Louise (ACT)
Emile Parisien
Released January 2022
AllMusic Favorite Jazz Albums 2022
YouTube:
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About:
“The best new thing that has happened in European jazz for a long time” (Le Monde), Emile Parisien has formed a top-flight American-European sextet for this album, his seventh as leader or co-leader on ACT. The band will be touring in 2022, the year which also marks the tenth anniversary of Parisien’s first appearance on an ACT album.
The saxophonist developed his strong sense of direction in music remarkably early: he was 10 years old when the news reached his family in Cahors that a new music school would be opening up roughly 200 kilometres away in Marciac. The young-ster told his parents that this was the school he wanted to go to as a boarder…and so, with their support and approval, off he went. And it was through the school and the festival in Marciac that he received mentorship from some of the greats of North American jazz: Wynton Marsalis (who appeared as a guest on the album Sfumato Live), Clark Terry, Bobby Hutcherson, Oscar Peterson…
The fact that three of the musicians in the sextet on “Louise or half of the band is American (Theo Croker (trumpet), Joe Martin (bass), and Nasheet Waits (drums) is important for Parisien: “It was time for me to return to the source that gave me the love for this music in the first place,” he explains. The idea of a ‘return to the source’ is especially true of Parisien’s choice to work alongside Theo Croker, the grandson of trumpeter Doc Cheatham (1905-97). Parisien describes their meeting on the “Jazz Animals” tour in 2018 as having been a ‘super-rencontre’, and a particularly strong musical connection and a personal friendship have developed since those meetings. On “Louise” Parisien has not only ensured that a huge emotional and stylistic range can be heard in Croker’s trumpet-playing, but has also enjoyed matching and intertwining his own melodic voice with Croker’s. Their interaction is something special, and provides some of the many joyous moments on this wide-ranging yet very coherent album. Parisien has also generously given Croker the chance to have last word on the album, with his solemnly evocative composition, “Prayer for Peace”.
Drummer Nasheet Waits is a vivid and energising presence throughout the album, and especially in the third part of “Memento”, the most substantial piece on “Louise”, which Parisien dedicates to his mother. “I just love Nasheet’s playing, he’s unbelievable. It was a dream to play with him,” says Parisien who first admired Waits’ playing on record, before their paths started to cross at festivals. This is the first time they have worked together. Joe Martin is one of the first-call New York bassists; Parisien knows him from their time as fellow members of Yaron Herman’s quartet.
Manu Codjia and Robert Negro are two of Emile Parisien’s very closest musical colleagues. “We have played in so many contexts, explored so much music together,” says Parisien. Guitarist Codjia was one of the very first musicians whom he met when he first moved to Paris nearly two decades ago. “Manu has an amazing ability to be the ‘glue’ that holds a band together and creates a common sound.” Codjia has contributed the composition “Jungle Jig”, an energetic piece in which an ideal balance has been struck between chaos and order. Roberto Negro has also played with Parisien regularly as a duo, in Sfumato and other contexts. “European music, classical, jazz, Roberto plays them all so well! He’s such a complete musician,” says Parisien. Roberto Negro’s composition “Il giorno della civetta” (civet) is elegantly paced and has a wonderfully natural flow.
The title track “Louise” is gentle, spacious and meditative. The title refers to the ‘spider’ sculptures of Louise Bourgeois. These sculptures have mostly been seen in public spaces, and that has caused Parisien to reflect on how confinement during lockdown has deprived us all of the joy of being out in the open. Bourgeois’ sculptures are also very strongly connected to themes of motherhood, and to the metaphors of spinning, weaving, caring and protecting. Parisien’s affection for and valuing of the unconditional love of mothers for their children is the emotional background to this evocative track, with its glorious solos from Theo Croker and Manu Codjia.
Two pieces bring to the fore European musicians from earlier generations who have been decisive influences on Parisien: “Jojo” is a happy reference to Joachim Kühn; the track is unmistakably, intentionally, and deeply ‘Ornette-ish’ in its inspiration. “Madagascar” by Weather Report recalls a time when Parisien played in The Syndicate, the band formed in 2007 to carry on Joe Zawinul’s legacy and to perform his music.
“Louise” is a remarkable album in which ferocious energy contrasts and co-exists happily with a much softer side. Its subtleties and joys emerge the more one listens. As a result, “Louise” gives us the closest insight yet into the character and the creative individuality of one of Europe’s leading jazz musicians.
Track Listing:
1. Louise (Emile Parisien) 05:47
2. Madagascar (Joe Zawinul) 08:21
3. Memento Part I (Emile Parisien) 07:14
4. Memento Part II (Emile Parisien) 02:56
5. Memento Part III (Emile Parisien) 05:15
6. Il giorno della civetta (Roberto Negro) 05:35
7. Jojo (Emile Parisien) 05:23
8. Jungle Jig (Manu Codjia) 03:36
9. Prayer 4 Peace (Theo Croker) 05:51
Personnel:
Emile Parisien: soprano saxophone
Theo Croker: trumpet
Roberto Negro: piano
Manu Codjia: guitar
Joe Martin: bass
Nasheet Waits: drums
Recorded June 2021, at Studio Gil Evans de La Maison de la Culture, Amiens (France), by Mathieu Pion
Produced Emile Parisien
Executive Producer: Andreas Brandis & Full Rhizome
Mixed by Mathieu Pion
Mastered by Klaus Scheuermann
Cover art by Helena Soubeyrand
Review:
One of the foremost soprano saxophonists in Europe, Émile Parisien is a supremely balanced performer whose music is both harmonically sophisticated and kinetic, bringing together his classic influences with hard-driving jazz improvisation. It’s this vibrant combination that he showcases on 2022’s Louise, an album that marks his tenth year with the ACT label. While he has led various incarnations of his quartet, quintet, and sextet in the past, Parisien has put together a dynamic, globally cross-pollinated ensemble here, featuring Italian-born/France-based pianist Roberto Negro, French guitarist Manu Codjia, and a trio of Americans with trumpeter Theo Croker, bassist Joe Martin, and drummer Nasheet Waits. Together, they play as a boldly cohesive unit with a sound that straddles the line between the propulsively swinging post-bop of Wynton and Branford Marsalis’ mid-’80s work and the crunchy ’70s fusion of John McLaughlin. However, rather than fitting neatly into any one paradigm, Parisien’s music is organic, ever changing, and rife with subtle nods to musical traditions far afield from jazz. The opening “Louise” is a brooding dreamscape, merging Middle Eastern-sounding sax and trumpet drones with ambient guitar flourishes and a far-off rumble of bass and piano. Also evocative, “Madagascar” features a bluesy, whirling dervish melody that sounds like Ornette Coleman playing with a Jewish klezmer ensemble. Yet more wild cacophony follows, as on the Thelonious Monk-esque burner “Jojo” and the wryly titled “Jungle Jig,” whose wild group improv builds to a fever pitch like a high school concert band gone rogue after the director has left the room. From the frenetic to the mournful to the devastatingly beautiful, Parisien continually pulls all of this controlled chaos into something akin to poetry.
Matt Collar (AllMusic)
