Soft Winds and Roses
Diana Panton; Reg Schwager; Don Thompson
Independent (dianapanton.com/releases-new.html)

With Soft Winds and Roses, vocalist Diana Panton offers listeners an album that will appease nostalgic music fans, without sounding out of place in the eclectic sonic world of the 2020s. This is a commendable feat, and perhaps the key to Panton’s ability to appeal to such a wide range of audiences. Her music has gained more commercial traction than many comparable Canadian musical acts, without failing to appeal to jazz purists. 

Some of the well-rounded nature of Soft Winds and Roses is a result of Panton’s excellent casting choices. Veteran musicians Reg Schwager and Don Thompson round out a trio “and then some.” Schwager contributes beautiful accompaniment on acoustic and electric guitars, and Thompson is responsible for the arrangements and piano work. The “then some” comes in the form of the aforementioned arranger adding vibraphone and bass to a handful of tracks. Thompson is a master of several instruments and has an uncanny ability to showcase ample musicality on all of them.  

On my first listen I thought that more liberties could have been taken when arranging some of the better-known pop songs covered by Panton. I changed my tune on this, so to speak, after delving further into the recording. The vocal melodies and song forms are treated beautifully by Panton, and they still leave room for improvisation from Schwager and Thompson. 

I’m confident that this album does not require my hype to reach a broad audience, but I’m happy to give it a positive review, as it indeed contains something for everyone.

Tryptique
Fern Lindzon; Colleen Allen; George Koller
Zsan Records ZSAN7458 (fernlindzon.com/tryptique)

What a compelling mixed metaphor it is that draws you into the seductive mystique of the three parts of the painting that adorns the package (bigger, and better explicated if folded out) of this disc. Of course, that magnetic pull only serves to intensify the effect of that metaphor on its transposed metamorphosis into the music of the album Tryptique. Indeed, the pianist Fern Lindzon, saxophonist (and flutist) Colleen Allen and contrabassist George Koller employ the sublime melodic, harmonic and rhythmic subterfuge in their arrangements of jazz standards (Satin Doll) and several originals.  In turn, this music finds reflection in each section of Mythology, the beckoning painting by artist Rose Lindzon, and the unique character of the group’s collaboration brings it to fruition. 

I could spiral into a frenzy trying to define this music and trace its influences. Is it jazz so evasively polyrhythmic that a clear, regular beat rarely emerges? (Cue Kerl Berger’s Zeynebim or Moe Koffman’s A Flower for Amadeus). Do these oh-so-seductive arrangements of standards and originals perfectly define the creativity of the players? 

The sensible thing to do would be to get out of the way and let each song do the “singing.” It bears mention that this is a perfect encounter of musicians whose individual and collective work redefines the very process of improvisation around composition. The result: overall performances that are crisply articulate, rich in hue and gesture.

Listen to 'Tryptique' Now in the Listening Room

Reverence
Carn Davidson 9
Independent CD9-004 (taradavidson.ca/cd9)

The Carn Davidson 9 is an ensemble comprising nine of the “finest players of their generation.” Those five words would be quite a meaningless epithet to describe this nonet were it not for the fact that virtuosity and individuality are almost always completely eschewed except in the case of total immersion in the music at hand. This is but one reason why Reverence is such a flawless musical production

The utter brilliance of the album is that it features beautifully crafted arrangements of beguiling variety and sensuousness. And this is evident in every lovingly caressed phrase of music composed in a myriad of musical idioms beloved of the husband and wife duo: trombonist William Carn and alto saxophonist Tara Davidson. 

Listen to the manner in which the judiciously chosen – and featured – soloists seductively bend and stretch notes, and propel phrases in glorious, airy arcs on Groove and If Not Now, Then When?, and how Davidson sculpts the long inventions of Carn’ Saudé, or how Carn and trumpeter Kevin Turcotte do likewise on Wonderment.

From such brilliant playing, solo or in ensemble, clearly there’s not a single semiquaver that hasn’t been fastidiously considered. Featuring the longtime rhythm section of drummer Ernesto Cervini and bassist Andrew Downing, every musician is completely attuned to the artistry of Carn and Davidson. What better way to honour revered musical icons.

Discovery
Luke Sellick
Sellick Sounds (lukesellick.com/discography)

I review albums from Canada, the US and beyond. Luke Sellick’s latest album Discovery is a hybrid of sorts, with its New York City based bassist and leader hailing from Winnipeg originally. Great music transcends geography, but New York is a city that has attracted the best and brightest improvising musicians for nearly a century. Sellick and his band sound right at home there.

Discovery has an uplifting and energetic tone to it, without eschewing any of the playful edginess one would expect from a group of young musicians in 2024. I was not familiar with most of the artists on this album prior to listening, and I postponed my usual internet sleuthing until I’d heard Discovery in its entirety. This was a fresh way to listen, and I was not disappointed! 

If I were to make an initial criticism, it would be centered on the production aspects of Discovery. Although the individual sounds on this recording are clear, and everyone is present in the mix as a whole, at times subtle additions like the organ on Fun and vocals on Discovery felt a little out of place in the sonic landscape. These were no doubt musical additions, but they toe the line between embracing “studio magic” and obscuring the live-sounding nature of the music. This is a nitpicky and subjective observation, but I’m including it because my other comments are all positive. 

Bassists as bandleaders often have an internalized sense of “programming,” whether in a live or recorded setting. Sellick demonstrates this brilliantly, with the album’s opening and closing tracks being perfect “bookends” to the music they surround. 

Dan Fortin – Cannon
Dan Fortin; various artists
Elastic Recordings (danfortin.bandcamp.com)

The voluptuous sound of Dan Fortin’s bass echoes with dark, sustained murmuration on Cannon, a fascinating programme conceived and executed in a series of duets. Each track features Fortin and a procession of intrepid experimentalists, restless in nature, who allow themselves to be led into the unknown seemingly by following the vibrations of a single note. 

There is a kind of propulsive energy in each of the works and this gives poignant meaning to the title of the recording – Cannon – where notes and phrases appear (metaphorically and literally) to be slingshot out of the principal instrument (which is Fortin’s bass) rather than played in the customary sense that music might be played. Thus Fortin succeeds in drawing his duet-partners into the elliptical gravitational force of his music. 

Moreover, using pedals plugged into his electric instrument, as well as through what seem like an array of effects mixed in from synthesizers, Fortin creates a kind of seductive, otherworldly atmosphere beckoning the other instruments. Each of these – saxophone, guitar, piano, trumpet and drums – then becomes fused into the impressive wall of sound created by Fortin to become a shifting panoply of sound. Surrealist and intergalactic pictures emerge. 

Instruments seem drawn to the bass’ powerful centrifugal force. Uh Hundred is a good example. Other works evoke thunderous natural power, such as the rippling musical groove tumbling down the Eastern Side of The Ural Mountains. What a forceful musical ride…!

Listen to 'Dan Fortin: Cannon' Now in the Listening Room

Lumination
Joel Frahm Trio
Anzic Records ANZ-0091 (joelfrahm.bandcamp.com/album/lumination)

When I reviewed the Joel Frahm Trio’s debut album, The Bright Side, for The WholeNote’s Sep/Oct 2021 issue, I closed with the hope that we’d hear more from this tenor sax master in the cordless trio format. Lumination is the exciting follow up, featuring Frahm, once again, with long-time musical friends, collaborators and fellow Turboprop members, bassist Dan Loomis and drummer Ernesto Cervini.

Here again we are treated to ten original tracks: six by Frahm and two each by Cervini and Loomis, “illuminating” their talents not only as dynamic, virtuosic players, but also as gifted composers. Peppered throughout with good humour, the fun begins with Cervini’s The Nurse Is In, a swinging tribute to his beloved Toronto Raptors’ former head coach, jazz lover Nick Nurse, where, alongside the tight-knit, rhythmic interplay and improvisational “lay-ups,” you can catch Frahm’s quick quote of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. There’s some good-natured teasing in Frahm’s Disco Nern, a jaunty tribute to Cervini, with a cheeky quote this time from Istanbul (Not Constantinople). 

Frahm’s signature warmth and mellifluous playing are heard on his poignant Moonface Lament, written, apparently, during a sleepless night on tour. The mood changes with Loomis’ driving and kinetic False Spring, followed by Frahm’s cool contrafact, Kern You Dig It?, based on All The Things You Are by, you guessed it, Jerome Kern, and featuring Cervini’s deft brush work.

The Joel Frahm Trio is a classy, cohesive, collective of consummate musicians. Lumination is an ideal vehicle for their exceptional talents.

You Are the Right Length
Exit Points
Independent EP-501 (exitpoints.square.site/product/vinyl-lp-you-are-the-right-length/45?cp=true&sa=true&sbp=false&q=false)

Now a staple of the Toronto improvised music scene, Michael Palumbo’s monthly Exit Points series at Arraymusic strikes a perfect balance of genre-bending collaboration between musicians across disciplines and capturing moments of pure serendipity. It is extremely fitting that an LP release featuring different performances from this series feels like it transcends the live album medium into something that feels significantly more alive, breathing. 

Track lengths range from under a minute to over ten, and these lengths feel quite deliberate; each piece brimming with energy and momentum, trains of collective thought that clearly state their destination without having to arrive there. Sitting at the extremes of this spectrum of duration are the pieces Falling into Echoes and Sonoluminescence, which bear incredible resemblances to each other, setting a tranquil groundwork, then eventually opting to draw from reserves of tension that are not pollutants; merely a texture etched a little deeper, or a new source of light. 

The consequence of choosing excerpts of larger pieces and then sequencing them a certain way is that the profound power of spontaneous composition is apparent in an entirely different manner than the act of circumstantially stumbling upon it. Instances that did not inform each other in the literal sense begin to touch on meaning they would not have in isolation, moments collide to change each other irrevocably. When unfettered process becomes crystallized in product form, there exists a chance of reincarnation as shimmering as this.

Listen to 'You Are the Right Length' Now in the Listening Room

Simpletrio2000
Anna Webber
Intakt CD 430 (annawebber.bandcamp.com/album/simpletrio2000)

Away from their academic roles, Canadian tenor saxophonist/flutist Anna Webber now at the New England Conservatory and American drummer John Hollenbeck who teaches at McGill, join long-time associate New York pianist Matt Mitchel, for a tenth anniversary reunion of their Simpletrio. The playing focus: ten enigmatically titled Webber compositions.

Bookended by two modest groove tunes that expose their innate interaction as they blend reed honks, patterning and splattering keyboard strokes and metronomic drum beats, the exuberant mood they express animates the entire album. Although a track like 8va is languid enough to highlight Webber’s expressive bass flute lowing matched with intermittent piano clips, tough pressure and sophisticated linear melodies with mercurial timbral divergences characterize most of the other tunes.

Idiom VII for instance is built around a repeated unison riff, with interludes of reed tongue slapping, drum press rolls and carousing piano pumps. Meanwhile Miiire is a spidery tune that becomes speedier and more dissident as it unrolls without losing its horizontal flow. Prominent are Webber’s transverse flutters and peeps and Hollenbeck’s rim clanks, which at points unfold in tandem with the piano for more prominent sound coloration.

Countering the old saw that those who can do, and those who can’t teach, is this session involving Webber, who is Co-Chair of NEC’s Jazz Studies Department and Hollenbeck who has taught jazz drumming at McGill’s School of Music since 2015. Alongside Mitchell they prove they can definitely do.

Peaks and Valleys
Teri Parker’s Free Spirits
Modica Music (teriparkermusic.com)

Paying homage to two irreplaceable legends of improvised music, Peaks and Valleys is about as refreshing, moving and ingenious as a tribute can be. Playing two pieces each from the expansive works of Geri Allen and Mary Lou Williams, Toronto pianist Teri Parker’s group makes the absolute most of them, with these renditions being sobering in their clarity and the care taken in bringing out every nuance of the original recordings, while feeling like something entirely new is constantly taking place. 

Geri Allen’s classic Drummer’s Song starts out as exactly that, with Mackenzie Longpre’s exhilarating drum intro slyly and gradually implying the song’s central pulse, and then when Allison Au enters with the saxophone ostinato near the one-minute mark, everything somehow perfectly falls into place, a moment that captures that intangible feeling of rhythmic alchemy unique to Allen’s music, where a listener is fully along for the ride without ever entirely reaching an understanding of why all these moving parts are so perfect for each other. 

Parker’s own original pieces comprise the other half of the tracklist, with some containing more easily identifiable parallels to the album’s influences (Gemini II for example, both shares a title with an iconic Mary Lou Williams piece and an opening progression that could easily be a nod to her later period). Others, like the mesmerizing, goosebump-inducing Bear Hug, sound like a heartfelt message expressed entirely sonically, the kind that offers receiving ears a sense of belonging.

Brett Hansen – Confluence
Brett Hansen; Mallory Chipman; Chris Pruden; Murray Wood; Joel Jeschke; Luis Tovar
Independent (bretthansen.bandcamp.com/album/confluence)

Confluence, the debut album from Edmonton guitarist and composer Brett Hansen, has its roots in jazz, but also injects many folk, rock and impressionistic elements. Most of the tunes feature the voice of Mallory Chipman. Perfect Intentions floats through its opening with Chipman singing the wordless melody, rocks out briefly, and then quiets down for Hansen’s solo which works through several restrained jazz moods. Chris Pruden adds a sparkling piano solo before it ends as it began. Starbathing is a winding and exploratory duet featuring Joel Jeschke (drums) and Luis Tovar (percussion). Moonshower begins with some nice guitar work before evolving into another Brazilian-influenced melodic section with Chipman singing. Jane’s Song is more folk influenced beginning with an arpeggiated guitar section before moving into a jazzy sung melody. 

Confluence is an engaging album where all the musicians contribute to the jazz/folk/fusion vibe giving it a coherent and identifiable sound. I look forward to Hansen’s next release and wonder what other moods he and his musicians will conjure.

Portrait of Right Now
Jocelyn Gould
Independent JGCD2405 (jocelyngould.com)

Sporting a water-tight tracklist, a phenomenal rhythm section, captivating soloing and a swing feel that never ceases to compel the feet to move, Portrait of Right Now is yet another exceptional offering from guitarist Jocelyn Gould, who yet again is in complete control of her craft. 

Alongside a pair of beautifully interpreted standards, eight Gould originals can be found here, all featuring a thoroughly catchy approach to melodicism, as well as harmony that beguiles and eludes in equal measure, forcing the listener’s hand at keeping the repeat button firmly pressed as their day progresses. Largely exchanging solos between them for most of the album’s runtime, Gould and pianist Will Bonness are equal parts inimitable and playful, wowing with their fleet-fingered runs, while constantly turning heads with the clarity and audacity of their rhythmic ideas. 

Accompanying them is a linkup of Jared Beckstead-Craan on bass and Curtis Nowosad on drums, simply a beautiful partnership. They effortlessly sit directly on top of the time, providing a sturdy foundation for the adventurous phrasings of the chordal voices, while also exhibiting deep listening, never missing a beat, a notion or an opportunity to jump on a synchronized comping figure. This album has the added benefit of sounding virtually perfect, with each instrument given ample room in the mix to articulate everything to the last syllable, and the physicality of every note played is palpable. What a breeze.

Cookin’ at the Queen’s Live in Las Vegas 1984 &1988
Emily Remler
Resonance Records HCD-2076 (resonancerecords.org/product/emily-remlercookin-at-the-queens-live-in-las-vegas-1984-1988-2cd)

Gifted jazz guitarist, Emily Remler, left this earthly coil in 1990 at the tender age of 34, having already established herself as one of the finest jazz musicians of her time. Embodying elements of the guitarists that she idolized, she blazed her own successful trail. Remler once said, “I may look like a nice Jewish girl from New Jersey, but inside I’m a 50-year-old, heavyset black man with a big thumb, like Wes Montgomery.”  

This archival, two-disc recording project just released on Resonance Record is co-produced (along with Zev Feldman) by noted jazz writer Bill Milkowski. Both discs were recorded live at The French Quarter Room in The Four Queens, located on the old Vegas strip on May 28, 1984 and September 19, 1988. It features a quartet with Remler on guitar, Cocho Arbe on piano, Putter Smith on bass and Tom Montgomery on drums, and also a trio format with Remler on guitar, Smith on bass and John Pisci on drums.  

Stand out tracks include a tasty, up-tempo, swinging arrangement of Autumn Leaves, with Remler fluidly incorporating influences here of Herb Geller all-the-while completely prescient of her own style. Also on this track is superb solo work from Arbe and Smith. Polka Dots and Moonbeams is a tender and vulnerable take on the Van Heusen and Burke classic, bringing to mind the great Lenny Breau, another guitar genius gone way too soon. Particularly inspired is the cooking medley of Tad Dameron’s Hot House and Cole Porter’s What Is This Thing Called Love. Remler is fearless, and takes no prisoners here – channeling her hero, Montgomery, all the while literally burning up the stage with her stultifying technique, taste and communicative sensibility. 

Incredibly moving is Gene DePaul’s You Don’t Know What Love Is. On this languid ballad, Remler’s emotional maturity and interpretive skill comes to the fore, while another stellar track is an up-tempo arrangement of Jerome Kern’s Yesterdays. Remler’s facile soloing is nothing short of breathtaking, and her intensity wrings the nuance out of every single note played or implied. This recording not only displays a great artist at perhaps the peak of her skills, but is also an essential part of jazz history.

Verdi Remix
Le Mirifique Orchestra; Alban Darche; Emmanuel Bénèche
Pepin & Plume P&P 009 (pepinetplume.bandcamp.com/album/verdi-remix)

Putting a new spin on the oeuvre of Giuseppi Verdi (1813-1901) is daunting, especially, if as French saxophonist Alban Darche has done, the transformation involves Le Mirifique Orchestra, which is only a nonet. Yet by inserting his own compositions among the familiar tunes and using different harmonies, polyrhythms and internal cycles to reorchestrate others, he’s created a standalone work. Transcending history these 14 melodies comfortably fit an ensemble of four brass, two reeds, plus flute, guitar and drums.

Without being reductive, the Verdi themes often move with a bouncy oomph, propelled by Matthias Quilbault’s tuba burps, and are given a swing and marching band foundation by Meivelyan Jacquot’s measured drumbeats. With many tracks expressed tutti or with emphasis such as Darche’s tremolo alto sax bites following Hervé Michelet’s trumpet fanfare and preceding a swelling reed/brass crossover on Variations sur la marche triomphale d’Aïda, the distance between village square brass band and chamber orchestra is minimized. So is the gap between opera and traditional songs.

Within a piece like La Forza del Destino/Destino variations may include blasting crescendos contrasted with guitarist Alexis Thérain’s lyrical finger picking and Thomas Saulet’s flute flutters, but the changes don’t suppress the initial themes. Other tracks include faint circus music or film score inferences. 

Deepening not destroying the composer’s canon is the aim here so that Verdi Remix honours both the composer and the interpreters.

Feel With Blood – Echoes of Theresienstadt
Lenka Lichtenberg
Six Degrees (open.spotify.com/album/6Dj5Uf3eCSgVNUCOePO6fr)

This album of songs is a continuation of the experiences of Anna Hana Friesová (1901-1987), and of Lenka Lichtenberg, her granddaughter. These stories of Friesová’s life in a concentration camp were first sung in the Czech language on Thieves of Dreams (2022) by Lichtenberg, an artist with a gorgeously spellbinding and agile soprano that sometimes swoops down into a dark lower register, eminently suited to bringing the elemental sadness of Friesová’s poetry to life. 

The crimson-coloured outer package is the first sign that what you are about to hear are especially heartbreaking songs based on Friesová’s diaries that documented life during the Holocaust. In Feel With Blood, Lichtenberg has grown to deeply inhabit more than just her grandmother’s character, but her very life. She sings with great feeling and intensity and an always vivid response to the text documented in Friesová’s diaries. Lichtenberg’s voice is sharp as a knife, penetrating the depth of life and poetry with each beauteously soft – sung or recited – phrase. The vocalist often employs chilling chest tones as she draws us into Friesová’s world, making her Holocaust life leap off the page. 

The superb song poetry features matchless depictions of Friesová’s loneliness and suffering. Lichtenberg displays sublime artistry, with an uncanny ability to make the North Indian tabla and its polyrhythms perfectly suited to the ululations of a voice soaked in Czech folk melodies on this wonderfully orchestrated recording.

Azadi
Tamar Ilana & Ventanas
Lula World Records LWR04551A (lulaworldrecords.ca/product-page/azadi-by-tamar-ilana-ventanas-cd)

Toronto-based multilingual singer and dancer Tamar Ilana, of Jewish, Indigenous, Romanian and Scottish descent, grew up on the road learning from and performing with her ethnomusicologist mother Dr. Judith Cohen. 

In three well-received previous albums Ilana’s world music band Ventanas (“windows” in Spanish), drew on her multiple roots and those of her Toronto bandmates. Their new studio album Azadi vividly extends the group’s musical purview, effectively mixing highly contrasting vocal and instrumental numbers over 12 tracks. As well as showcasing traditional Flamenco, Sephardic, Balkan and Brazilian songs in inventive arrangements, compositions by Ventanas members contribute contemporary themes. Ilana renders the lyrics in an impressive range of languages: Spanish, Ladino, French, Urdu, Greek, Portuguese and Bulgarian. 

Meaning “freedom” in Urdu and Farsi, the album’s title track was inspired by the women’s freedom movement in Iran opening with the uplifting lines, “Sun breaks through the darkened and cloudy skies / Shining bright on open and peaceful eyes / Moving free with liberty…” As for the song Ventanas Altas, within the charm of its vocal melody lies a secret earworm power. I was compelled to listen to it several times. This old wedding-courtship song, popular among Sephardic Jews of Salonika Greece, was collected by Cohen in Montréal. Ilana’s unaffected light soprano sounds just right.

Ilana shares that she’s “always struggled with my multiple identities, both cultural and genetic. As the world also struggles with these issues on multiple fronts, this album is a deep reflection of these questions, and a musical response in the form of peace, collaboration and acceptance.” I’m feeling it too.