Volume 21 Issue 2 - October 2015

especially in the closing Love Reign O’er Me
where his powerful expressive singing against
the colourful choir washes, tinkling piano
and thundering percussion transforms the
rock anthem into an operatic showcase. Billy
Idol as Ace Face sings with his trademark
gruff presence; Phil Daniels is convincing in
the part of Jimmy’s dad; while Townshend as
the Godfather makes satisfying yet way too
brief vocal and guitar appearances. The Royal
Philharmonic Orchestra under Robert Ziegler
and the London Oriana Choir under Dominic
Peckham perform with joyful conviction. An
accompanying DVD supports with visuals and
informative commentaries.
Missed here in performance is The
Who’s rock stadium energy, stage presence
and spontaneous musicality, yet Classic
Quadrophenia soars as a more classical music
alternative.
Tiina Kiik
Asia Beauty
Ron Korb
Humble Dragon 2015 (ronkorb.com)
!!
Ron Korb’s new
CD, Asia Beauty, is
a charming hybrid –
sad, sweet melodies
with a Chinese and
sometimes a Celtic feel
– played on a variety
of instruments, traditional
and modern. Korb’s melodies are
accompanied by small ensembles which
include an astounding 27 musicians playing
15 different plucked, bowed or hammered
Chinese, Celtic and Western string instruments,
one of which is always the piano,
playing harmonic progressions recognizably
of the Western tradition.
Reflecting on this amalgam of East and
West, Korb muses in the liner notes, “In the
1930s...Hong Kong, Shanghai, Singapore and
Hanoi were meeting places between East and
West. ...I wondered how the cultures intermingled
and all the secret romances that
must have occurred.” Later he writes about
the “bittersweet feelings” and “sublime
romantic tragedy” expressed by both traditional
and contemporary pop Asian music.
The same atmosphere is to be found on most
of the tracks on this CD.
Most intriguing, however, is the Celtic
influence, which never seems far away in
Korb’s music, helped along at times by, but
never dependent on, Sharlene Wallace’s Celtic
harp and Korb’s penny whistle. In fact the
Chinese bamboo flute (dizi) and the traditional
Chinese clarinet (bawu) seem made
for the Celtic idiom, which mysteriously and
frequently appears.
Both Eastern and Western musical currents
are part of who Ron Korb is as a musician
and as a man. He has totally assimilated the
musical language of both traditions; the result
is music which is really neither one nor the
other but both.
Allan Pulker
Something in the Air
Skilful Eastern European Musicians are No Polish Joke
KEN WAXMAN
Since the realignment of East and West after the fall of the Berlin
Wall, musicians of every stripe have found new playing opportunities
and partners. In the former Soviet countries, one
particularly fertile area for improvisers has been Poland. While westerners
may figure Polish jazz begins and ends with Krzysztof
Komeda’s score for Rosemary’s Baby and other Roman Polanski
films, the country’s rich jazz history goes back to the 1920s and maintained
its place during Communist rule. Today, like the equivalent
attention paid to their ancestral roots among the children of immigrants,
western improvisers have discovered the fulfillment of
working with Polish bands or having Polish musicians part of
their groups.
Case in point is Montreal alto saxophonist
François Carrier. Unknowable (NotTwo
Records MW 928-2, nottwo.com) showcases a
touring partnership he and his Montreal associate,
drummer Michel Lambert, have formed
with Krakow-based acoustic bass guitarist
Rafal Mazur. Authoritatively using both the
guitar and double bass properties of his
instrument with equal proficiency, Mazur is
like the third partner in a fantasy ménage à trois, adding to the situation
without disrupting the others’ union. An equal opportunity
companion, his hand taps add percussive weight to Lambert’s rolling
ruffs and pops, while his array of thumb and finger positions
animates Carrier’s skyward smears or stressed multiphonics.
Listening Between, the first track, could serve as a description of how
the three operate throughout: not only shadowing each other’s
propelled textures, but also anticipating sound patterns to fit what
will soon be heard. Carrier’s initial churlish reed-straining on that
track for instance is soon pulled towards accommodating mezzo-like
melisma as Mazur strums his guitar as if he was backing an operatic
tenor. With Lambert beating away stoically, the bass guitarist loops
out multiple theme variations, as compressed buzzes slide from
Carrier’s Chinese oboe for a unique interaction. Broken-octave
communication characterizes Unknowable, the date’s centerpiece.
Like an extended length of hose unrolling, Mazur’s staccato finger
style sets up a continuum that’s matched by the saxophonist’s rubato
cries which retain some sweetness. Eventually rim shot crackles and
cross sticking from Lambert resolve the outbursts into a satisfying
thematic whole. Still, it’s indisputable that the three didn’t want to let
go of what they achieved musically. Like guests at a great party who
dawdle before leaving, Springing Out, the next track, and Dissolution,
the concluding, barely 90-second one, come across as coda and then
as coda to the coda of the title performance.
A duo consisting of American pianist
Matthew Shipp and Polish multi-reedist Mat
Walerian illustrates another collaborative
application. Involved with his own trio and
other combinations, Shipp has worked sporadically
with Walerian, who plays alto saxophone,
soprano and bass clarinet plus flute,
yet the ten selections on The Uppercut – Live
at Okuden (ESP-Disk 5007 espdisk.com) document fulfilling rapport
between the two. Like a method actor, Walerian portrays a different
character on each horn, but the output is united in finding unique
sounds. Because of this, Shipp’s narratives encompass everything
from multi-note Art Tatum-like emphasis, out-and-out abstract key
and string ratcheting reflecting both new music and free music,
shaggy keyboard carpets of Chopin-like recital-ready intermezzos and
primitive blues and early jazz echoes. The last is apparent on Blues for
Acid Cold where a restrained lounge-like exposition from Shipp gradually
hardens into a blues conception following Walerian’s rangy,
elongated clarinet tone. By the climax the two could be Jimmy Noone
and Earl Hines in 1920s Chicago. In contrast, what begins with the
pianist and alto saxophonist propelling slick mainstream timbres at
one another on Love and Other Species – think Phil Woods and Jim
McNeely – evolves into a breathtaking display of complicit split tones,
as the two deconstruct the melody as if it were a building being dynamited
to smithereens, then rebuild the tune into a solid edifice for a
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