Kinds of Love (Smoke Sessions Records)
Renee Rosnes
Released September 3, 2021
JAZZ FM 25 Best Jazz Albums of 2021
YouTube:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nJBJDwz1LJnYPquLdW0o5sEL5uRrHNu10
Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/album/67gSqihoAVZyWcTzIRpiPR?si=ozN7az4eR4ablweMq3hGdA
About:
Pianist and composer Renee Rosnes celebrates and honors all kinds of love found in the world with a brilliant album of brand new music featuring a stunning all-star band with Rosnes, Chris Potter, Christian McBride, Carl Allen and Rogério Boccato.
The strange pandemic year 0f 2020 was a time of reflection and contemplation for many. Pianist and composer Renee Rosnes emerged for it with a reinvigorated appreciation for the many different shapes that love can take. Her breathtaking recording, Kinds of Love, is both a celebration of and a meditation on the myriad forms it’s taken in her own life – romantic love, love of family, of nature, of the arts and of close relationships she’s forged with many of her fellow musicians.
The staggering all-star quintet that Rosnes assembled for the occasion – saxophonist Chris Potter, bassist Christian McBride, drummer Carl Allen, and percussionist Rogério Boccato – represent a deep web of friendships and collaborations stretching back decades in some cases. She seized the opportunity to craft a full album’s worth of new compositions, conceived with these particular voices, and their singular combination, in mind. And for many of them, this recording date marked one of their first times back in a studio after the long dry spell of 2020.
“I’ve tried to look at the pandemic as a gift of time, and the knowledge that I would soon be recording with my friends inspired much of the music,” Rosnes says. “It was thrilling to experience the humanity of making music again in the moment. Each of these musicians are profound, humble virtuosos and, on a human level, enlightened spirits.”
Today, a major voice in jazz, Renee Rosnes stands at the summit of pianist/composers who have left—and continue to leave—an indelible mark on this music. As a pianist, she is an entirely unique and original artist who is, at once, firmly rooted in the legacy and tradition of the jazz piano vernacular, and at the same time a visionary and innovative performer who pushes the boundaries of that very tradition. As a composer, Renee is a gifted storyteller and chronicler of the human condition through her musical works. She is a purveyor of truth and authenticity in her compositions, and she has found that delicate balance between craft and expression—between the mind and the heart. Having recorded ten critically acclaimed albums for the Blue Note label, she ups the ante with this sterling new offering for Smoke Sessions by presenting a kaleidoscope of breathtaking compositions. Assembling a super-group of Olympian level musicians to partner up with on this date—Chris Potter, Christian McBride, Carl Allen, and Rogério Boccato—Renee presents an astonishing variety of musical stories.
For instance, the opening track, “Silk,” dedicated to the great pianist/composer Donald Brown, starts out cloaked in mystery with the diminished sounding melody and stepwise bass line over the tribal sounding groove set up beautifully by Carl and Rogério. It then explodes into a hard swinging up-tempo number that conjures the chaotic busy-ness of the New York City jungle, with Chris Potter and Renee offering hard hitting and inventive solos, like two acrobats on a tightrope.
By contrast, the title track, “Kinds of Love,” is a paean to compassion—to empathy. I love the structural choice of starting the tune as a trio and then adding Chris Potter’s lyrical soprano saxophone for the second half, thus heightening the drama of the piece. Renee’s playing here is extraordinary—surprising yet logical and ultimately inevitable. The conversation between her, Christian McBride, and Carl Allen is deep, compelling, and intimate. When Potter enters with his solo, the performance elevates in intensity, until finally the soprano sax takes over the melody. The rhythm section, at the very end, utters a closing plea by emphatically accentuating four bass notes, as though to make an impassioned final argument for peace.
“In Time Like Air” is a musical portrait where I see birds and forests. The music imitates nature in that the ensemble works together to create a sonic environment by interacting with one another, much like creatures and plants in a forest must cooperate and adhere to the rules of nature in order to survive. Renee had heard a particular bird in her yard that sang a unique and interesting song every day for several weeks. Unfortunately, she could not identify the bird, so she never knew what it looked like, but its song is what inspired the melody of her piece. But maybe it’s a good thing that she couldn’t place the bird. She has instead invented a remarkable musical soundscape just from her imagination, creating an entire exotic world pulsating with strange life, inspired by the unseen bird.
Starting out with a labyrinth of angular melodic lines and thorny counterpoint, “The Golden Triangle” then launches into a medium swing 16 bar form which showcases virtuosic and imaginative soloing from Renee, McBride, and Potter. Named for the predecessor to what is now The Village Vanguard, the piece ends with the same contrapuntal head as it began with.
As I listen to “Evermore,” I am struck by its poignancy. This song is an invocation, a meditation of profound beauty and structure. “Evermore” emanated from a Renee Rosnes improvisation based off of a Sarabande from Bach’s English Suites, so it definitely has a Baroque spirit to the harmonic progression. But I also hear shades of late romanticism a la Schumann or Brahms. Renee’s calm, beautiful, and understated playing throughout serves as kind of a glue binding the whole performance—a constant subtle force guiding the direction of the song. Christian McBride plays an extraordinary, bowed bass solo and Chris Potter’s soulful offering transforms his tenor sax into a human voice.
“Passing Jupiter” is a song about space travel. This composition sounds like a happy journey which begins with a lilting, relaxed introduction. The introduction gives way to a two-note motif treated contrapuntally; it’s anchored by Chris Potter’s bass clarinet, which signals a somewhat sinister or dangerous aura to the proceedings. A high point is McBride’s strikingly creative bass solo, which emulates the motion of passing satellites, meteors, stars, or other things you’d encounter on a space journey. This is followed by brilliant solos from Renee and Chris Potter.
The longer I live, the more true the title of the next song is: “Life Does Not Wait.” Time passes furtively, without us noticing, imperceptibly stealing the minutes, hours, and days of our lives until one day you discover that you have only the consequences of your past actions to live with—good or bad. The message of this piece is an admonition to value your life in the present—value each moment and try to use it to create happiness and contribute things of real value to the world. The weaving and angular melodic line of the melody floats over the intoxicating rhythmic groove—set up by Rogério Boccato and Carl Allen—with grace and fluidity, and the way Renee negotiates the chord progression during her solo is a study of elegance and finesse.
Swoop is just a straight up swinging tune that starts out with all cylinders firing. It’s a conversation, spoken in the language of modern bop, between old friends who are at the top of their game. Starting with an intricate unison line in the melody and continuing with maze-like harmonic progression, over which Renee, Chris, and Christian take masterful solos, Swoop brings to mind four players in a beautiful and complex game.
We all know how difficult 2020 was—a year of COVID, racial upheaval, fires, uncertainty about our future, and political drama. “With Blessings in a Year of Exile,” Renee has chosen to make a healing statement on this paradigm by focusing on the positivity in her life and bringing to light what she is thankful for—what blessings are in her life. Still, there is an air of trepidation as illustrated by the dark harmonies and uneasy left hand piano figure, as though to express that our society has not left 2020 unscathed. We still need time to recover.
Billy Childs
Track Listing:
1. Silk [Dedicated to Donald Brown] (Renee Rosnes) 05:24
2. Kinds of Love (Renee Rosnes) 05:47
3. In Time Like Air (Renee Rosnes) 06:08
4. The Golden Triangle (Renee Rosnes) 06:35
5. Evermore (Renee Rosnes) 07:29
6. Passing Jupiter (Renee Rosnes) 07:17
7. Life Does Not Wait [A Vida NA£o Espera] (Renee Rosnes) 05:20
8. Swoop (Renee Rosnes) 06:35
9. Blessings in a Year of Exile (Renee Rosnes) 05:31
Personnel:
Renee Rosnes: piano, Fender Rhodes, vocals
Chris Potter: tenor sax, soprano sax, flute, alto flute, bass clarinet
Christian McBride: bass
Carl Allen: drums
Rogério Boccato: percussion, vocals
Recorded March 31 – April 1, 2021, at Sear Sound Studio C, New York City
Producer: Paul Stache
Recorded, Mixed and Mastered by Shristopher Allen
Photography: Shervin Lainez
Package Design: Damon Smith
Executive Producer: Molly Johnson
Review:
Here, Renee Rosnes continues to prove why she’s one of today’s leading voices in jazz. Following the critically acclaimed debut by her supergroup Artemis, the pianist and composer returns with yet another stellar work under her name. Featuring a quintet that includes bassist Christian McBride and saxophonist Chris Potter, Kinds of Love is instrumentally masterful, harmonically rich and highly listenable, all while offering plenty of variety across these nine original compositions. Whether they’re playing slowly and serenely or swinging at top speed, the music is velvety smooth and full of life.
Adam Feibel (JAZZ.FM91)
