Susan Alcorn, Leila Bordreuil, Ingrid Laubrock: Bird Meets Wire

Avant Jazz / Free Improvisation / Avant-Garde
premiera polska: 2021-11-02
kontynent: Ameryka Północna
kraj: USA
opakowanie: digipackowe etui
opis:
multikulti.com - ocena * * * * 1/2
Trzy wzięte improwizatorki zapraszają na zmysłową muzyczną ucztę!

Elektryczna gitara hawajska, wiolonczela i saksofon tenorowy lub tenorowy, te instrumenty słyszymy na "Bird Meets Wire". Intrygująca i niezwykle sugestywna muzyka tego tria śmiało wkracza w dziewicze muzyczne tereny. Przy pierwszym kontakcie uwagę zwraca świetna, oryginalna produkcja i hipnotyzujący charakter tej muzyki. Oniryczny wręcz, ale niejednoznaczny – od baśniowych marzeń sennych po niepokój koszmarów.

Najbardziej znana w składzie Susan Alcorn, swoją przygodę z elektryczną gitarą hawajską zaczęła w wieku 21 lat, wychodząc od western swingu i country. Dzisiaj należy do grona rozchwytywanych polistylistycznych improwizatorek. W wywiadach podkreśla swoją fascynację twórczością Johna Coltrane’a, Ornette’a Colemana, Oliviera Messaiena, Krzysztofa Pendereckiego czy Astora Piazzolli. Wykroczyła poza granice narzucone przez tradycyjne podejście do instrumentu, a rozwijając technikę slide’u i glissanda, wypracowała autorskie podejście do elektrycznej gitary hawajskiej, łączące nie tylko jazz, muzykę indyjską czy gamelanową, lecz także klasyczną i minimalistyczną.

Wiolonczelistka Leila Bordreuil, jakiś czas temu przeprowadziła się z Francji do Nowego Jorku, by trafić na wielu doskonałych muzyków, jak Marina Rosenfeld, Lee Ranaldo, Eli Keszler, Anthony Coleman, Peter Evans, Thurston Moore, Nate Wooley, SENYAWA, C. Spencer Yeh, Toshimaru Nakamura, Tetuzi Akiyama, Zeena Parkins, Weasel Walter, Kim Gordon, Chris Corsano, Aki Onda.

Triową stawkę zamyka awangardowa saksofonistka Ingrid Laubrock. Mieszka w Nowym Jorku i pracuje z tuzami muzyki improwizowanej, jak Mary Halvorson czy Tyshawn Sorey. Pisze też utwory chociażby dla orkiestry Anthony’ego Braxtona. Jest bowiem nie tylko znakomitą improwizatorką o drapieżnym usposobieniu, ale też nietuzinkową kompozytorką tworzącą własny, niepowtarzalny brzmieniowo i konstrukcyjnie świat dźwięków.

Na swojej pierwszej wspólnej płycie Alcorn, Bordreuil i Laubrock mieszającą w głowach słuchaczy wielowymiarową narracją, zuchwale spiętrzając liczbę wątków i nastrojów. Jest ich więcej, niż można usłyszeć na innych podobnych płytach. Od dronowej kameralistyki w "Area 41" i baśniowego nastroju tytułowego "Bird Meets Wire" po totalny "Is Is Not". Niezwykła jest ta zdolność do kreowania muzycznej rzeczywistości zupełnie od podstaw!
autor: MAd
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freejazzblog.org * * * * 1/2
"Bird Meets Wire" brings together an unlikely trio of fearless improvisers - pedal steel visionary Susan Alcorn, noise cellist Leila Bordreuil and sax player Ingrid Laubrock for a mostly free-improvised session, captured at The Thousand Caves studio in Queens, New York, in April 2018. The intriguing and highly suggestive music of this trio extends the open and inclusive sonic vision of Alcorn, expressed already in her composition 'The Heart Sutra' (arranged by cellist Janel Leppin, Ideologic Organ, 2020), her trio with Joe McPhee and Ken Vandermark (Invitation to a Dream, Astral Spirits, 2019), and her quintet (Pedernal, Relative Pitch, 2020).

This trio has been playing together since 2015 and has developed organic, intimate and emphatic dynamics, but also dynamics that also search for mysterious and unpredictable territories, as the suggestive titles of the pieces tell. In the meantime, Alcorn and Laubrock collaborated again in the recording of Mary Halvorson Octet (Away With You, Firehouse 12, 2016).

Alcorn, Bordreuil and Laubrock sketch patiently on the opening piece “Area 41” a vulnerable yet unsettling abstract drone that weaves together the processed sounds of the cello, quiet whispers and breaths of Laubrock and the sustained, Americana-like lines of Alcorn. The following title piece takes this kind of intimate, yet tense interplay into a delicate, ethereal dance. “Is Is Not” is a free-associative piece where Alcorn, Bordreuil and Laubrock experiment with adventurous, distorted and noisy tonal searches.

The gentle, hypnotic-meditative atmosphere of “Topology of Time” introduces the beautiful, lyrical and clearly introspective adaptation of the iconic Chilean protest song “¡El pueblo unido, jamás será vencido!” (The people united will never be defeated, with music by Sergio Ortega) in “Cañones”. “The Fourth World” deepens this fragile, atmospheric spirit and suggests a series of minimalist, melodic veins that morph naturally into the straight-forward yet reserved version of the American folk song “Wayfarin' Stranger”.

In the sonic universe in which Alcorn, Bordreuil and Laubrock travel through, there are no borders, but there are many fascinating colors, and a bright land that invites us all to immerse into its many delights.
By Eyal Hareuveni

All About Jazz * * * *
It may be impossible for anyone to free the pedal steel guitar entirely from its roots in country music but, if anyone can, Susan Alcorn would have to be the leading candidate. She has a phenomenal range on the instrument, capable of everything from folk-drenched Americana to abstract excursions, and she will sometimes combine her variegated tendencies on the same release, as she did on Pedernal (Relative Pitch Records, 2020), using a quintet to embody her atmospheric meditations. Here she teams up with saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and cellist Leila Bordreuil, and the results are just as transfixing.

The majority of the album is freely improvised, and the opener, "Area 41," perfectly encapsulates the air of mystery which prevails in much of Alcorn's music. Bordreuil's deeply resonant cello communes with Alcorn's capacious gestures, and Laubrock joins with breathy flutterings and longer, sustained notes. The track possesses a strange momentum and palpable sense of unease, with a seething subterranean energy, yet the overall effect is to draw the listener into the recording, to see where things may go next. And other pieces open up similar terrain, with "Bird Meets Wire" seeing a more animated Alcorn fueling Laubrock's surging leaps over Bordreuil's drones, and "Topology of Time" providing an elongated, fragmented exploration which never flags despite its eleven-plus minute duration. "The Fourth World" delves into another sinuous world of sound, with Alcorn's arpeggios spurring delicate ruminations from Laubrock which evince a fragile beauty.

But Alcorn's muse can also lead her in less rarefied directions. "Cañones (El Pueblo Unido)" and "Indigo Blue (Wayfarin' Stranger)" make contact with folk and protest music traditions, and although they are hardly straightforward renditions, they reveal the way in which Alcorn's forbidding soundscapes can sometimes give way to a poignant lyricism. Built loosely on the Chilean protest song "El Pueblo Unido," "Cañones" has Alcorn at her most melodic, as her articulation of the simple tune floats alongside Laubrock's repeated staccato rhythms and Bordreuil's gentle dissonance. And there is a similar magic on "Wayfarin' Stranger," with a graceful treatment that avoids falling into sentimentality by leaving room for all three musicians to explore the tune's contours freely.
by Troy Dostert

Editor's info:
This is the first recording by pedal steel prodigy Susan Alcorn, saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, and noise cellist Leila Bordreuil. The result is an unexpected mix of freely improvised Americana.This is the first recording by pedal steel prodigy Susan Alcorn, saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, and noise cellist Leila Bordreuil. The result is an unexpected mix of freely improvised Americana.

An unusual grouping of improvisers--pedal steel guitarist Susan Alcorn, cellist Leila Bordreuil, who's experimental approach to the instrument has her labeled as a "noise cellist", and saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock on tenor & soprano--in a collective album of implicitly lyrical, embraceable yet experimentally investigative, unruffled free improvisation.

muzycy:
Susan Alcorn-pedal steel guitar
Leila Bordreuil-cello
Ingrid Laubrock-tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone

utwory:
1. Area 41 11:29
2. Bird Meets Wire 05:23
3. Is Is Not 08:23
4. Topology of Time 11:32
5. Canones (El Pueblo Unido) 05:43
6. The Fourth World 07:36
7. Indigo Blue (Wayfarin Stranger) 04:08

wydano: May 14, 2021
nagrano: Recorded at The Thousand Caves, in Queens, New York, on April 1st, 2018, by Colin Marston.

more info: www.relativepitchrecords.com