José Lencastre Nau Quartet plus Pedro Carneiro: Thoughts Are Things

Avant Jazz / Free Improvisation / Avant-Garde
premiera polska: 2024-06-19
kontynent: Europa
kraj: Portugalia
opakowanie: Gatefoldowe etui
opis:
multikulti.com * * * * 1/2
Kwintetowe nagranie portugalskich improwizatorów, z których każdy pochodzi z jazzowego dream teamu tego iberyjskiego państwa, to cztery utwory trwające z grubsza po dziesięć minut, wszystkie wyraźnie improwizowane, ale jak improwizowane!
Doskonale znany już José Lencastre Nau Quartet zaprosił do współpracy wibrafonistę Pedro Carneiro, tutaj na marimbie. Jego obszerna dyskografia obejmuje zarówno recitale solowe, muzykę kameralną i koncerty – w katalogach ECM, Zig-Zag Territoires, Rattle, Stradivarius, Clean Feed Records.
Pianista Rodrigo Pinheiro i Pedro Carneiro na marimbie tworzą świetne połączenie, to dwa przenikające się harmoniczne strumienie, tworzące kameralistyczne podglebie dla mocnego saksofonu tenorowego lidera, lub jego delikatnego altu. W sekcji kontrabasista Hernâni Faustino i brat lidera - João Lencastre za perkusją.
Bracia Lencastre przyzwyczaili już nas do panowania nad formą, bez względu czy w zanurzonych w lizbońskiej melancholii ("Thought Atmospheres" i "The Magnet Of Thought"), kipiącym free jazzowym ogniem ("One Way To Cultivate Courage"), czy najbardziej ponadgatunkowym ("Your Latent Powers"), bez trudu odnajdują nici łączące całość w jednorodną, zwartą narrację.
Nikt tutaj nie gna na złamanie karku, muzycy wolą skupiać swoją uwagę na pojedynczych wybrzmieniach lub współbrzmieniach (szczególnie jednogłos/dwugłos fortepianu i marimby), dramaturgicznych niuansach (ślady bluesa) i energii płynącej z pełni kolektywnego sposobu budowania pełnej pasji improwizacji, podczas której muzycy często zaskakują nas ryzykownymi interakcjami, które wychodzą im znakomicie.
autor: Mad
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Liner Notes
" I´m very happy to share with all of you “Thoughts are Things “ the new release by Nau Quartet.
This time we invited master marimba player Pedro Carneiro. I first heard about Pedro maybe some 15 years ago and I kept this name in my mind as someone I admire and would like to work with. A few years later I spent a trimester in Rochester, where I would attend the performances by the Percussive Department at Eastman School of Music. These always blew my mind, much more than the jazz ones I must say! The marimbas, vibes, and other percussive instruments were playing amazing contemporary compsitions like I have never witnessd before.
The title of the album has to do with the manifestation in the direction of materializing our ideals, goals, etc. Edward Walker, the author, defends that we create our own character and personality by the thoughts we originate, or accept from others. We are, each of us, the result of what we have thought in the past; we will be the result of what we are now thinking.
Thoughts are mental Things, and tend to become material Things. The Ideal becomes Real. Our dreams come true.
I sincerely hope you enjoy it!
Last but not least, a huge thanks to Rodrigo, Hernâni, and my brother João, for their beautiful friendship and music."
José Lencastre

The Free Jazz Collective * * * * 1/2
How many times have I listened to this album? Possibly fifty times. And I'm sure I will listen even more to it in the future. The band is saxophonist José Lencastre's Nau Quartet with Rodrigo Pinheiro on piano, Hernâni Faustino on double bass, and João Lencastre on drums. The new voice is Pedro Carneiro on marimba to become a quintet.
They present us four tracks of around ten minutes, all clearly improvised, but how! The piano and the marimba form an unexpected great match, both creating a flowing harmonic river that creates the structure for José Lencastre's strong tenor or more sensitive alto. The bass and drums actively participate in creating the fullness of the band's sound.
Whether in the more intense opener "One Way To Cultivate Courage", or the slower and more lyrical "Thought Atmospheres", the vibrant "Your Latent Powers", or the gentle "The Magnet Of Thought", the whole band is in supershape, making music that is cohesive and unidirectional.
Like with Lencastre's other bands or with the RED Trio, the music is warm, emotional while being free as the wind and flowing as the river, even to the point of being hypnotic. As the listener, you can only sit back and well ... listen and enjoy this warm blanket of sound to envelop you, to rejoice in the solos and the interplay. Despite its inherent freedom, the music has a post-boppish accessibility with sometimes even bluesy undertones, only showing that they are deeply rooted in jazz tradition.
By Stef Gijssels

salt-peanuts.eu
Portuguese sax player José Lencastre has wanted to play with marimba master Pedro Carneiro since the first time he heard him play about 15 years ago. The classically-trained Carneiro feels at home with contemporary music, modern jazz and free-improvised music and recently collaborated with drummer Pedro Melo Alves («Bad Company», Clean Feed, 2021) and pianist Rodrigo Pinheiro (who plays in Lencastre Nau Quartet, «Kinetic Études», Phonogram Unit, 2021). And as Lencastre tells in his liner notes, some thoughts have a tendency to materialize into actual things, ideas become real, and dreams come true.
«Thoughts Are Things» was recorded at OCP – Orquestra de Câmara Portuguesa in Algés in March 2021. Its atmosphere was inspired by the time Lencastre visited the Percussive Department at Eastman School of Music in Rochester and listened to contemporary works. Lencastre plays here the tenor sax in addition to the alto sax that was before his sole horn, and his Nau Quartet features his brother, drummer João Lencastre, and two-thirds of the RED Trio – pianist Rodrigo Pinheiro, and double bass player Hernâni Faustino.
The four extended pieces are credited to the five musicians and highlight the immediate and urgent rapport of Pedro Carneiro and José Lencastre. The music on the opening «One Way to Cultivate Courage» flows naturally, and sketches open, loose textures, but in a passionate and risk-taking interplay that enjoys the past collaboration of Carneiro and Pinheiro. The more structured and slow-cooking «Thought Atmospheres» offers first the introspective, lyrical of this ensemble, led by José Lencastre’s warm, singing voice and the subtle ways that Carneiro and Pinheiro converse before its cathartic coda. «Your Latent Powers» suggests a reserved, chamber atmosphere and an organic playfulness. The last «The Magnet of Thought» deepens further the profound affinity of Carneiro with the Nau Quartet, and the elusive, subtle ways of the open, introspective dynamics of this ensemble.
Sometimes, dreams do become true and beautiful.
by Eyal Hareuveni

muzycy:
Pedro Carneiro - Marimba
José Lencastre - Tenor and Alto Sax
Hernâni Faustino - Double Bass
Rodrigo Pinheiro - Piano
João Lencastre - Drums

utwory:
1. One Way to Cultivate Courage 11:17
2. Thought Atmospheres 08:14
3. Your Latent Powers 13:16
4. The Magnet of Thought 16:24

wydano: July 23, 2021
nagrano: Recorded by João Sousa at OCP - Orquestra de Câmara Portuguesa, Algés ( PT ) on March 7th 2021