KODIAN TRIO (Colin Webster, Dirk Serries, Andrew Lisle) tours Belgium and The Netherlands for the next 5 days. For devotees of the full-on free impro. Don’t miss this chance to see them live in action.

HUNT AT THE BROOK AGAIN / HUNT AT THE BROOK WITH NEIL METCALFE (2xcd, A New Wave Of Jazz 2023). Order here.

“Hunt at the Brook Again / Hunt at the Brook with Neil Metcalfe est la suite de Hunt At The Brook, le premier disque du trio de Tom Jackson (clarinette), Benedict Taylor (alto) et Daniel Thompson (guitare acoustique archtop) publié en 2015 par le label FMR, un trio dans la pure “tradition” de l’improvisation British, la manière du guitariste faisant plus qu’évoquer celles de son ami John Russell ou du Derek Bailey acoustique . Ces trois musiciens ont multiplié les albums en duo avec l’un et l’autre. Daniel Thompson a enregistré t’other en compagnie de Benedict Taylor (Empty Birdcage) et tous deux, Compost avec le clarinettiste Alex Ward (CRAM). On retrouve Thompson et Jackson avec le trompettiste Roland Ramanan dans Zubeneschamali (Leo Records) et dans Nauportus avec le percussionniste Vic Drasler (Creative Sources). Taylor et Jackson ont oublié aussi Songs From Badly -Lit Rooms (Squib Box). Quant au flûtiste Neil Metcalfe qui s’adjoint en quartette dans le CD 2 avec cette fine équipe, on le retrouve dans deux albums en trio et en duo avec Daniel Thompson : Garden Of Water And Light (FMR) et Eight Improvisations (Creative Sources). Ces trois improvisateurs poussent l’art d’improviser aux sommets de leurs facultés et de leurs intuitions avec une authenticité et une sensibilité créatives fascinantes. Tom Jackson est tout en spirales, volutes, sursauts, pépiements avec une qualité de timbre « clarinette classique contemporaine informée par sa pratique du jazz toutes époques confondues » : admirable ! Ses deux acolytes incarnent le courant improvisationnel libre. Daniel Thompson agite ses doigts et son plectre au travers des cordes et de la touche en créant des simultanéités d’angles aigus, d’harmonies excentrées, de pincements et raclements bruitistes, d’ostinatos discrets, de trilles métalliques et d’harmoniques sauvages en favorisant l’interaction tangentielle ou la digression suggestive. Quant au « violoniste » à l’alto, Benedict Taylor, sa manière de presser l’archet sur ses cordes en étirant ses notes évasives et tendues comme si la touche chantait un appel oriental imaginaire. Taylor crée un univers différent quasi « non-occidental » : violon tzigane hypertrophié, notes étirées, saturées, glissantes, serpentines, striages carnatiques, vièle d’Anatolie murmurante au bord du silence, pizzicati puissants et décalés. Leur réunion au sein d’Hunt at the Brook occasionne une musique en trio (sans batterie) parmi les plus distinctives de l’improvisation libre telle que je l’ai découverte au fil des décennies : Rutherford/ Bailey/ Guy (puis Wachsmann), Butcher/ Durrant Russell, Christmann/ Altena/ Lovens, Wachsmann/Beswick/ Wren, etc… Au fil des secondes et des minutes durant six improvisations, ils élaborent une architecture tridimensionnelle, des mouvements métamorphiques qui s’emboîtent, s’échappent et renaissent sous d’autres formes… sous le signe directeur de l’ébat ludique et le partage de l’espace et des sons/ On a de cesse de voir et entendre où cela les mènent, quand ils retombent sur leurs pieds ou s’envolent dans les sphères.
Avec l’inclusion du flûtiste vétéran Neil Metcalfe, on est au-devant d’une surprise. Neil Metcalfe a joué et enregistré aux côtés de John Stevens, Roger Smith, Nick Stephens, Tony Marsh, Paul Dunmall, Paul Rogers, Phil Gibbs, Adrian Northover, Daniel Thompson, Phil Wachsmann. Il est apprécié pour son approche minutieuse et maniaque dans les infimes déplacements – glissements de la note « juste » en adaptant subtilement l’embouchure de son épaisse flûte noire. Tous ses collègues qui ont (acquis) une oreille musicale « absolue » se régalent. En quartet dans le CD 2 , le quartet commence à petits pas émaillés de silences, de frottements lents et nuancés, la clarinette lunaire et la guitare pincée égrenant deux ou trois notes répétées discrètement. La musique se fait petit à petit cascadante, Daniel Thompson accroche les intervalles les plus outrés percutant les cordes assourdies ou en harmoniques de sa six cordes, ravageant la conception du jeu de guitare « atonal ». Tom Jackson spirale avec une articulation magistrale. Entre ces deux pôles pépie la flûte de Neil Metcalfe comme s’il s’envolait de l’Empty Birdcage du label de Thompson. Les séquences s’enchaînent comme les mouvements d’une œuvre pensée et délimitée dont ils n’ont pas à suivre la partition inventant la musique immédiatement sachant précisément comment jouer et inventer au moment opportun et à celui qui surgit sans crier gare. Et sans mimique ni clin d’œil appuyé, le savant dosage étant le maître-mot. Entre les deux souffleurs , on note aussi une empathie profonde et une connivence tant au niveau des sonorités que des légers étirements de notes, infimes glissandi évanescents ou tourbillons de notes évoquant les gazouillis de joyeux volatiles échappés de la volière (Empty Birdcage). La présence active de Neil Metcalfe renforce encore l’excellence du trio devenu quartet et la sagacité collective. La simultanéité de propositions de jeu, de timbres, de lignes, les contrastes les plus suaves ou les plus forcenés, la variété des affects et des suggestions accouche d’un kaléidoscope de l’infini et d’une poésie en écriture automatique, celle des surréalistes. Il en résulte une magnifique expérience d’écoute.” Orynx-improvandsounds – Belgium

our new release of GUILHERME RODRIGUES/CARLOS ‘ZINGARO’/JOSÉ OLIVEIRA ‘Zwosch, Zwosch, Zwosch’ – available here.

“New Wave of Jazz is een Belgisch platenlabel dat avontuurlijke improvisatiejazz op de kaart zet. Het label van gitarist Dirk Serries draaide in eerste instantie vooral op musici uit België, Nederland en het Verenigd Koninkrijk, maar de grenzen worden steeds meer verlegd, zodat we nu met een volledig Portugees trio mogen kennismaken.

Cellist Guilherme Rodrigues speelt in deze sessie van ruim een half uur samen met de veelzijdige percussionist José Oliveira en een oude rot in het vak, de violist Carlos “Zingaro”, en je hoort hoe ze in dat half uur op een verbluffende manier een breed spectrum aan mogelijkheden verkennen. Op een bepaald moment zijn ze gedrieën puur ritmisch bezig, terwijl er even later prachtig breed en lyrisch wordt uitgehaald. Als luisteraar zit je steeds alert te luisteren, want elk moment verandert er wel subtiel iets waardoor het muzikale verhaal weer een andere richting op gaat.

Er is dan ook ruimte voor een cellosolo van een minuut, terwijl de anderen even later naadloos invallen alsof ze al een leven lang samen spelen. Muziek om ademloos te beluisteren. Voor iedereen met open oren en de bereidheid vaker naar een stuk te luisteren, want geloof me, bij een tweede keer is deze muziek nog mooier.” Moors Magazine – The Netherlands

Todd McComb’s Jazz Thoughts just wrote an impressive extensive review on our latest release of HUNT AT THE BROOK/HUNT AT THE BROOK AGAIN with NEIL METCALFE. In this review Todd blends in several other releases on our label as well some from affiliated labels and musicians. Get ready.
This double disc is of course available from our webstore on bandcamp.

“Hunt at the Brook (recorded in 2014) has felt like a pivotal album for me, in terms of finding my own interests in this space, i.e. as slowly moving away from following a variety of other sources (as can seem inevitable…), into more personal priorities & articulations. Moreover, that’s been underscored by ongoing interest in the performers involved: Just this past May, I reviewed It used to be an elephant (recorded in 2022 & released on Daniel Thompson’s Empty Birdcage label), a quintet combining the original trio with frequent collaborators Dirk Serries & Colin Webster. (That album comes off as more exploratory, preliminary again with its unusual ensemble….) And there I’d traced some historical relations as well, including to me in this space, so I’ll skip over some of that now. Nonetheless, the recent release of two albums at once on Serries’ “A New Wave of Jazz” label — Hunt at the Brook Again & with Neil Metcalfe — necessitates some further thoughts on chronology (as well as confirms that Hunt at the Brook was a significant project for the trio of musicians involved): The addition of Metcalfe on flute for the second album of this double release raises as well his participation (with Thompson) in Runcible Quintet, e.g. their own quartet formation on (half of) Four suggesting something of the quartet interaction here. Of course, the Runcible albums have more in the way of rhythmic articulation via drums, but there’s a sort of tuneful “anthropology music” cultivated as well. (This is a notion I’ve been articulating here over the past few years, namely musical inspiration from “natural” sounds, e.g. zoomimesis, or in this case more in the way of outdoor resonances woven into a sort of harmonic tapestry….) And there’s likewise a sort of pointillism much of the time underlying Hunt at the Brook, multiple relations woven more densely than a real (ecological) scene, evoking multiple perspectives & collisions in counterpoint…. So the chronology here implicates Runcible as well, the latter’s most recent album Three having been recorded in March 2019 (& reviewed here in May 2020), followed by Hunt at the Brook Again in April 2019 & Hunt at the Brook with Neil Metcalfe in May 2019. And I’d already been emphasizing post-pandemic productions here, so this does come to seem like the past…. Still, both albums have been quite compelling, and further (even centrally…) illuminate subsequent productions: 2019 had opened for Thompson & Benedict Taylor recording the double duo album T’other in January (launching Thompson’s new label…), as reviewed here in November 2020, i.e. only after I’d reviewed the horn-less SETT (recorded in November 2019, and first documenting the unusual double acoustic guitar formations that followed these trio & quartet chamber ensembles…). (Taylor himself also went on to record a series of duos that year, including Live Offerings 2019 with Serries, reviewed here in March 2021, plus e.g. Knotted Threads with Yves Charuest on Inexhaustible Editions…. Moving ahead then, he appears with Serries & e.g. with Stefan Keune for the middle disc of Live at Plus-Etage, Volume 1 too, recorded last September: That understated triple album, also produced by Serries, includes two striking duo recitals as well, from different musicians who also intersect this unit sometimes.) Meanwhile, I’ve had more of an “in order” (if sparser…) chronology for clarinetist Tom Jackson (who joined the core Hunt at the Brook trio later, replacing Alex Ward from Compost, as reviewed here in April 2013…), appearing e.g. with the trio album Nauportus with Thompson (reviewed already July 2019, but after the present recordings were made), and then Dandelion (actually recorded in the interim in 2021) with Serries instead on guitar. (The latter was also presented in big, dynamic 24bit sound — as are now Hunt at the Brook Again & Hunt at the Brook with Neil Metcalfe….) And then Thompson himself has recently e.g. reprised his duo with Webster, releasing However, Forward! (as recorded only last October) this month on Webster’s Raw Tonk label, yielding a relatively tighter articulation for that ongoing formation…. So then one thing I’ve (apparently) learned from doing this sort of review over the years is that it becomes too easy simply to trace relations…. What about the specific music? Why do I return (even to 2019 yet again)? For one, there’s always more to appreciate, even to learn! For instance, sometimes I feel smart for appreciating the original Hunt at the Brook, but the notes for this new release also tell me that I didn’t pick up on title, which names the engineer & (studio) location. (So then I don’t feel so smart.) Anyway, I’d instead focused on the outdoorsy quality (pace the previous), and even a sense of nostalgia, i.e. as “also” reflected in the track titles. (And admittedly, the fact that this was a substantial album, lengthy rather than short, figured into my interest in those days, i.e. offering more to chew on over time….) Now the “new” albums — & they’re still significantly more recent than the original trio, even if one wonders why the delayed release… — dispense with track titles (as so often in this space…), figuring similar material inspirations into a denser & more detailed network, seeming to leave behind nostalgia per se (about which I’ve already expressed ambivalence…). (There’s of course still the matter of my own familiarity….) So while Hunt at the Brook Again provides a remarkably taut & lively exploration of some of the earlier ideas in greater depth & concentration (as befitting a reprise five years later…), Hunt at the Brook with Neil Metcalfe then broaches some different interactions, more in the way of harmonic shading (e.g. via register between the two woodwinds), yielding almost a modernist vibe in more chordal sections (& incorporating e.g. traffic, beyond anything potentially idyllic…). A similar, more chordal (v. pointillist) approach then opens It used to be an elephant (without Metcalfe), before turning elsewhere…. Acoustic guitar particularly feels like a pivot for the quartet formation, articulating counterpoints rhythmically, the potentially chordal viola often functioning more like a horn, raucous even at times, almost an alto sax…. Hunt at the Brook with Neil Metcalfe can thus feel almost like three top lines — & regular readers will know that pairing flute with clarinet was likely to appeal to me… — yielding a “different” approach to (fluid) harmonic combinations, pace e.g. “spectral” ideas on (“natural”) overtone relations. There’s also some real “fire” on both albums, especially from violist Taylor, but the “modernist” feel also involves tangible affective modulation, a sort of sinking-calming at times (including dueling runs…), moody… maybe sometimes almost new age-y? But with its assertive opening & quicker pace of articulation & dynamics, Hunt at the Brook Again had already made Hunt at the Brook seem relatively more stark (or classic…), similar materials & inspiration worked further into more intricate articulations…. Both formations are still able to summon a sense of quiet (or even silence) as well, via basic fluidity figuring dynamics throughout. As far as musical parameters per se then, i.e. in addition to their articulation of an abstracted ecology, it’s perhaps this sense for “dynamics” that most marks this group of colleagues as (sometimes) a collective. Theirs is thus a rich (rather than simplistic…) interaction with the world (& especially its outdoor sonic palette…), yielding a regime of actively shifting attention, figuration & human choice as well. Counterpoint per se then comes to feel like a condensation or embodiment of multiply intersecting experiences.” Todd McComb’s Jazz Thoughts – UK

We’re hosting another event at the beautiful Oude Klooster chapel in Brecht tonight with a fine double bill : JEAN-MICHEL VAN SCHOUWBURG (voice) goes into dialogue with MARTINA VERHOEVEN (crumar electric piano), and the trio of HUGO COSTA (sax), DIRK SERRIES (guitar) and FRISO VAN WIJCK (drums, percussion) re-gathers after their passage in the Nordic church in Rotterdam on October 31st, 2021, as part of the Solace Music Concert series. Doors : 7.30pm Concert : 8.15pm