Jazz and Improvised

Two-by-fours are a bedrock element of Canadian vocabulary and clearly have resonance with the country’s top flutist Bill McBirnie, whose terrific new album surpasses his recent acoustic hits “Nature Boy” and “Paco Paco”. On the indie release Mercy (EF02 www.cdbaby.com) the Bill McBirnie Duo/Quartet offers a dozen-track, dazzling display of technique, dynamic range and stunning musicality. In the duo setting it’s pianist Robi Botos, joined in the quartet by rhythm stalwarts with the right stuff, bass Pat Collins and drummer John Sumner, in genre forays - bossa, ballads, bop and more. This is not neo-jazz comfort food but a feast of elegantly executed ideas with a live concert vibe. Highlights abound - the emotion dredged from Willow Weep For Me, the florid flute-piano onslaught on Airegin, the wit on Monk’s rare Stuffy Turkey, and a brilliant reimagining of Moment’s Notice. Add quick-witted interplay, adventurous flow, bluster and sophistication and this disc’s a keeper. Only the elegiac title piece seems misplaced.

Bass guru Dave Young, he of the flying fingers and big thick notes, pushes all the right wake-up buttons on his indie album Mean What You Say (MFA 17267 www.daveyoung.ca) with his classy quartet forging steely forward momentum for the 11-cut mix of standards, jazz classics and a trio of tunes by the boss. His solos are never just an afterthought – they’re formidable, imaginative yet always to the point with a huge woody sound and impeccable timing. The band emulates him, with pianist Robi Botos, his drummer brother Frank and in-demand trumpeter Kevin Turcotte chomping at the bit. The pianist never misses the chance to roar, notably on Will You Still Be Mine which also features a stunning arco bass contribution. Young’s melodic statement on his Sandhu is grand, his robust strength and loping lines an inspiration especially to Turcotte with his exuberant swoops and sculpted notes. Seven Minds swings powerfully with intense chords and tense vitality that shows the group at its best, all urgent eloquence.

Random Access loves wallowing in collective improv but under the leadership of drummer Barry Romberg and his trademark dexterity, their rambunctious rough-housing is disciplined, often attractive, and very accessible. On Was, Shall, Why, Because (Romhog 118 www.barryromberg.com) his cast of thousands - actually 15 of Hogtown’s leading lights - demonstrate ideas with substance, power and frequent fleeting logic that amounts to a stimulating fusion of pioneering jazz forms. Intro is a chase starring Romberg and slick electric bassist Rich Brown, but the following items (Urban Landscape, I Was A Celestial Body) are vehicles for power ensembles and fierce solos from the likes of Kelly Jefferson, Brian O’Kane and Peter Lutek. This huffing and puffing is merely a warm-up for Romberg’s epic seven-movement, 40 minutes-plus Suite For The Wolfman, a totally improvised creation by the Random Access core – violinist Hugh Marsh, saxman Kirk MacDonald, guitarist Geoff Young, trumpeter Kevin Turcotte, Brown and Romberg. It has delicate playing, work that’s sly and sprightly and a consistently invigorating spontaneity.

Guitarist Tim Posgate indulges new fancies with Banjo Hockey (Black Hen BHMCD0065 www.guildwoodrecords.com), playing banjo and enjoying tuba, for the latter recruiting nimble maestro Howard Johnson. Add the exploratory tastes of trumpeter Lina Allemano and reedman Quinsin Nachoff and the result is a foursome’s worth of bright, light and lively jazz that’s unusual and surprisingly subtle in its working of the leader’s 11 originals. There’s free jazz expressiveness, writing complex but clear, playful genre-bending and spirited soloing that includes Johnson doubling on baritone sax. The funky guitar, clarinet and tuba joust on Moosamin Eh! is splendid, as enticing as the other tunes that underline Posgate’s restlessly ambitious imagination which seeks to marry contemporary immediacy to jazz tradition.

Quebec saxist Yannick Rieu has been a force for decades, and the live Montreal show Spectrum (Justin Time JTR 8546-2 www.justin-time.com) illuminates his sinewy soprano playing and composing skills in a program that draws on rock’s energy, funky fusion and structures so loose you’d think it’s every musician for himself. The package is a CD with eight Rieu tunes and eight musicians plus a five-song DVD taped in Beijing last year with guitarist Jocelyn Yellier, bassist Remi-Jean Leblanc and drummer Philippe Melanson. Odd meters and anthemic passages meld with lightweight atmospheric accompaniment. Cutting edge it’s not, despite effortless cunning interplay, but the writing is boldly original with classical accents and spacey, wintry stylings. The DVD has bigger impact – and the audience is much more enthusiastic.

Veteran drummer Terry Clarke has been recorded on more than 400 albums but his first as leader has just arrived. The title, It’s About Time (BlueMusicGroup.com BMG 7028 www.bluemusicgroup.com), has a few droll meanings but you have to wonder why it’s taken almost 10 years for these excellent 78 minutes of throbbing music to emerge from the vaults. Four of the seven long, live tracks are from the Montreal Jazz Festival, three from the Ontario Science Centre. The Montreal tunes, which include bristling exchanges on Feel Free and a lilting calypso inspired by guitarist Jim Hall, feature Joe Lovano on tenor and later alto Greg Osby on two tracks each. Hogtown tenor duties are handled by Phil Dwyer in bruising mode, especially on Passion Dance and his own Flanders Road. Ever-present is Don Thompson, lively on bass or piano, while Clarke, who ratchets up intensity with quick turns of phrase and impish flights, is at his versatile best throughout as a relaxed, intricate time signature combatant, subtle accompanist and inquisitive, invigorating soloist.

Pink

Diana Panton Trio + 1

Independent DP009CD1 (www.dianapanton.com)

On “Pink” Diana Panton is staying the course she plotted with her first two well-received albums. She’s working once again with a small group – although when one of the band members is genius multi-instrumentalist Don Thompson you get a lot of bang for your musician buck. Reg Schwager is also back, accompanying with his customary artful and sensitive playing. A new addition, and a completely fitting one given Panton’s languid style, is trumpet and flugelhorn player, Guido Basso. His fills and solos add rich warmth to the mix, like honey drizzled over an English muffin, filling in all the nooks and crannies.

Panton has carefully chosen a collection of well-crafted songs that she can mine for lyrical gold. She is foremost a story teller - not a flashy or emotionally overwrought singer - Panton simply and deftly presents the songs so the listener can take them in without being distracted by vocal pyrotechnics. With her soft, sweet voice and sincere delivery you can really believe it when she sings “This is my first affair” on Please Be Kind and on Wouldn’t It Be Loverly when she pines for “a room somewhere, far away from the cold night air” you just want to run right out and find her one!

If you’re a fan of Panton’s, or if you’re looking for an album of thoughtful, accessible songs, beautifully sung and played, “Pink” would be a wonderful addition to your collection.

Blips and Ifs

Gino Robair; Birgit Ulher

Ratascan Records BRD 062 (www.ratascan.com)

Percussion doesn’t have to involve bombast, beats or even a full drum set. That’s the idea of Californian Gino Robair who played with Toronto improvisers at Somewhere There the last week of November.

Robair, a Free Music veteran who uses drums as resonators for bowed, scraped and rubbed objects and amplifies his instrument using circuit-bending electronics, demonstrates the resulting sonic freedom on the onomatopoeically titled “Blips and Ifs”. Partnered by German trumpeter Birgit Ulher, whose understated brass timbres are processed through radio speakers, the two express the cited sounds and many others in seven improvisations.

The resulting duo recital is equal parts pressured air, droning pulses, unexpected pauses and circuitous wave forms. Throughout the two expose unique timbres which see-saw during contrapuntal improvisations. Ulher combines mouthpiece kisses, static air wafting and, tongue thumps with suggestions that she’s masticating each tone individually. Robair’s contribution includes blurry machine oscillations, intermittent rumbles, slide whistle-like peeps and percussive timbres that could arise from dominos clacking against one another, sticky door hinges yawning, or unyielding metal being rubbed by blunt objects.

Circular and contrapuntal, the CD reaches its climax with the lengthy Rings Another Rust. Mesmerizing, the Ulher-Robair face-off depends on the ramping tension engendered accelerating in short bursts and then subsiding. Since almost no instrumental timbre is instantly identifiable by its expected properties, the pleasure of this exercise in abstract improvisation lies in itemizing how frequently and how surprisingly new and unexpected connective textures are exposed.

Ken Waxman

S'cat got my tongue

Ori Dagan

Scatcat Records ODCD01 (www.oridagan.com)

Toronto-based singer, Ori Dagan has released his debut CD, “S’cat Got My Tongue”, and he is one of the few new singers I’ve heard lately who has a true grasp of what it is to be a jazz singer. Dagan hasn’t simply chosen a bunch of standards, hired some jazz musicians for back up and called it a jazz album. He has immersed himself in the genre, learned his craft and re-imagined these songs in his own way. Not that this is a serious, studious album - far from it. There’s lots of playful interaction, especially with the cream-of-the-crop female singers he’s enlisted for duets. Heather Bambrick gets all Louis Armstrong on Swing’s the Thing, Julie Michels is at her earthy best on Old Mother Hubbard and he and Sophia Perlman have great fun trading wicked fast scat solos in S’Qua Badu Bop, an original composition. Dagan can also croon out a beautiful ballad as in Dinde, a gorgeous, but lesser-known Jobim tune and ‘Round Midnight, with Bernie Senensky’s masterful accompaniment on piano. Dagan’s penchant for scooping can at times veer a little too far into Las Vegas lounge singer territory for my liking, but when he takes a controlled approach and cleanly attacks the notes as he does on Here’s That Rainy Day, his abundant talent shines through.