ASSIF TSAHAR / HUGH RAGIN / PETER KOWALD / HAMID DRAKE – Open Systems (2001)

Label: Marge – 28
Format: CD, Album; Country: France - Released: 2001
Jazz Style: Free Jazz, Free Improvisation
Recorded on May 4 & 5, 2001 at La Fenêtre Studio, Paris.
Painting – Obeye Fall
Design – Laurent Groffe
Engineer [Assistant] – Sylvain Delafosse
Engineer, Edited By, Mastered By – Philippe Maté
Photography By – Thierry Trombert
Producer – Gérard Terrones

... Drake and Tsahar were in Paris as guests at a friend’s wedding. Turning the celebration into a busman’s holiday, the two subsequently went into a studio with veteran German bassist Peter Kowald and American trumpeter Hugh Ragin, who were specifically invited to take part, and produced OPEN SYSTEMS. It’s more than 72½ minutes spread among seven compositions that relate as much to hard core energy music of the late 1960s as the former disc does to spirituality...

... Take the saxman’s “ The Lizards in the Maze ”, one of four Tsahar compositions elaborated here. Beginning with a powerful Wilbur Ware-type string-punishing intro courtesy of Kowald, the freebop head soon gives way to a selection of solos. Even when he soars at the top of his range, Ragin still properly balances every note. In contrast, the tenorist’s tone sometimes slips into altissimo, but is always made up of staccato-inflected sound particles. Probably reminding Drake of his long-time employer Anderson, the percussionist usually meets Tsahar’s steaming thrusts with protracted tattoos, then follows the duet with a calm but heartfelt solo that starts off heavy on the snares and cymbals, but then turns proper attention to all parts of the kit.

Building from an early Ornette Coleman Quartet type of head, “ The Call ” offers more of the same, with Drake in his Ed Blackwell role providing a steady rat-tat-tat and Kowald as Charlie Haden providing the rhythmic bottom. On “ Lonely Woman ” -- a real Coleman line -- he authors a solo which has the different strings on his instrument dialoguing with themselves, and that let’s you know that his assumed identity here was just momentary role playing. Channeling Don Cherry, who spent some time in Paris himself, Ragin not only to creates whinnies and smears to follow Tsahar’s lead, but manages to expose a tiny, melodic passage of modulated beauty, built on short, sharp ascending horn bursts. Odd man out with his tenor tone obviously closer to John Coltrane’s or Ayler’s than Coleman’s alto conception, Tsahar spews out a well-nuanced solo, and after time spent chasing the brass man through the stratosphere, elaborates another motif that drags everyone back to the initial theme.

This drawing together seems to be the motif behind Tsahar’s “ Dream Weaverts ” (sic), dedicated to the newly married couple. Although Ragin, using a sort of funky burr sometimes sounds as if he’s playing Charles Mingus ’“ Weird Nightmare ” or Ayler’s “ The Truth Is Marching In ” -- and what are the brassman’s views on marriage? -- the bowed bass and bass clarinet mirror one another with irregular reverberating vibrations. Despite sections where each horn appears to be heading in a contrasting direction, they pull back to meld together before the end. Is there a wedlock partnership metaphor here somewhere?

Finally, Drake presages the pietistic passages he’d be singing three weeks hence in New York on “ Hearts Remembrance ”, where his measured Arabic (?) chanting is complimented by reverberating didgeridoo-like vocal sounds from Kowald and Ragin. Manipulating the buzz of the frame drum and adapting the bass clarinet ’ s natural resonance and some meshed, muted trumpet, the four allude to timeless, primitive music...

_ By KEN WAXMAN



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DIE LIKE A DOG QUARTET – Little Birds Have Fast Hearts - No. 1 (1998)

 

Label: FMP – FMP CD 97 

Format: CD, Album; Country: Germany - Released: 1998 

Style: Free Jazz, Free Improvisation

Recorded during the "30th TOTAL MUSIC MEETING" on November 7/8, 1997 at the "Podewil" in Berlin

Design – Brötzmann
Photography By – Dagmar Gebers, Tony Getsug
Producer – Jost Gebers, Peter Brötzmann
Recorded By – Holger Scheuermann, Jonas Bergler

The Die Like a Dog Quartet came together four years after recording their first album for the 30th Total Music Meeting festival in Berlin that took place in November 1997. The sets that the quartet performed over the course of the three day festival were subsequently released by the FMP label in two volumes entitled Little Birds Have Fast Hearts. Peter Brötzmann plays tenor, of course, as well as some tarogato and clarinet, and he is joined by bassist Wiliam Parker, drummer Hamid Drake, and trumpeter Toshinori Kondo who occasionally utilizes electronic effects. On this first volume, the quartet is in it for the long run; there are just two parts, totaling over an hours' worth of music. They go long, but not without pause, for there are definite let-ups over the course of "Part 1" (which remains engaging and varied throughout its 45 minutes), and "Part 2" is a relatively low-key piece. But "calm" and "low- key" for this group are still strongly out; there is no "casual" mode, there is no collapsing into old forms, this is a work-out, and all four musicians give 100 percent as they are known to do. This is not music for people wanting to hear some nice jazz, some hum-along-able standards; this is music for listeners who want to take a journey and are willing to let this quartet steer. The Die Like a Dog Quartet is not improvising for an audience, they are improvising because. Because that is how you find music. Little Birds Have Fast Hearts, No. 1 is a great example of why that is important.

_ By JOSLYN LAYNE, All Nusic Guide



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DIE LIKE A DOG QUARTET – Little Birds Have Fast Hearts - No. 2 (1999)

Label: FMP – FMP CD 101
Format: CD, Album; Country: Germany - Released: 1999
Style: Free Jazz, Free Improvisation 
Recorded during the "30th TOTAL MUSIC MEETING" on November 7/8, 1997 at the "Podewil" in Berlin
Design [Cover Design] – Brötzmann
Photography By – Dagmar Gebers
Producer – Jost Gebers, Peter Brötzmann
Recorded By – Holger Scheuermann, Jonas Bergler

This second installment of the Die Like a Dog Quartet's live performances at the 30th Total Music Meeting in Berlin picks up right where the first volume (with two long cuts, "Part 1" and "Part 2") left off, with a first track entitled "Part 3." Leader Peter Brotzmann signals the beginning with a clarinet call, soon answered by trumpeter Toshinori Kondo (who often utilizes electronic effects), and it's not too long before bassist William Parker and drummer Hamid Drake come rolling in. The quartet warms up slowly during this opening number, giving themselves plenty of space between the colors and shading for the first many minutes before things start to heat up and really get going for a few minutes until the quartet drops back into an unhurried, exploratory mode. The second half of this 20-minute improvisation finds them intensifying, with solos from both Kondo and Brotzmann (still on clarinet) during the tail end. "Part 4" matches the first track in both length and dynamics, finds Brotzmann on tarogato and tenor sax, and includes two brief sections where Parker and Drake go it alone. "Part 5" actually opens with a fragment of a bluesy melody from Kondo and Parker has his bow in hand for this number that stays, for the most part, whispery and abstract. The short "Part 6" is a finale during which the quartet plays full force. Little Birds Have Fast Hearts, No. 2 complements the first volume, including more of this quartet's excellent interplay and self-feeding energy.

_ By JOSLYN LAYNE, All Music Guide



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EVAN PARKER TRIO and PETER BRÖTZMANN TRIO – The Bishop's Move (2004)

Label: Les Disques Victo – VICTO CD 093
Format: CD, Album; Country: Canada - Released: 2004
Style: Free Jazz, Free Improvisation
Recorded live at the 20 Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville, 19 / 5 / 2003.
Graphics – François Bienvenue
Liner Notes – John Corbett
Painting [Cover Paintings] – Tania Girard-Savoie
Photography By – Caroline Forbes
Producer – Joanne Vézina, Michel Levasseur

Festival organizers are always searching for meetings that have a killer combination of artistic cachet and audience draw. Victoriaville artistic director Michel Levasseur has mastered this over the years, coming up with some spectacular combinations amongst the expected fizzles. When he found out that Evan Parker ’ s trio with Barry Guy and Paul Lytton and Peter Brötzmann ’ s Die Like a Dog trio with William Parker and Hamid Drake would both be touring during the spring of 2003, he arranged a one-off meeting of the two at the tail end of their tours. Things took an intriguing twist when pianist Alex von Schlippenbach was recruited as a last-minute replacement for Guy, who was unable to make the tour.

Parker, Brötzmann, and Schlippenbach ’ s history goes back decades, but they had not played together in quite some time. With little practice time together, there was a question as to whether this would become simply a clash of titans, or if the sextet would find its way to more provocative collective heights. Over the course of a continuous 80-minute set, they managed to work at both extremes.

The buzz was high when the sextet hit the stage and the group seemed to feed off of it. Sections by the two trios serve as bookends for this continuous set. After an initial salvo where the twin tenors laid out bellowing torrents in full assault over stabbing piano clusters and roiling pulse, Parker ’ s trio was left to negotiate their snaking labyrinths. Those looking for a document of the trio at the height of that spring tour should be steered to America 2003, the two-disc document on Parker ’ s Psi label. That said, the Parker trio ’ s segment shows the group ’ s ability to move from muscular intensity to circuitous detail.

But it is other sub-groupings that provide the real highlights. After Die Like a Dog joins in, the reed players and W. Parker break off to leave Schlippenbach and the two drummers for a long central section. Here, the pianist ’ s Monk-like clusters and percussive prepared abstractions jostle against the coursing waves of Drake ’ s polyrhythmic pulse and Lytton ’ s free textures. When W. Parker joins in on bass and E. Parker dives in on soprano, the fractals fly with ever-mounting dramatic tension.

Oddly it is when the ensemble opens way for Brötzmann ’ s trio that things begin to flag. The reed player starts on tarogato but can ’ t seem to settle in, relying more on bluster and burly force than his usual molten barrage. When the trio breaks way for an extended bass/frame drum duo, then a bit later for a bass solo, it feels out of place with what had preceded.

When the full group finally convenes to finish things out, the energy is regained for an incendiary final blast. (Missing on the CD is the full-on five-minute encore with the whole group storming with an intensity gathered over the set.) Though a wildly uneven meeting, this is still one of those summits that was an intriguing reunion of masters and well worth checking out.

_ By MICHAEL ROSENSTEIN, 23 December 2004 (One Final Note)

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GEORG GRÄWE QUARTET – Melodie Und Rhythmus (1997)

 

Label : Okka Disc - OD12024

Produced by: Georg Gräwe; Executive Producer: Bruno Johnson 

Engineer: John McCortney

Format : CD, Album; Recording Date : 1997

Recorded at AirWave Recording Studios, Chicago, IL, May 1997

Style : Free Jazz, Free Improvisation

Cover painting: Ben Portis
Graphic design: Louise Molnar; Inside photo: Bruce Carnevale

Linear Notes:

Georg Gräwe visits Chicago for the first time (1995), performing solo, recording a solo record for OkkaDisk, and collaborating with alto saxist/clarinetist Guillermo Gregorio. Gräwe quickly develops an affinity for the vibrant local scene and the city ’ s jazz and blues heritage. Buys a copy of Magic Sam ’ s West Side Soul (Delmark). Enjoys a Bookers at the Hopleaf. Late that year, he hears a group of Chicago improvisors in Germany at the Moers Festival. Bassist Kent Kessler and drummer Hamid Drake are among the six participants (later known as the Moers Six). At a certain point in three days of ad- hoc groupings, long-standing Gräwe accomplice Frank Gratkowski adds his alto sax and clarinet to the Chicagoans ’ music. The seeds for the group are sown in the ears of the listening pianist. In 1996, Gräwe is deeply impressed by Kessler ’ s playing on Steelwool Trio ’ s International Front (OkkaDisk), and he finally settles on the formation of a quartet, inviting Drake — with whom he had been eager to work since before his first visit to Chicago — and Kessler from the Windy City, and Gratkowski from Köln. Music Minus One: first concert (and studio session) in November of ’ 96, without Drake. Intensive trio interaction, clear connection forged between these three parts — big question-mark how it will work with the master percussionist in the mix. Inspired by the scene, and with a desire to rehearse (and eventually record) his new quartet, in April ’ 97, Gräwe moves to Chicago for the spring and summer. The full group makes its triumphant first appearance in May at the Empty Bottle Festival of Jazz and Improvised Music, in Chicago, then plays again in July at Nickelsdorf Konfrontationen, in Austria. In between these two performances, both spectacularly rich and (for Gräwe followers especially) extremely surprising, the quartet storms the studios and produces the record you now hold in your hands. And as the group presently finishes its first European tour, the story continues...

- John Corbett, Chicago, November 1997

Review:

Melodie und Rhythmus captures the interplay of a fine and charismatic quartet of German and American jazz improvisers. Pianist Georg Gräwe is joined by reeds player Frank Gratkowski from Köln, Germany, and Chicago jazzmen, percussionist Hamid Drake and bassist Kent Kessler, for a recording date that reveals a strong likemindedness and communication between the musicians. The opening piece begins quiet and sparse, with staggered steps of high piano chords and ambient shadings provided by the others. As "Nodality" develops, the space gradually fills in with increased activity. The immediate contrast of a dark piano punctuation starts the next piece, "Imaginary Portrait I," which turns into quick streams of nightclub piano jazz fragments and runs. It's a testament to this group's skill that the fast- paced activity seems effortless, coming off with elegance. The album continues with the hot afternoon bustle of "Passing Scopes," which includes a solo by Gratkowski; the dark and stormy bombardment and impressive whirlwind that is "Trajectory"; "Fringe Factor," with a slowly building clarinet monologue that runs through the center of the quartet's playing, ultimately giving way to a beautiful solo from Gräwe; the more abstracted, single-note rounds of "Multiversum"; and, finally, the more traditional feel of the excellent "Memory of Wings II." The superb playing of drummer Hamid Drake, as well as the strong presence of Kessler's bass throughout this session need mentioning, as does the evocative and tight knit sound of this quartet.

_By Joslyn Layne (AMG)



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