Moonshadow Dance is the gozillionth recording by Rebecca Kilgore. This album, however, is an amazing partnership between Kilgore, Mike Horsfall and Ellen Vanderslice wherein all three contribute original music and lyrics.

Kilgore, of course, sings on all the tracks (joined by Susannah Mars in guest appearances) and Horsfall adds the vibes to a talented and skillful array of some of Portland’s most notable musicians. Randy Porter is on piano with the cool Tom Wakeling on bass and the precise Todd Strait on drums. Guest appearances include Dan Balmer on guitar, Israel Annoh on percussion, David Evans on tenor sax, John Moak on trombone, Tim Jensen on flutes, and others.

Listening to Moonshadow Dance was like a weeklong tour of Portland’s Jazz spots. Here is Mike Horsfall performing with the Nu Shooz Orchestra, over there is Todd Strait with George Colligan, around the corner is Israel Annoh performing with…everyone and Dan Balmer with Mel Brown’s Quartet.

Most of the songs are written by two or all three of the composers with the exception of tracks 1 and 10 (by Mike Horsfall) and 9 (by Rebecca Kilgore). The music glides effortlessly between straight-up Jazz, swing and a little bit of samba. The core trio of Porter (piano), Wakeling (bass) and Strait (drums) provide the great foundation upon which all else is built.

Tunes range from One Little Kiss, a sweet samba composed by Vanderslice and Horsfall, to The Day I Leanred French, a whimsical tune with Kilgore’s standardized vocal approach. Steve Christofferson adds the melodica to create the faux French feel that enhances the cool whimsy.

One of the more remarkable aspects of Moonshadow Dance is the generous way in which Kilgore clears room for the splendid musicians that surround her. Tim Jensen’s flute, Dan Balmer’s guitar, Mike Horsfall’s vibes and Israel Annoh’s percussion all deserve focused attention.

In fact, after the third listening of the album, I found myself playing all of Balmer’s tracks in succession, then Jensen and Annoh. To add Israel Annoh to any ensemble is proof of musical depth and wisdom. Pay attention to the joined instrumental work of Horsfall and Annoh together.

The entirety of the album is a thing of collective and individual beauty.

Yes, there are several standout moments to be enjoyed over and again. The title track is a cool Jazz nocturne while Cantando o Amor is a hot Latin swing with the obligatory sizzling rhythm beneath Balmer’s fine guitar work.

All of this is surrounded and surveilled by Rebecca Kilgore’s smooth and sweet, sultry and swinging vocals. As great as the musicians are at creating the structure and sound, Kilgore breathes her own spirit into each and every track.

Crafty compositions, flawless performances, and hearts full of joy make this album Moonshadow Dance an incredibly enjoyable album.




~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl

What a fun and charming jump back to the Swing Era! Sarah King and the Smoke Rings have released a self-titled debut album with some of my absolute favorite songs from that glorious time and I enjoyed every second of the experience.

The Smoke Rings are Alex Levin on piano, Scott Ritchie on bass and Ben Cliness on drums and these cats swing hard. Fronting this exemplary group is Sarah King on vocals on ukulele. The guys play straight-up swing and Ms. King delivers an adorable approach to the lyrics. The song choices and track order are just what makes a swingster swoon.

The first song is the old Duke Ellington/Irving Mills chestnut It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing). The prelude is a deep-voiced groove before Sarah King joins in with her soprano sass. The vocalization is light-hearted, as it should be, and the musicians roll with her. Alex Levin plays the cool cat piano as Scott Ritchie bumps along with the bass. Ben Cliness gets a brief drum interlude and the whole groups carries the song to completion.

Vincent Youmans’ Tea for Two is a great representation of what the band presents in their weekly residence at the Boom Boom Room atop the Standard Hotel in New York City. The first half represents the trio as they were before Alex Levin decided to add a vocalist. The second half of the piece shows just how smart he was to ask her to come aboard.

The story must be told of how she joined The Smoke Rings. Levin was wanting to add a female vocalist to the trio. One day, he was in Prospect Park in Brooklyn and saw a young woman walking by with a ukulele in hand. Levin asked her to play a number for him and, instead of hammering him over the head with the cherished instrument, she obliged him. He said that her voice sounded like an old record. And so it does…in a good way.

That quality is nowhere more evident that on the Tiny Bradshaw/Eddie Johnson/Bobby Plater number Jersey Bounce. She has a brilliantly charming enunciation that over-emphasizes her Rs and rounds the OU diphthong as it disappears into the N. Listen to the album and you’ll see what I mean. Cute as can be.

I Won’t Dance is the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II standard is given a new swing by Sarah King and Smoke Rings. Despite the title, the music compels exactly that. Scott Ritchie gets a smoking bass solo which he delivers with great swagger.

Gifford and Washington’s Smoke Rings follows. The piece is wistful and sweet and delivered wonderfully. I realized, as I listened to this track, that I had been smiling from the start of the album. It has not gone away.

What comes next is one of my favorite Jazz standards of all time. Duke Ellington’s famed Caravan—co-written by Ellington, Juan Tizol and Irving Mills—is perfect. Cliness opens the track with the throaty toms and brings the whole kit to bear as Ritchie swing s the bass alongside. Sarah King nails the vocal performance splendidly with a near-Ella Fitzgerald delivery. I was still thrilling to her over-hardened Rs.

Ritchie’s bass solo runs brightly and warmly andLevin’s piano is spot-on. Beautiful.

Some Other Spring by Arthur Herzog, Jr. is lovely and innocent and compelling. An andante swing casts the image of cool stroll as Levin’s piano creates the oh-so-right atmosphere Ms. King’s gorgeous vocals.

Our Love is Here to Stay (George & Ira Gershwin) is introduced by Ms. King’s encouraging a cappella before kicking in gear with the trio. The Smoke Kings’ version pulls off a bigger swing and Cliness’ well-seated rim shots and snare rolls add a punch that is welcome indeed.

I Don’t Know Why (I Just Do) by Roy Turk and Fred Ahlert is a sweet lament that King presents with anguish and languish but without losing that delightful charm.

The album concludes with Hoagy Carmichael’s Up a Lazy River. The piece opens with vocals, ukulele and piano. A warm and lucid image of just what the title suggests. Then the listener hears the countback and a whole ‘nother thing breaks loose—a ripping yarn of fun and merriment. The instrumental passage is catchy and gives all the artists a spin in the spotlight. The smile has remained undimmed.

Some have suggested that Sarah King’s voice is the center of attention and the “star of the show.” While there can be little doubt that she has enhanced what went before, the trio delivers with integrity and aplomb and creates the foundation upon which Ms. King builds. All four artists are integral to the finished sound.

Sarah King and The Smoke Rings are a treasure. Here's to the lucky New Yorkers who get to enjoy them weekly.



~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl

 
 

Curtis Stewart has created a musical offering of incredible scope and depth with Of Color(s)/UN-folding. From the original compositions to the arrangements of Jazz, Classical and Pop pieces to the colorful and unfolding packaging which protects it, this album is a thing of cool intelligence, warm beauty and hot violin virtuosity. I mean, it has everything a music-lover could hope to find in a single experience.

He has performed with Stevie Wonder, Wyclef Jean and the Jimmy Heath Big Band and is competent and compatible with those and various other artists from Snarky Puppy to Don Byron and Linda Oh. The man is comfortable in his own world and opens the gates for the willing to join him.

His track selection proves his open-mindedness and skill as he moves from J.S. Bach to Coltrane to Webern to Outkast with amazing lightness and integrity. I say integrity because he does no violence to the original compositions in his arrangements while—at the same time—recasting them with varied lights and shades.

He breaks up, for example, the four movements of Bach’s Solo Violin Sonata in G minor (BWV 1001) across the space of the album and rearranges the movements to fit and sit in complement to the pieces that surround them. He does the same with Anton Webern’s Four Pieces for Violin and Piano, op.7. The original pieces work splendidly with the arrangements. This results in a special fluidity in the progress of the music.

As I said, incredible scope and depth.

With Stewart and his violin are Alex Hills on piano, Alex Wyatt on percussion, Tyler Gilmore on electronics and Fung Chen Hwei on 2nd violin (track 22), Joanna Mattrey on viola (tracks 20, 22) and Jeremy Harman on cello (tracks 14, 22).

The album opens with the Adagio from Bach’s Solo Violin Sonata in G minor. This is the only one of the four movements that remains in Bach’s order. Originally, the order of movements were Adagio-Fugue (Allegro)-Siciliana-Presto. For Stewart, Adagio-Presto-Siciliana-Fugue works better…and he’s correct.

The Adagio is attacked with dedication and warmth. Be silent, Georges Enescu, you old ghost. A living spirit among us has something to say.

Just after the one-minute mark, the two Alexes join in on keyboards and percussion and this album has just taken a brilliant turn. This is not the cheesy “Turned on Bach” from the 1970s. This has got soul and swing.

From one master to another, the second track is John Coltrane’s Giant Steps. The violin of Curtis Stewart carries the voice of Coltrane’s saxophone and the outcome is fascinating. The arrangement is as cool as Coltrane could ever ask and the musicians deliver.

With every track, a written meditation and/or quote accompanies the music. The Unfolding parchment of the packaging is a companion work of creativity that should be enjoyed alongside, not in addition to or instead of, the music it elucidates. I recommend enjoying it simultaneously. And learning from the experience.

A Color Between Colors from Webern follows after. The piece is only 59 seconds in duration but the depth achieved so quickly is profound. The written pieces contrast Gauguin and—of all people—Adolf Hitler. Experience for yourself the effect.

Stewart’s original piece, Alone Together, follows. There is a sweetness in this Grappelli-esque work, a charm that captivates and enriches.

Anton Webern’s Four Pieces for Violin and Piano, op.7 makes its first appearance next with the first of the four pieces. The piece is an exercise in subdued dynamics and percussion. The dialogue of melodic fragments and rhythmic currents compels attention.

Like with the Bach sonata, Stewart will break up the progression by rearranging the pieces in 1-3-4-2 order. There is a reason, of course.

Webern arranged his four to show contrasts in tempo and dynamic character. The even numbered pieces were both to be slow and subdued while the odd numbered pieces were to be fully dynamic and rapid.

Stewart’s arrangement of both the pieces and their order, creates an ever-brightening and more vibrant hue. He is clever. I mean that in a good way.

After the first of Weberns comes another of the Webern-inspired works entitled Contrast Color. Another very short interlude at only 41 seconds which serves to separate the Webern from what follows after.

Indeed, what follows after is an arrangement of Outkast’s Prototype. It opens with a melancholy intonation that moves ever-so-sweetly into a funkier bit of affection. It is whimsical and delightful. Not as apparently serious as other tracks, this dedication to melody contains the hope of sustained love or, at least, the prototype of it. Beautiful work.

The Presto of Bach’s Sonata in G minor is, of course, lively and quick. The shimmering colors of the Presto are on sonic display in full exposure. Alex Wyatt’s percussion gets special attention.

Of Webern: Compare gives another interlude between the quick and the slow as it serves to bridge between the Presto and the third of Webern’s Four Pieces. As with the first of the four, it is in the slower tempo with the undeveloped dynamics.

A whole section of original compositions comes next with four works from Curtis Stewart himself prefaced by one from Alex Hills.

Hills’ Prime is a cool mover with fascinating tempo switches and tight melodic movement. Wyatt again turns in a brilliant bit of rhythm before morphing into Stewart’s Descent which causes Hills’ electric piano and Stewart’s violin to regale the listener with a tale of love and regret and emptiness.

Tectonics by Curtis Stewart moves as slowly as the Earth’s plates in the opening (Okay, not really) but that motion shifts creates a beauty of movement as surely as the Indian subcontinent colliding with the main plate of Asia to create the Himalayas. The colorful ‘scapes and scenes are resplendent with shade and tones that only the ear can see. This could be my favorite piece on the album…including the Bach.

Stewart’s A Breath in Time is performed by Jeremy Harman on cello. It is slow, evocative and meaningful with its references to inner power.

The originals section—in fact, the Of Color(s) section—concludes with Stewart’s Gone. It is forlorn and reminiscent. It is call for what is no longer present. A person. A place. An emotion. A thought.

The (UN)-folding section opens with the Siciliana of Bach’s Sonata. The pizzicato of the violin is taken over by the electronics of Tyler Gilmore before Stewart resumes the dominance. Gilmore creates a rhythmic substructure that is in stark but brilliant contrast to the melodic lines.

The Siciliana is immediately followed by the Fugue of the Sonata. Stewart labels this as a Tyler Gilmore Remix. The electronica warps and weaves the melodic lines into something blurred and incredibly intriguing.

Webern’s fourth of the Four Pieces is, along with the second which follows, more dynamic and awash with watercolor imagery. The electronics of the second is a fine touch of texture.

Stewart’s A Drop of Wind is a more lyrical work against the stark backdrop as Stewart contrasts with Joanna Mattrey’s viola.
The penultimate tracks are Of Color(s) and UN-folding Remix by Tyler Gilmore followed by Of Color(s) and UN-folding by Curtis Stewart. The Remix coming before the original mix. However, I appreciate the electronics-laden remix first. It allows for a movement away from the harsh effects to the lusher strings of Stewart’s and Hwei’s violins, Mattrey’s viola and Harman’s cello. The twin tracks create a contrast in tone and hue that is unmistakable.

The album concludes with a reprise of Gone. A lovely, lonely farewell.

In the liner notes, one of the most telling quotes is from Shel Silverstein. “And all the colors I am inside have not been invented yet.”

This is the strength and the beauty and the wonder of Curtis Stewart’s Of Color(s) and UN-folding, that in expressing vivid musical colors, in sharing the poetry of his own composing, in remembering the words of those who have imagined before, he shows his audience the colors inside of himself—color(s) not yet invented.

Far from self-indulgent, it is self-revelatory. It is vulnerable. It is creation.





~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl
 
 
 

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Enrique Haneine was born in Mexico City (of Lebanese ancestry) and is currently living in New York City. All of those influences and environments have found their way into the captivating and cultivating forms discovered within the confines—if there are any—of “Instants of Time” from Elegant Walk Records (EWRecords-001).

Haneine has pulled together improvisational artists, proficient in Jazz and World Music, to manifest exactly what it is that he wants to convey. Lex Samu is on trumpet, Catherine Sikora on tenor and soprano saxophones, Michael Rorby on trombone, Carlo de Rosa on acoustic bass, Lori Cotler (appearing three times on vocals) and Haneine himself on drums and percussion. Haneine himself produced the album.

The rhythms are soaked with meaning and profundity. As is true with most drummers and percussionists, the meter is more important than the melody, the tune serving the tempo. Haneine’s use of those brilliant Afro-Cuban clave rhythms and the neck-jerking provide the structure from which the horn players are free to leap. This is the stuff that mesmerizes the mind and enraptures the soul.

The album opens with “Bordeaux.” The introduction is a heavy bass and drum groove that is immediately inviting. The horns slide alongside with muted cool. Lex Samu springs away on trumpet in vein-bulging intensity. At first in consonance with the trumpet, Lori Cotler’s vocals emerge from the duo in a Middle Eastern vocal riff. Catherine Sikora’s soprano sax mirrors the riff before improvising on her own. The bass and drums maintain the groove from start to finish. Call it Afro-Cuban-Arabic Bop. Sweet stuff.

“Angularity Within” follows with an almost trigonometric study in angles. The switchbacks in times and tones is eye-opening, if not mind-bending. The cross-cutting horns over the circular patterns of bass and drums is thrilling.
“If You Know What I Mean” is an almost Free Jazz improvisation. And that is fine with me. The free rhythm section runs amok beneath the lock-step singularity of the horns. It comes across as a philosophical rendering of what it means to act freely in a restrictive environment. Haneine remains free beneath the strident horns and oppressive bass. He exults in percussive liberty and beckons us to follow in freedom.

This is followed by “Houston.” The rhythm and melody sound like Latin American life in a cosmopolitan sphere. The Latin flavors struggle beneath the adamant expectations of foreign city. The Latin elements never lose their joy and life, no matter where they are located.

“Esperanza” opens with Sikora’s sonorous tenor sax to be soon joined by the sweet sounds of Cotler’s vocals. With de Rosa’s bass and Haneine’s drums, a tapestry of warmth and vulnerability is woven that draws the listener ever deeper into the emotion of the piece. Beautiful.

“Slippery When Dry” is a cool work of New York City textures and times. Sikora’s tenor sax sets up the wild ride of Samu’s trumpet as de Rosa and Haneine carry on with switches and runs that almost steal the show. The work between rhythm section and horn section is brilliant, to say the least.

“Inside the Journey” is the midway point of the album. Haneine opens with a Udu Drum as Cotler’s vocals sound like speaking in tongues. The use of vocal as percussion with the drum is fascinating. Near the two-minute mark, the horns come aboard as Haneine sits the full drum kit and de Rosa carries out the bass structure. Soprano sax walks off with a melody that is soon taken by the trumpet. The full horn section carries the melody to the end with the faint whiff of incense.

“Color and Space” is perfectly named. The whole piece is an expression of the importance of what is not played over what is played. The holes in time carry as much richness as the structured time. In defiance of optics, the true color is found within the space.

Still, the hues and tones are expressed magnificently in the sections of deft artistry and composition. It is a wonderfully constructed piece and musicians and composer alike shine brilliantly.

The ninth track is “By Choice.” Again, bass and drums opens the introduction. The horns join in with a raw bravado which is invigorating and challenging. Sikora’s tenor sax is rich in its solo as Samu’s trumpet follows with flights of purpose and destiny. Rorby’s trombone is throaty, even lusty, before the full horn section returns in force.
Again, de Rosa and Haneine create a smoky firmament upon which the others stand—the foundation being as beautiful as the edifice.

“The East Side of Lloyd” offers a terrific example of a partnership between Brazil and Beirut. If Latin rhythms were mated with Lebanese melodies, this is the result and it is stunning. This could be my favorite piece on the album. As the piece concluded, during my first listening, all I could say was “No! Don’t stop!”

“The Tear and Smile of an Angel” is introduced by Michael Rorby’s trombone before the drums come rolling in. Sikora and Samu each get their turns while de Rosa and Haneine are absolutely on fire. As the two of them play in duo—while the horns sit out for a bit—it is easily some of the most rewarding minutes of the whole album.

“Let the Cedar Tell the Story” is as Lebanese as one can wish. The cedar is the tree that adorns the Lebanese flag and the rhythms and melodies of this track are as richly Lebanese as the fragrant cedar. This is so well-layered that it requires multiple listenings to peel away the many facets. Delicate and thunderous, sweet and strong, the piece speaks volumes of wondrous culture and nature. This is the track I could not hear enough.

“Who’s Willing” concludes this stunning album. The horn section and the rhythm section are vibrant and dynamic. First together, now apart, they offer cooperation, solidarity, then independence as they all bend their artistry to the singular purpose of displaying what Haneine has determined.

Enrique Haneine’s “Instants of Time” is not an amalgam of musical expressions and varied rhythms. It is a mural of a life of experiences and emotions, artistic adventures and innovative improvisations. It is a revelation of the soul of the man. It is a self-portrait painted in cool.




~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl