live recording, capturing Davies with drummer James Maddren and bassist Dave Whitford lost in collaborative musical meditation. Free jazz can sometimes sound hostile or anxiety-inducing but Davies’s confident, lyrical playing imparts a feeling of warm wellbeing. The sensitive interplay between the trio members adds to the magical intimacy. (Whirlwind Recordings WR4764 ★★★★)
The word ‘horn’ comes up a lot in jazz, but you’ll be lucky to ever find an actual horn player on the stand. Cue Jim Rattigan, jazz French horn specialist. Rattigan forsook the Royal Philharmonic some years ago to become the go-to player in jazz brass ensembles, and also lead his own exuberant 12-piece Pavillon. His new album When, which features Julian Tear’s string quartet, reunites Rattigan with the classical world, resulting in a lush, blue-washed version of chamber jazz. The original compositions and arrangements are elegantly poised and, with a sound suspended somewhere between flugelhorn and trombone, Rattigan’s playing is ravishing. The jazz side of the equation is beautifully resolved by Nikki Iles’s piano, bassist Michael Janisch and James Maddren on drums. (Three Worlds Records TWR0005 ★★★★)
The vibraphone is another relative rarity in jazz these days.
It’s a pity because, as a percussion instrument with the melodic potential of the piano, it has a lot to offer. That’s borne out by Us-based Taiwanese vibraharpist Chien Chien Lu who gets the best out of the instrument on her wideranging debut The Path. ‘We Live In Brooklyn Baby’ is familiar vibes territory (it’s a Roy Ayers piece) with its ominously groovy blaxploitation backdrop over which Lu’s mallets lightly dance; the modal standard ‘Blue In Green’ is given the equally vibey, lounge ballad treatment. By contrast, ‘Blossom in a Stormy Night’ threads a luminous Taiwanese folk song into a forceful fusion workout; a more marimbalike reverberating sound sets up
‘The Imaginary Enemy’. Superior backing comes from trumpeter Jeremy Pelt’s group – Lu’s regular gig. (Self-released ★★★★)
Acclaimed leader and reeds supremo Chris Potter is in similar fusion territory with his new release There Is A Tide. Lockdown called for a new approach and he opted to play all the parts himself, involving 11 instruments. Getting an equally good performance on everything from saxes and woodwinds to keys, guitars and drums, and recording himself outside the studio did wonders for the creative process. The ten original pieces flow tightly and brightly over an insistent bass pull, making for a seamlessly seductive conveyor belt of tightly controlled funk gems. (Edition EDN 1168 ★★★★)
Pre-lockdown, US four-piece Yellowjackets squeezed into Cologne’s WDR Studio 4 with the station’s Big Band to make Jackets XL, the group’s 25th album. This latest selection of premier cru smooth jazz won’t disappoint their legion followers, not least because it includes many Jackets classics sumptuously reimagined by longtime leader Bob Mintzer.
(Mack Avenue MAC1175 ★★★★)