Á

Blues / BY FRANK-JOHN HADLEY
Empowerment
Teresa James & The Rhythm Tramps,
Bonafide (Jesi-Lu 1016; 53:18 )
Twenty years and nine albums after starting
out in Houston, Teresa James thrives as
a passionate blues-soul singer who has an
aversion to complacency. Long based in Los
Angeles, she works up potent dramatic tension
in bassist Terry Wilson’s songs about
modern romance and fast living in Hollywood
and Las Vegas. The expressive quality of her
timbre spurs her makeovers of John Hiatt’s
signature song “Have A Little Faith In Me” and
proto-rock band The “5” Royales’ “I Like It Like
That.” Wilson and the other A-list musicians in
her Rhythm Tramps have absorbed influences
from Memphis soul and Texas blues.
Ordering info: teresajames.com
Deb Ryder, Grit Grease & Tears (Bejeb
Music 110; 52:25 ½) On her
third release, Deb Ryder sings blues-funk
shuffles and other high-quality originals
with authenticity and high spirit as drummer-producer
Tony Braunagel and other
Southern Californians drive the action.
“Sweet Mary Ann,” saluting the “prettiest
girl in town,” is a perfect vehicle for Ryder’s
commanding prowess. Small complaint:
One of her gestures of vocal grit, a rippling
rasp suggesting Koko Taylor, sounds overly
mannered.
Ordering info: debryder.com
Sari Schorr, A Force Of Nature (Manhaton
2044; 56:55 ½) Noted British
blues producer Mike Vernon, long ago
associated with Peter Green’s Fleetwood
Mac and John Mayall, supervised this session
in Spain starring opera-trained singer
Sari Schorr. For most of this debut album,
Schorr, a New Yorker, belts out blues-rock
aggressively, bludgeoning the skulls of listeners
who are partial to a more nuanced
approach. Sharing her oft-exaggerated
excitement, among others, are U.K. guitar
sensation Innes Sibun.
Ordering info: sarischorr.com
Joanna Connor, Six String Stories
(M.C. Records 0080; 48:58 ) Joanna
Connor’s first studio effort in 13 years
strains after mediocrity. Her empty guitar
conflagrations and wayward vocals scorch
forgettable songs she’s composed with
producer/band member Marion Lance
Lewis. Connors does a lot of nothing with
Jill Scott’s “Golden” and Elmore James’
“The Sky Is Crying.” Only “Heaven” offers
temporary relief, its appealing Hugh Masekela-in-Cape
Town thrust taking an unexpected
turn into a gospel finale featuring
testifier Lewis and his singing family.
Ordering info: mc-records.com
Nancy Wright, Play Date! (Direct
Nancy Wright
Hit/VizzTone 111; 55:55 ) On a rare
solo album recorded during breaks from
work with other bands in Northern California,
Nancy Wright shouts and purrs through
her tenor saxophone like a musician whose
intelligence has evolved to match her
technique. Whether performing Chicago
and West Coast blues material out of the
archives or playing her own vibrant tradition-based
songs, she uses tension to mark
out stylistic territory somewhere between
the camps of Junior Walker’s r&b, Willis Jackson’s
jazz and Eddie Shaw’s blues. Wright is
a perfectly good mezzo-soprano vocalist,
proven by several selections, yet she reaches
out to full-time songsters Frank Bey, Wee
Willie Walker and Terrie Odabi to add hearty
expression to a track each. Tommy Castro
and Joe Louis Walker are among the seven
excellent guest guitarists on hand.
Ordering info: vizztone.com
Tami Neilson, Don’t Be Afraid (Outside
Music 23339; 40:19 ½) A Canadian
living in New Zealand when not touring,
Tami Neilson has a great big canyon of a voice
that she narrows to accommodate whatever
dynamic the music demands. The outstanding
numbers are “Don’t Be Afraid,” a rockribbed
pledge to love authored by her late
musician father, and “Holy Moses,” an original
almost apocalyptic in its jangly nervous
intensity. The singer’s honest expressionism
runs through nine more songs, too. Ill-treated
by lukewarm audio production, Neilson’s
four Down Under accompanists appear unsure
if their stock-in-trade is blues or country
music.
DB
Ordering info: outside-music.com
Satoko Fujii/Joe Fonda
Duet
LONG SONG RECORDS 140
Over the decades, Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii
has demonstrated an uncanny power and musicality
as a considerable force in the avant-garde
end of the jazz spectrum. At once an assertive
and keenly conversational player, she readily
adapts to varied settings, including the fascinating
quartet Kaze, with her husband, trumpeter
Natsuki Tamura. With the bold and
luminous new album Duet, she beautifully
pares down to an intimate but uncharted and
wide-ranging improvisational encounter with
a fellow free-zoning master, bassist Joe Fonda,
whose rich resume includes a long stint playing
with maverick jazz icon Anthony Braxton.
Given Fujii and Fonda’s easy rapport and
empathetic language, it’s surprising to learn this
was their first meeting. Recorded at Woodfords
Congregational Church in Portland, Maine, in
November 2015, Duet marks the second date of
their inaugural duet tour together, and ranks
among the more significant piano-bass recordings
of recent vintage.
They get along beautifully, and courageously,
from the earliest moments of the extended,
suite-like opening track, “Paul Bley” (dedicated
to the late pianist-adventurer). Over the course
of close to 40 minutes, the pair navigates a shifting
terrain of emotionality and musical atmospheres.
With the nonintrusive addition of sonically
elastic trumpeter Tamura, the album’s
11-minute second track is aptly named “JSN”
(the three players/improvisers’ initials). Here,
opening introspective piano lines imply that
the search is on, building in visceral intensity
and sliding into primal trumpet/flute dialogue
and prepared piano, fading into some enigmatic
realm. This music is commanding, yet
infused with a wide-open spirit.
—Josef Woodard
Duet: Paul Bley; JSN. (48:30).
Personnel: Satoko Fujii, piano; Joe Fonda, bass, flute; Natsuki
Tamura, trumpet (2).
Ordering info: longsongrecords.com
76 DOWNBEAT FEBRUARY 2017