Saturn Sings (Firehouse 12)
Mary Halvorson Quintet
Released October 5, 2010
Top 10 NPR Jazz Critics Poll Albums 2010
YouTube:
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Spotify:
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About:
Saturn Sings is
guitarist/composer Mary Halvorson’s highly anticipated follow-up to her
acclaimed 2008 debut, Dragon’s Head (Firehouse 12). It documents a new book of
music written for her latest ensemble, the Mary Halvorson Quintet, which adds
fellow New Yorkers Jonathan Finlayson (trumpet) and Jon Irabagon (alto
saxophone) to her longstanding trio with bassist John Hebert and drummer Ches
Smith. These compositions, her first for a band with horns, employ harmonies
influenced by such diverse inspirations as Clifford Brown, Sam Cooke and The
Soul Stirrers, Marvin Gaye, Thelonious Monk, Alexander Scriabin, Archie Shepp,
Dmitri Shostakovich and Robert Wyatt.
“Saturn Sings is a continuation of the concepts and ideas heard on
Dragon’s Head,” Ms. Halvorson explains. “My interest in harmony has
grown and I’m attempting to build on the foundation of guitar, bass and drums
while writing a lot of close-knit and often dissonant horn lines. There are now
many other directions to go in, and the horns push the trio into different
realms and vice-versa. The more we perform, the more the music gets both looser
and tighter; tighter because we are working on developing a band sound, and
looser because we are comfortable and trust each other, which allows us the
freedom to take chances and to explore within the framework of the piece.”
Track Listing:
1. Leak Over Six Five (No. 14) (Mary Halvorson) 06:44
2. Sequential Tears In It (No. 20) (Mary Halvorson) 06:02
3. Mile High Like (No. 16) (Mary Halvorson) 04:48
4. Moon Traps In Seven Rings (No. 17) (Mary Halvorson) 09:24
5. Sea Seizure (No. 19) (Mary Halvorson) 05:23
6. Crack In Sky (No. 11) (Mary Halvorson) 08:47
7. Right Size Too Little (No. 12) (Mary Halvorson) 07:31
8. Crescent White Singe (No. 13) (Mary Halvorson) 07:27
9. Cold Mirrors (No. 15) (Mary Halvorson) 05:38
10. Saturn Sings (No. 18) (Mary Halvorson) 04:28
Personnel:
Jonathan Finlayson: trumpet
Jon Irabagon: alto saxophone
Mary Halvorson: guitar, composition
John Hebert: bass
Ches Smith: drums
Recorded December 19th & 20th, 2009 at Firehouse 12
Produced by Mary Halvorson
Co-Produced by Taylor Ho Bynum and Nick Lloyd
Recorded, Mixed, and Mastered by Nick Lloyd
Graphic Design by Megan Craig
Drawing by Craig Halvorson
Review:
One
of the things that make Mary Halvorson’s music so distinctive is the sense of
flux which ensures that every release under the guitarist’s own name seems like
a report back from musical territories as yet uncharted.
Making Saturn Sings something of a milestone, as the addition of
horns might have had a detrimental effect on the music of her trio, which has
already reached a state of almost telepathic understanding. But there’s no
reason to fear, as the music is as singular as ever.
Listening to “Mile High Like (No.16),” it’s difficult to imagine how
the piece could be played any other way. For
all of the singularity of Halvorson’s instrumental conception, her fellow
players have a knack for deeply enriching the music; Jonathan Finlayson’s
stately trumpet backs sounds as if it’s the only logical alternative to
becoming involved in the rhythmic stew fomented by Halvorson, bassist John
Hébert and drummer Ches Smith.
Halvorson,
Hébert and Smith comprised the trio on 2008’s Dragon’s Head (Firehouse
12), so it’s clear where that telepathy comes from. Happily, the slickness
often born of such longstanding associations isn’t evident here, a
characteristic apparent on “Sea Seizure (No.19),” where the music
assumes a polyrhythmic edge through the simple expedient of the three players
working in different rhythms. What might have been a mess retains a coherence
rendered only more extraordinary by Halvorson’s string manipulations.
By the by, the numbers attached to each composition refer to the order in which
Halvorson composed them. This has the practical effect of allowing her to
realize how she’s developing as a composer. Her playing, however, might not be
so amenable to such a straightforward practice, because she’s already working
such a personal seam. On “Right Size Too Little (No.12),” her
aptitude for deconstruction is apparent. As is so often the case, her tone is
legitimately clean, which throws the spotlight on the degree to which she’s
constructively taking things apart. Here, perhaps more than anywhere else in
the program, the music is informed by nuance, the slightest inference on the
part of one player being the object of stimulus for the others.
So it might be the case that conception is the key when it comes to Mary
Halvorson’s music. If so, then it’s important to emphasize that the notion
doesn’t preclude warmth or indeed the staple of creative improvised music that
is spontaneity. Both of these qualities are here in abundance and the
consequent balance is as finely struck as anything out there.
Nic Jones (All About Jazz)
