UpRoot
| UpRoot | ||||
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| Studio album by Alexander Hawkins / Elaine Mitchener Quartet | ||||
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Publication |
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| Label (s) | Intakt Records | |||
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Format (s) |
CD |
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Title (number) |
8th |
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running time |
48:18 |
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| occupation |
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Alexander Hawkins, Elaine Mitchener, Patrik Landolt |
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Studio (s) |
Fish Factory Studios, London |
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UpRoot is an album by the Alexander Hawkins / Elaine Mitchener Quartet. The recordings were made on April 19 and 20, 2017 in the Fish Factory Studios in London and were released on November 17, 2017 on the Intakt Records label .
background
The Alexander Hawkins - Elaine Mitchener Quartet consists of Hawkins on piano, Mitchener (vocals), Neil Charles on double bass and Stephen Davis on drums. Neil Charles had previously recorded the trio album Alexander Hawkins Trio with Hawkins in 2015 . Elaine Mitchener is an experimental singer and movement artist whose work includes various vocal styles and influences from free improvisation, contemporary music, sound art , musical theater and dance. She has worked and performed on a variety of projects with leading artists including Apartment House, Van Huynh Co., Steve Beresford , Sonia Boyce , John Butcher , Attila Csihar , Tansy Davies , Christian Marclay , Phil Minton , George Lewis , Evan Parker , Alasdair Roberts , David Toop and Jason Yarde .
Track list
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- Alexander Hawkins - Elaine Mitchener Quartet - UpRoot (Inatakt CD 297)
- Why Is Love Such a Funny Thing? ( Patty Waters ) 2:16
- The Miracle ( Jeanne Lee ) ▪ You (Hawkins) 7:04
- UpRoot (Hawkins) 8:57
- If You Say So (Charles / Davis / Hawkins / Mitchener) 4:43
- Blasé ( Archie Shepp ) 2:48
- OM-SE (Hawkins) ▪ Environment Music (Hawkins) 13:23
- Joy (Hawkins) 3:57
- Directives (E. Mitchener) ▪ Walk Nicely (Hawkins) ▪ I'll Meet You There (Hawkins) 6:10
reception
Glenn Astarita wrote in All About Jazz that the British pianist and composer Alexander Hawkins had become a fixture since the mid-2000s and can be found primarily in Europe's exploring circles of progressive jazz and improvisational music. As an actor in various bands and solo artists, the pianist conveys an unmistakable approach in which the melody and extrapolation of the free form enjoy happy togetherness. In the present studio set he works with the remarkable performance artist and singer Elaine Mitchener in a semi-structured set that is characterized by the deconstruction of some standards and the title 'Blasé' by the free jazz icon Archie Shepp .
Is the album's view Astarita "different pitches, contemplative interludes, frenetic pulse, swelling cadences and loosely organized subplots that of the adventurous full of changing flows Scat - phrases and the velvety vocals Mitcheners are determined." Hawkins' tension-filled game " OM-SE / Environment Music "moves up in the midst of its ascending block chords and melodic intervals that evoke a lot of different tonal contrasts when the quartet is encouraged by its freeform excesses, along with multiple aberrations of the primary harmonic components." Toxic action subsides when bassist Neil Charles plays a solo part “and leads his cohorts into a slightly swinging groove that ends in a whisper. Therefore, the musicians traverse numerous musical areas during this intoxicating program, which radiates a multitude of convincing viewpoints and broken subgroups of established paradigms. "
Also in All About Jazz, David Rocheleau-Houle said of the album, which he awarded 4½ (out of five) stars, with UpRoot Hawkins continues to secure his place as a great composer in the free jazz world, which he has achieved through the release of many high quality recordings. His ability to compose for different contexts (solo, duo, trio, quartet and larger ensemble) is also admirable. As an experimental singer, Mitchener shows extraordinary control over her voice and uses different techniques to explore different facets of expression and timbre. On many tracks, such as “The Miracle / You”, “UpRoot” and “OM-SE / Environment Music”, Mitchener formulated sounds that are not words - in some cases something like “dummy words” - to give the music an unusual one To give texture. This approach and technique, which Mitchener wonderfully uses, gives Hawkins' compositions a different meaning, since these sounds or "dummy words" do not have a fixed meaning, as is the case with natural language words. The risks Mitchener takes for UpRoot also pay off, the author concludes, “because they are supported by great musicians like Hawkins, Charles and Davis. Her voice is a monad of a larger ensemble in which she merges perfectly. "
Dan Bergsagel, who saw the quartet live at the launch of the album, wrote in London Jazz News, “The quartet belongs to live and recorded are subtly different things. The record feels more like a collection of vignettes - short emotional episodes that combine tonal language and thinking. Live they are an amorphous beast, blurring the boundaries of the songs and only appearing in the break and at the end. ”“ Part of the mesmerizing performance is the tension that Mitchener and Hawkins can create between them from an alluring unpredictability, ”wrote Bergsagel further. Directives, an avant-garde journey fluttering from instructions to questions through an astonishing range of sounds, was opened and dismissed throughout the set to get the audience back into a certain atmosphere, and documentarily closely accompanied by the serious overtures of “I'll Meet You There ”. UpRoot is an epic battle, the author sums up, “a constant tension between disorder and clarity, which is characterized by emotions. Another unique feather on the cap of the different careers of Mitchener and Hawkins. "
In the Belgian newspaper Jazz Halo, Danny De Bock compared Mitchener's singing stio with that of her role model Jeanne Lee ; Compared to Jeanne Lee, in his opinion her singing does not have the same depth, but “the fact that she is (still) less phenomenal does not prevent me from being further fascinated.” Her articulations of sounds, syllables, words, there was something convincing about her murmuring and playing with repetitions. These vocal sounds are also wonderfully embedded in melodic and stimulating, rhythmic accompaniment. The individual tracks on the album often showed a calm, steady course that could alternate quickly. "Whether slow or fast, uncomplicated or in jerks, there is always an urgent urgency." The interaction between the four musicians is precise, the chemistry is wonderful. This album appears to the author “as the ripe fruit of an intense growth process. For those who like it when jazz sounds like something's expandability is being tested, or the chance of getting out of the corner seems realistic, it can be worth trying. "
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Tom Lord : The Jazz Discography (online, accessed November 14, 2019)
- ↑ Portrait at Cafe Oto
- ↑ Discographic information at Discogs
- ↑ Glenn Astarita: Alexander Hawkins / Elaine Mitchener Quartet: UpRoot. All About Jazz, December 2, 2017, accessed November 7, 2019 .
- ^ David Rocheleau-Houle: Alexander Hawkins / Elaine Mitchener Quartet: UpRoot. December 29, 2017, accessed November 7, 2019 .
- ^ Dan Bergsagel: Alexander Hawkins - Elaine Mitchener Quartet - Uproot album launch at Kings Place. London Jazz News, January 14, 2018, accessed November 7, 2019 .
- ^ Danny De Bock: Alexander Hawkins / Elaine Mitchener Quartet - UpRoot. Jazz Halo, December 29, 2017, accessed November 7, 2019 .