Coin Coin Chapter Four: Memphis (Constellation)
Matana Roberts
Released October 18, 2019
Jazzwise Top 20 Releases of 2019
Los Angeles Times Best Jazz Albums of 2019
AllMusic Favorite Jazz Albums 2019
Stereogum 10 Best Jazz Albums Of 2019
YouTube:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nr8-FRKwOAVFclHGZ1H_g53nSx5LUlS4E
Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/album/5mIDlb3HP4bTFU7SbmuIoF?si=5VoeiudZTK-egQHom1NSyw
About:
Matana Roberts returns with the fourth chapter of her
extraordinary Coin Coin series — a project that has deservedly garnered the
highest praise and widespread critical acclaim for its fierce aesthetic
originality and unflinching narrative power. The first three Coin Coin albums,
issued from 2011-2015, charted diverse pathways of modern/avant composition —
Roberts calls it “panoramic sound quilting” — and ranged sequentially from
large band to sextet to solo, unified by Roberts’ archival and often deeply
personal research into legacies of the American slave trade and ancestries of
American identity/experience. Roberts also emphasizes non-male subjects and
thematizes these other-gendered stories with a range of vocal and verbal
techniques: singspeak, submerged glossolalic recitation, guttural cathartic
howl, operatic voice, gentle lullaby, group chant, and the recuperation of
various American folk traditionals and spirituals, whether surfacing in
fragmentary fashion or as unabridged set-pieces. The root of this vocality comes
from her dedication to the legacy of her main chosen instrument, the alto
saxophone.
On Coin Coin Chapter Four: Memphis, Roberts convened a new band, with New
Yorkers Hannah Marcus (guitars, fiddle, accordion) and percussionist Ryan
Sawyer (Thurston Moore, Nate Wooley, Cass McCombs) joined by Montréal
bassist Nicolas Caloia (Ratchet
Orchestra) and Montréal-Cairo composer/improviser Sam Shalabi (Land Of Kush,
Dwarfs Of East Agouza) on guitar and oud, along with prolific trombonist Steve
Swell and vibraphonist Ryan White as special guests. Memphis unspools as a
continuous work of 21st century liberation music, oscillating between
meditative incantatory explorations, raucous melodic themes, and unbridled
free-improv suites, quoting archly and ecstatically from various folk
traditions along the way. Led by Roberts’ conduction and unique graphic score
practice, her consummate saxophone and clarinet playing, and punctuated by her
singing and speaking various texts generated from her own historical research
and diaristic writings, Coin Coin Chapter Four is a glorious and spellbinding
new instalment in this projected twelve-part Gesamtkunstwerk.
Says Roberts: “As an arts adventurer dealing w/ the medium of sound and its
many contradictions I am most interested in endurance, perseverance, migration,
liberation, libation, improvisation and the many layers of cognitive dissonance
therein as it relates to my birth country’s history. I speak memory, I sing an
american survival through horn, song, sadness, a sometimes gladness. I stand on
the backs of many people, from so many different walks of life and difference,
that never had a chance to express themselves as expressively as I have been
given the privilege. In these sonic renderings, I celebrate the me, I celebrate
the we, in all that it is now, and all that is yet to come or will be… Thanks
for listening.”
Track Listing:
1. Jewels of the Sky: Inscription (Matana Roberts) 01:48
2. As Far as Eyes Can See (Matana Roberts) 04:03
3. Trail of the Smiling Sphinx (Matana Roberts) 09:43
4. Piddling (Matana Roberts) 02:29
5. Shoes of Gold (Matana Roberts) 03:07
6. Wild Fire Bare (Matana Roberts) 05:41
7. Fit to Be Tied (Matana Roberts) 02:41
8. Her Mighty Waters Run (Matana Roberts) 04:57
9. All Things Beautiful (Matana Roberts) 02:30
10. In the Fold (Matana Roberts) 03:16
11. Raise Yourself Up (Matana Roberts) 02:44
12. Backbone Once More (Matana Roberts) 00:51
13. How Bright They Shine (Matana Roberts) 02:50
Personnel:
Matana Roberts: alto sax, clarinet, wordspeak, voice
Hannah Marcus: electric guitar, nylon string guitar, fiddle, accordion, voice
Sam Shalabi: electric guitar, oud, voice
Nicholas Coloia: doouble bass, voice
Ryan Sawyer: drumset, vibraphone, jaw harp, bells, voice
Guests
Steve Swell: trombone, voice
Ryan White: vibraphone
Thierry Amar: voice
Nadia Moss: voice
Jessica Moss: voice
Recorded at Break Glass Studios, Montréal, Québec
Recorded by Jace Lasek
Assistant Engineer: Dave Smith
Mixed by Radwan Moumneh
Mastered by Harris Newman
Review:
The fourth installment in Matana Roberts’ ambitious meditation on African-American history and folklore focuses on the city of Memphis “unlike a place I have yet 2 know”, according to the artist. Regardless of the inspiration that Roberts has drawn from the location, her treatment of the subject maintains the high standards set by the previous work. Firstly, her meshing of sung vocal and spoken word is compelling, primarily because the stories, detailing anything from family testimony to the black church experience, are so vivid. When Roberts confides that “memory is a most unusual thing”, she is really homing in on the heart and soul of the project, and it is to her credit that the complexity of the subject matter has been matched by the intricacy of the composing and arranging.
The strikingly wide timbral spectrum features the ecstatic ricochet of a jaw harp, rabble-rousing country-blues fiddle riffs, occasional Ornetteish breakdowns and instrumental interludes that are consistently imaginative, none more so than during an utterly haunting movement of vibraphone and percussion that sounds like wind chimes running backwards. Yet, for all the moments of gripping abstraction, it is the heart-stirring a capella gospel staples, ‘Her Mighty Waters Run’ (‘Roll The Old Chariot’) and ‘This Little Light Of Mine’, which also prove to be hugely impactful. Roberts’ ability to treat such demanding, multi-layered material with a clear focus is a testament to the strength of her original vision and skill as a narrator.
With her core quintet, in which guitarist-fiddler Hannah Marcus stands out, being joined by an array of guests that also includes four vocalists, the music, in lesser hands, could easily have become overblown if not diffuse. Roberts has kept her conceptual focus and creative engine finely tuned to deliver work that has structural invention and a deep poignancy that should move anybody interested in real lives.
Kevin Le Gendre (Jazzwise)
