John Hébert / Benoit Delbecq / Gerald Cleaver: Floodstage

Avant Jazz / Free Improvisation / Avant-Garde
premiera polska: 2014-05-20
kontynent: Ameryka Północna
kraj: USA
opakowanie: kartonowe etui
opis:
jazzarium.pl, ocena: * * * *
Współczesny jazz otworzył się na tak wiele inspiracji różnymi kulturami muzycznymi, że znalezienie oryginalnego i intrygującego poznawczo źródła swej twórczej podniety jest dziś dla muzyka nie lada zadaniem. Być może trzeba - jak John Hébert - po prostu powrócić do źródeł. Kluczową inspiracją twórczości rezydującego w Nowym Jorku kontrabasisty i kompozytora wydaje się być spuścizna francuskojęzycznej mniejszości Cajunów, kultywujących swą muzyczną tradycję w tej samej Luizjanie, w której przed niemal stu laty rodziły się jazzowe tradycje.

Tego, że tradycja to dla twórczości Héberta bardzo ważny termin, niekiedy wręcz słowo-klucz dowodzą nie tylko takie inspirowane kulturą cajuńską krążki jak chociażby "Byzantine Monkey" ale również projekty poświęcone takiemu dajmy na to Georgesowi Enesco - gigantowi rumuńskiej muzyki Georgesowi Enesco. Rezydujący w Nowym Jorku kontrabasista to jednocześnie muzyk, któremu przypięcie łatki konserwatywnego tradycjonalisty byłoby doprawdy pomyłką porównywalną kojarzeniem terminu 'Cajun" z nazwą zamieszkującego w sercu Amazonii indiańskiego plemienia. Wystarczy spojrzeć na listę niektórych jego współpracowników: Tony Malaby, Gerald Cleaver, Mary Halvorson czy Taylor Bo Honum to muzycy, dla których improwizacyjne poszukiwanie jest zasadą ich artystycznego bytu.

Takoż jest i w przypadku Héberta. Muzyczny dorobek swoich ziomków traktuje on jedynie jako punkt wyjścia w procesie konstruowania zespołowego dialogu, którego uczestnikami są również Benoit Delbecq i Gerald Cleaver. Inspiracje lidera subtelnie zaszyte są tak w rozpędzanych stanowczą pulsacją sekcji rytmicznej galopadach ("On the Half Shell") jak i w kameralnych melodiach ("Red House in NOLA"). Dawkowane są słuchaczowi w odpowiednich ilościach, nie pozwalając zbytnio skrępować wyobraźni trzech świetnych improwizatorów. Gdyby spróbować opisać "Floodstage" za pomocą lapidarnego terminu, metafora "złotego środka" wydaje się być w tym kontekście zdecydowanie na miejscu. Trio kontrabasisty w swej muzyce świetnie waży proporcje pomiędzy kompozycją a improwizacją, gęstą harmoniczną tkanką a przestrzenią ciszy, otulającej pojedyncze dźwięki, brzmieniowymi eksperymentami (fortepianowe preparacje Delbecq'a) i momentami słabości wobec konwencji ("Just a Closer Walk with Thee"). Jeśli Drogi Czytelniku/Czytelniczko potrzebujesz odrobiny odpoczynku od natłoku muzyki utrzymanej w jednoznacznie evansowskiej stylistyce fortepianowego tria, "Floodstage" jest płytą właśnie dla Ciebie.
Autor: Mateusz Magierowski

Editor's info:
Louisiana born double bassist and composer, John Hébert, is committed to exploring deeper his own Cajun roots. If there were traces of it in his previous trio album, “Spiritual Lover”, and in his first recording as leader, "Byzantine Monkey" that identity search is now ever more present. But this highly in demand and sought after bassist didn’t make the easiest step: “Floodstage” isn’t a world jazz recording. On this latest outing the creole references come with subtlety and are mixed with the contributions of Hébert’s partners: French pianist Benoît Delbecq and drummer Gerald Cleaver, both also widely recognized virtuosos of their respective instruments.
A dreamer and an adventurer, specializing in a very unique approach that provides multi-layered grooves on prepared piano, Delbecq is either diving into the traditions of jazz, a less known side of his many skills, or adding unexpected electronic textures to it, giving a mysterious and unique vision to the compositions. Something similar can be said about Cleaver: he defines and keeps tempos with excellent mastery and wonders us with a tapestry of complex rhythms. Hébert is always there, providing the pillars of support, even when the axis moves to the side and the center of gravity is obscured. The result is challenging music, with earth, and all the sky above

freejazz-stef.blogspot.com, ocena: * * * * *
The sophomore album from the John Hebert Trio, following 2010's Spiritual Lover disc (also on Clean Feed), opens with a rich, dark, brooding atmosphere of the sort Miles Davis used to conjure up in the 1970s. The piano trio, led by prominent NYC bassist Hebert, is augmented by a weird electronic delay-soaked pulse that flies in and out of the track like a drunken firefly in search of a place to pass out. This piano trio is different.

Things start swinging right away following this slightly surreal introduction with the title track, but it retains a dreamlike quality. The pulse wobbles and changes tempo and direction often enough that the alcohol-soaked quality comes to mind again, but I also can't help thinking of a dust devil in slow motion. (Isn't that it on the cover?) Drummer Gerald Cleaver is especially expressive here as he pushes and pulls the momentum of the music like a puppeteer controlling a mobile in a wind storm.

The next track, “Tan Hands,” features pianist Benoit Delbecq doing his best Keith Jarrett impression while Hebert does Gary Peacock and Cleaver does Paul Motian. Definitely derivative, but an homage that works and sounds absolutely gorgeous while still retaining the mysterious depth of the previous two songs. (Interestingly, the band also reminds me of Paul Bley - with Peacock and Motian - on a track sequenced later on the album called “Morning Mama.”)

This is followed by a very abstract blues called “Red House in NOLA,” appropriately steeped in humidity. Hebert and Delbecq dance gracefully around each other while Cleaver avoids steering the mobile into anything, letting its pieces clang softly in the breeze. This is followed by a rolling groove-based track called “Holy Trinity,” which sets the album back on the main road again with quiet force.
Among the many highlights: Delbecq plays a clavinet that sounds like a muted marimba or a thumb piano on “Saints,” which is followed by a track called “Sinners,” on which Hebert and Cleaver join in with Delbecq to thank Africa for talking to them. The band tackles “Just A Closer Walk With Thee” with a purity of heart that will put a big dumb smile on your face. Then there's “On The Half Shell,” on which Delbecq combines piano and electric keys, playing the melody line an octave apart on each. Hebert is jumping all over the neck of the bass as well, full of giant octave leaps. Cleaver is again the playful driver of this bus, threatening to run them off the road at every turn just for fun, but in complete control of every situation.

I honestly love every second of this recording. There is mystery, beauty, soulfulness and darkness throughout, and the rapport between the players is beyond exceptional – but what absolutely kills me is the glowing tube-amp, wood fire, Christmas lights, cherry-pie-right-out-of-the-oven warmth of every single track. Maybe it's this sub-zero Midwestern nightmare of a winter talking, but I think I'm going to spend every dark evening driving home from work to this album for the next month or so.
By Tom Burris


All About Jazz
Finding three musicians that speak the same language—jazz—is not uncommon. However, finding three that are as compatible as bassist John Hébert, pianist Benoit Delbecq, and drummer Gerald Cleaver is, as the French say, recherché.

French culture is the theme of Hébert's trio recording. The New Orleans born, Cajun bassist invited the Paris-based pianist and Detroit's Cleaver (a city founded by French officer Antoine de La Mothe Cadillac) to record the follow-up to their inaugural release Spiritual Lover (Clean Feed, 2010). Floodstage continues their conversation, one delivered with distinctive enunciations.

Hébert, who can be heard as a sideman to a who's who of players including Mary Halvorson, Fred Hersch, Uri Caine, came into his own as a member of Andrew Hill's final ensemble. He collaborates in the trio Body Of Three with Taylor Ho Bynum and Gerald Cleaver. Like Hébert, the drummer can be heard in multiple bands, including those of Ivo Perelman, Tomasz Stanko, Elery Eskelin, and Craig Taborn's Trio. The conservatory- trained Delbecq can often be heard with clarinetist François Houle in a jazz setting. He has a strong connection to classical music, African-American jazz, and experimental musics.

"Cold Brew" opens the disc with a hauntingly painted moodiness that is eerily bolstered by electronic pulses that sound as if they were sampled from a 1970s sci-fi B-movie. Hébert's compositions, like "Tan Hands," are sketches for obliging, Keith Jarrett Trio-like music making and the bassist's sound here could easily be confused with that of Gary Peacock. But where Jarrett might zig, Hébert zags. "Holy Trinity" layers a heaviness of pulse over the mathematical structure of the melody— creating an understated blues feel. Choosing Delbecq, a classically- trained player with an ear for world music, Thelonious Monk, and early-fusion jazz, and Cleaver, perhaps the most expressive drummer working today, the idea of a jazz trio is refocused as a mischievous chamber ensemble.

Delbecq's clavinet heard on solo on "Saints" and in trio on "Sinners," sounds like a xylophone. The latter piece is a circular exercise that incorporates African music into the African-American traditions of New Orleans. The same goes for the traditional song "Just A Closer Walk With Thee," played as a straight church blues, and the rumble-rolling of "On The Half Shell" that pairs Joe Zawinul-sounding synthesizers with piano, thunderous bass and talking drum.
By MARK CORROTO

muzycy:
John Hebert: double bass
Benoit Delbecq: piano (and analog synth and tronics on tracks 1 and 2)
Gerald Cleaver: drums

utwory:
1. Cold Brewed
2. Floodstage
3. Tan Hands
4. Red House in NOLA
5. Holy Trinity
6. Morning Mama
7. Just a Closer Walk With Thee
8. Loire Valley
9. Saints
10. Sinners
11. On the Half Shell

All compositions by John Hébert, Cavebear Music ASCAP except "Red House in NOLA" by Benoit Delbecq SACEM and "Just a closer walk with thee" is a traditional gospel song

total time - 53:20
nagrano: Recorded December 11, 2012 by Tom Tedesco at Tedesco Studios, Paramus NJ USA.
more info: www.cleanfeed-records.com
more info2: www.johnhebert.com