I’m writing this piece on a Friday, when a large number of new jazz releases traditionally appear in stores and on streaming services. I’ve been hearing and reading about some of the releases from today’s Randomizer for weeks (and even months) in advance. Some albums were released earlier as well. Some I’m hearing for the first time now. What they all have in common is that I like them at least initially, on first impression, and that more careful listening still lies ahead. When the time comes for the year-end lists, I’ll have a clearer picture of which albums have “stood the test of time”, even if that time is measured only in weeks and months.
I’ve already written several times about releases published by the Budapest label BMC Records, which has been a major discovery for me. As I write this, I’m listening for the first time to the album Black Sea Songs II, released by Sanem Kalfa (vocals, cello), George Dumitriu (viola, guitar, electronics) and Joachim Badenhorst (clarinet, bass clarinet). This is chamber music that I perhaps wouldn’t call “jazz” in the narrow sense of the word, but it contains elements of jazz improvisation, classical composition, and a folk sensibility connected to the Black Sea region. Although the musicians come from different parts of the world, what they have in common is that they live and work in the Netherlands, a country that is a “melting pot” for contemporary European cross-genre music, which can also be felt in their highly creative approach to loosely understood references and genres.
The second album I recommend this week is the freshly released Floating by the new quartet of Emile Parisien, a soprano saxophonist whose work I’ve been following for 10–15 years and whose albums I always enjoy. I particularly like his duo with accordionist Vincent Peirani, while concerts by his regular quartet have always been a real spectacle. For weeks now, ACT Music has been promoting his new band, which we can freely call an all-star lineup featuring pianist Yaron Herman, bassist Linda May Han Oh and percussionist Prabou Edouard. This band sits somewhere between his intimate duo and his wild quartet, while Parisien himself is always reliable and recognizable as an instrumentalist.
This week’s discovery for me is seasoned pianist Gisela Horat, whom I hadn’t heard of before, but who appeared on my radar thanks to my growing interest in the Swiss label Unit Records. She has just released the album “Trio Solo”, which in practice means that it is a double album – on one she performs with a trio, and on the other without the band. Although the solo album is interesting as well, my attention was particularly drawn to the trio section with Simon Iten on bass and Samuel Büttiker on drums and percussion. This is an album of minimalist and restrained improvisation, relying more on small gestures and interactions and a commitment to texture and atmosphere than on excursions into ecstatic crescendos. And I quite like that, although more extensive listening and impressions are still to come.
On the other hand, saxophonist and clarinetist Andrew D’Angelo has been a familiar and dear name to me for decades, although mostly in the context of bands he has worked with. I have also already developed enormous trust in guitarist Jakob Bro’s Loveland label. So I approached the album BCDELUXE with a positive bias, and my expectations were met. To be fair, this isn’t an album I’ll want to obsessively listen to on repeat, given its distinctly fragmentary-minimalist structure and the fact that it is a solo album of bass clarinet miniatures. But the recordings are convincing, and for now I’m finding enjoyment in them.
Several more potentially interesting releases have accumulated on my radar, but I simply haven’t had time to listen to them, so I believe next week’s Randomizer will be quite substantial.
On the festival scene, it’s time to mention N.O. Jazz Festival, which has been of immeasurable importance to me both personally and professionally. I first went there in 2005 and attended the festival for several years until it was discontinued due to funding problems, after which it was revived a few years ago in a somewhat more stripped-down, but no less high-quality form.
The curator and organizer of this festival, held in Zagreb (Croatia), is Mate Škugor, something of a legend in the region and an organizer/promoter who has played an important role in shaping the musical taste of several generations of fans of avant-garde sound (not only jazz). From the 1990s to the present day, he has organized the Žedno Uho and N.O. Jazz festival in Zagreb, followed by Terraneo in Šibenik and SuperUho in Primošten (on the seaside, near Šibenik), where, for example, I saw Marc Ribot and Colin Stetson in 2019.
Anyway – this year the festival will feature The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis (November 10), Spike Fuck + Gordan Glad (November 11), and Artifacts Trio (Nicole Mitchell, Tomeka Reid and Mike Reed) and Eksterminator ‘81 (a project by the tireless Croatian keyboardist Toni Starešinić) on November 13. Quality guaranteed!