Ron Carter Esperanza Spalding - Downbeat

Roberto Gatto/Alessandro
Lanzoni/Gabriele Evangelista
Replay
Parco Della Musica 40
HHH1/2
Veteran Italian drummer Roberto Gatto has
constructed a career from a variety of materials.
He’s played supporting roles for Art Farmer
and Joe Lovano, led recording dates that featured
Michael Brecker and John Scofield, composed
for film and worked as artistic director
for a music festival in Rome. On the piano trio
outing Replay, Gatto takes a similar approach,
exploring jazz from three views: standards,
compositions by each band member and free
improvisation.
Rounded out by bassist Gabriele Evangelista
and pianist Alessandro Lanzoni, the trio is at
its best when maneuvering through original
charts. “Hat,” by Evangelista, begins life as a
sad, moaning hunk of solo bass, then morphs
into a pensive ballad marked by dark, sparkling
piano runs and subtle, song-first stickwork. The
intro of Lanzoni’s “Levra” is something of a
creepy lullaby, but the composer’s clear lines
and rich harmonies brighten things up as the
song progresses. On top of brushes and a barebones
bass line, Lanzoni delivers the melody of
“Replay” with care and emotion. And Gatto’s
“Valse Laconique” skews mysterious, framing
sharp solos with a subtly unsettled head.
Also winning are the two group improvs
included on Replay. Where so much free
music is noisy and abrasive, “Impro 1” is quiet,
thoughtful and more-or-less tonal. “Impro 2”
is darker and more threatening, but it, too,
steers clear of clichés, extracting abstraction
from conventional ideas. Also notable are the
lengths of these pieces: “Impro 1” finishes up
around the two-minute mark, and “Impro 2” is
less than 90 seconds long.
On standards, the trio could be any threesome
playing; when free improvising or issuing
its own compositions, there’s no mistaking
Gatto and company. —Brad Farberman
Replay: Ana Maria; Double Rainbow; Mushi Mushi; Impro 1; Pannonica;
Hat; Impro 2; Levra; Surrounded By Frame; Valse Laconique;
Replay; The Hands. (57:27)
Personnel: Roberto Gatto, drums; Alessandro Lanzoni, piano;
Gabriele Evangelista, bass.
Ordering info: auditorium.com/pdm_records
Rob Mazurek Pulsar Quartet
Stellar Pulsations
Delmark 2018
HHH1/2
Rob Mazurek’s Pulsar Quartet is a pared-down
version of his Exploding Star Orchestra, featuring
long-time collaborators Matthew Lux and
John Herndon, along with relative newcomer
Angelica Sanchez, whose piano becomes
the glistening heart of the music on Stellar
Pulsations.
Mazurek’s titles oddly refer to the seven
non-Earth planets of our solar system rather
than anything to do with stars, but the pulsations
of the album title are quite present. One
of the most beautiful passages comes at the end
of “Magic Saturn,” where it’s easy to imagine
Lux’s spacey bass ostinato and Sanchez’s tiny
notes dropped into yawning silences as a sonic
metaphor for interstellar drift.
Credit Mazurek for resisting the obvious
tendency to make his Mars composition warlike—“Spiritual
Mars” is instead a striking
slow burn that gives the melody to the bass and
relies on Sanchez to keep it anchored while
the drums and cornet sink into a quiet frenzy.
Mazurek’s recordings always have a strong
sense of atmosphere, and here it’s as thick as the
atmospheres of the gas giants—Lux’s job on
“Primitive Jupiter” is to create a low-end rumble
that underscores the planet’s volatility.
Mazurek is adept at building striking contrasts
into his compositions, and “Spanish
Venus” features a simple but very effective one,
as the rhythm section never deviates from a set
pattern, while the piano and cornet play almost
without a tether, freely flowing together over
rigid backing. It’s unpretentiously thoughtful
writing. Even with its conceptual framework,
Stellar Pulsations is similarly unassuming, an
album of quiet intensity that imbues the vast
distances it covers with warmth.
—Joe Tangari
Stellar Pulsations: Primitive Jupiter; Magic Saturn; Spiritual Mars;
Spiral Mercury; Spanish Venus; Twister Uranus; Folk Song Neptune.
(47:32)
Personnel: Rob Mazurek, cornet; Angelica Sanchez, piano; Matthew
Lux, bass guitar; John Herndon, drums.
Ordering info: delmark.com
DECEMBER 2012 DOWNBEAT 91