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| Coruscating |
| John Surman |
| első megjelenés éve: 2000 |
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| (2000)
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CD |
Kérjen
árajánlatot! |
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| 1. | At Dusk
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| 2. | Dark Corners
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| 3. | Stone Flower
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| 4. | Moonless Midnight
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| 5. | Winding Passages
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| 6. | An Illusive Shadow
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| 7. | Crystal Walls
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| 8. | For the Moment
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Jazz
Recorded January 1999
John Surman soprano and baritone saxophones, bass and contrabass clarinets
Chris Laurence double-bass
Rita Manning violin
Keith Pascoe violin
Bill Hawkes viola
Nick Cooper cello
* Dieter Rehm - Cover Photo
* Manfred Eicher - Producer
* Markus Heiland - Engineer
* Roberto Masotti - Liner Note Graphics
A new chapter opens in the work of one of Europe's most consistently adventurous musicians. "Coruscating" features finely crafted and richly-melodic music for strings by John Surman, with the composer and his long-time associate Chris Laurence deployed as primary soloists and improvisers. The music heard on "Coruscating" was, in live performance, one of the big successes of ECM's 30th Anniversary Festival in Brighton and was also hailed as one of the highlights of the Bath Festival. Reviewing the material, The Times of London compared its sonorities to the music of Ralph Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten. Jazz, though, remains a crucial component of the material. Tracks such as "Stone Flower" reveal Surman's love of Duke Ellington. The piece is dedicated to the memory of Ellington's great baritone saxophone, Harry Carney, one of Surman's primary influences and a player to whom John has often been compared by the press.
Finely crafted and richly-melodic music for strings by John Surman, with the composer and his long-time associate Chris Laurence deployed as primary soloists and improvisers.
John Surman's outstanding accomplishments as an improvising musician hardly need restating at this point. When the Devon-born multi-instrumentalist arrived on the London scene in the mid-1960s he was very rapidly acclaimed as the first major voice on the baritone saxophone since Gerry Mulligan, and has been a persistent poll-winner ever since... and a musician whose lyrical imagination and expressive power has dazzled in so many diverse contexts: from The Trio (with Barre Phillips and Stu Martin) to John Potter's Dowland Project, from the Paul Bley Quartet to the jazz and Arab music synthesis of the "Thimar" trio with Anouar Brahem and Dave Holland. His own projects on ECM have ranged from his unique solo/overdub projects ("Upon Reflection", "Withholding Pattern", "Private City", "Road To Saint Ives" and "A Biography of the Rev. Absalom Dawe") to the melodically inventive free improvising of the "Stranger Than Fiction" quartet with John Taylor, Chris Laurence and John Marshall, from duets with Jack DeJohnette to the massed horns of "The Brass Project".
Alongside his soloistic achievements, Surman has been growing steadily as a composer, putting his background and enthusiasms to good use, unafraid to take risks and yet never overreaching himself, a familiar problem when musicians try to step beyond the demarcation lines of their given idiom. Surman's work may also transcend familiar boundaries, but it is really all of a piece. It seems always centred, grounded. Although a deep love of the entire jazz tradition is an important element - early Ellington is a particular enthusiasm, as evidenced on the piece "Stone Flower" on the present recording - he is equally affected by the melodic qualities of chamber music, choral music and English folk music. He has been integrating these elements in both his playing and his writing for a long time now. For listeners who know Surman only from records, his 1998 recording, his Mercury Prize-nominated "Proverbs And Songs" - the powerful oratario featuring the 75 voices of the Salisbury Festival Chorus - may have seemed a departure; in reality it was a continuation.
Surman's development as a writer has been spurred by, for instance, his long association with Carolyn Carlson, dating back to collaborative work at the Paris Opera in the mid-1970s. He wrote "Private City" for the Sadlers Wells Royal Ballet, and was Composer In Residence at the Glasgow Jazz Festival in 1989. He has written music for film, TV and radio plays. In 1993 he was commissioned to write a new suite for the Oslo Radio Symphony Orchestra and Quartet. In 1998 he premiered a new chamber orchestra version of the "Road To Saint Ives", commissioned by the Bournemouth Sinfonietta. In the same year he also received a commission to present new music for saxophone and strings at the Bath Festival. It was this commission that led, ultimately, to the music heard on "Coruscating".
Reviewing the pieces on the first airing in Bath, The Times drew comparisons between Surman's writing and "the sonorities of Vaughan Williams, Bridge, and Britten" and spoke of the special "stamp of authority" conferred by the solos of Surman and Laurence.
John Surman, on the projects's genesis: "Chris Laurence and I have played together for many years in a variety of contexts, including our regular quartet with John Taylor and John Marshall, as well as in larger groups like the Brass Project. We had spoken about the possibility of getting some music together in a duo format, but somehow never really developed the idea. It was only when I was writing music for a concert in Prague with the Krynkl string quartet that it struck me what a terrific idea it might be to add Chris to the string quartet formation. This could produce a really interesting ensemble in which the double-bass would operate both as part of the string group and as an independent improvising voice.
"Chris and I decided early in the planning that we wanted to assemble this group 'from scratch' and not use an already-existing string quartet. This would ensure that all of the players were happy with the idea of working with music that included a great deal of improvisation, especially from Chris and myself. Through his long association with the orchestra of St Martin in the Fields, Chris was able to suggest some terrific string players who were not only superb chamber music specialists in their own right but who were also already familiar with our particular style of music making and who were keen to become involved.
"Happily, things went well at our first rehearsal and the music has continued to develop ever since."
***
Chris Laurence was born in London where he studied the double-bass with James Merrett at the Guildhall School of Music. Since then he has played with various jazz groups and chamber orchestras. He first met John Surman in the 1970s and has played with him in various combinations over the years. He was until 1995 principal bass with The Academy of St Martin in the Fields orchestra, playing on their many recordings and concerts over the world. He has recorded with many artists including J.J. Johnson, Tony Coe, Norma Winstone, and Sting on the soundtrack of "Leaving Las Vegas." Recent recordings include sessions with Andy Sheppard, Norma Winstone, and Sam Rivers/Tony Hymas.
Rita Manning studied at the Royal Academy of Music and in Freiburg, Germany. On her return to London, she was awarded the "Young Artists Platform Award". In 1985 she was invited to join the Academy of St Martin in the Fields which she co-led for six years. During that time she appeared on several occasions as soloist with the Academy as well as with the RTE Symphony Orchestra and the London Chamber Orchestra. In 1990, with pianist Jonathan Plowright, Rita formed Capitol Virtuosi and was also for two years the violinist in Attaxa, a seven-piece ensemble formed by guitarist John Williams. In 1998 she recorded with Sam Rivers and Tony Hymas.
Keith Pascoe was a founder member, and guest leader, of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe under Abbado, and sub-leader of the London Philharmonic in 1981. He has also been a member of the Syrinx Ensemble and a guest with the Nash Ensemble, the Prometheus Ensemble, and the Academy of St Martin's Chamber Ensemble. In 1987 he was invited to play chamber music at St Moritz Musiktreffen with Tortelier, Bashmet and Vegh. In 1985 he formed the Britten Quartet, with which he toured world-wide for ten years. At present, he plays with the Vanbrugh String Quartet.
Bill Hawkes was born in Cambridge. From 1985-1990 he studied violin and viola at the Royal Academy of Music where he won prizes for both instruments. Since then his career has been diverse, ranging from Principal Viola of the Scottish Opera in 1991-2, to violist in both the Balanescu and Nigel Kennedy String Quartets. He has worked with many other chamber ensembles and orchestras, notably as First Violinist in the Michael Nyman Band and as Principal Viola/Soloist in the Gavin Bryars Ensemble.
Nick Cooper is cellist with Trans4mation and also with Chris Wood's innovative Folk String Trio and with Solid Strings, who collaborate with Orchestra Mahatma and For All The Saints. Nick has toured with the jazz trio Equal Interest (Joseph Jarman/Myra Melford/Leroy Jenkins) for the Contemporary Music Network. He was formerly with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Balanescu Quartet.
***
In John Surman's wildly diverse recorded catalog, two things remain constant: his dedication to finding the players he wants and getting the sonic atmosphere he needs to accomplish his musical ideas. There are few players and/or composers whose record is as consistent or as prolific as Surman's. John Zorn may be as diverse, but he's got a long way to go to match Surman's recorded output. Surman is one of those artists who is the creative musician ECM is named for. His career can be categorized according to the definition of this album's title, "flashing brightly." On Coruscating Surman assembles a string quartet, a bassist, and his own array of saxophones and clarinets to embark upon a journey that texturally resembles a suite, but is actually a series of compositions by Surman of settings for strings and soloists. The atmospheric backdrop that the string quartet drapes the scene with is chilling in its beauty. Bassist Chris Laurence and Surman are soloists in another world, full of color, balance, and harmonic space. That said, there are two pieces on the record written strictly for strings and bass where Surman doesn't appear at all. On "Stone Flower," a tribute to the late baritone saxophonist Harry Carney, Surman bleeds the opening with the strings playing glissandi and states a minimal melodic theme before allowing Laurence to move into this space and paint it with a deeply moving and melodically intricate bass solo. Surman's own solo restates the theme twice (sounding like something out of 1940s Hollywood -- Charlie Haden eat your heart out) before reaching into Carney's fake book for a phraseology that is equal parts his own and the late musician's -- particularly in the glides to the lower register of the baritone. Harmonically, the tune is simple enough, but Surman stretches it in the upper register while crossing lines with Laurence. It's not dissonant, but it isn't consonant either. Rather, as Jackie McLean would say, there exists here "a fickle sonance." There is "out" baritone sax play on the album, however, as "The Illusive Shadow," originally commissioned by a dance company, moves modally to juxtapose itself against a series of tone rows by the string section. The notes and phrases are minimal, but there are microphonics coming from both the horn and the two violins, underscored deeply by Laurence. It feels as if the notes have disappeared altogether into an ether of silence and resonant harmonics. As the work progresses, there are serial tone rows asserting themselves before giving way to pastoral washes of color and nuance. "Winding Passages" is an illustrative work that feels very close in its beginning to Vaughan Williams in its layering of the string quartet's individual harmonic cadences; viola and cello assert themselves in counterpoint and are closely followed in unison by the violins. It changes quickly, however, upon the entrance of Surman's bass clarinet and Laurence's pizzicato style. The minor-key, shaded trade-off with the strings presents a problem of intervallic irresolution, but it's covered by the bass clarinet which fluidly binds both ends together in a gorgeous cadenza that scales the strings and offers an open mode for Laurence. It's simply brilliant in its modern classicism -- a la Britten, Williams, and even Dvorak in places -- and still so full of Gil Evans elegance in its jazz-like architecture, where tempos and changes occur seamlessly and without warning according to space and color. Coruscating is one of the finer moments in an already stellar career. Coruscating's mood and timbre is delicate, mysterious, and gentle, but its musical reach is muscular and wide.
--- Thom Jurek , All Music Guide
"In his ability to blend some of the methods and textures of modern jazz with a wholly English sensibility, John Surman is a true original."
---Richard Williams, The Times
"John Surman has helped European jazz evolve in ways it now takes for granted - into a lyrical but structurally broader idiom that mixes jazz tonality and phrasing with other forms - scores for ballets, meetings between jazz and European folk forms, even English church music. His work continues to represent a truly personal reappraisal of jazz. "
---John Fordham, The Guardian
"John Surman is perhaps the most gifted British jazzman of his generation."
---Richard Cook, The Sunday Times
John Surman
Active Decades: '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s and '00s
Born: Aug 30, 1944 in Tavistock, England
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Avant-Garde Jazz, Jazz Blues, Jazz-Rock, Modern Composition, Post-Bop
John Surman was one of the very few saxmen in England to find a significant audience in rock during the late '60s, playing gigs regularly at venues like the Marquee Club in London. Also a clarinetist of some renown, and no slouch on keyboards either, the atmospheric sounds that Surman creates on his horns has been a major asset to the ECM label ever since the late '70s; but, before that, he was an extremely prolific artist on Deram, Futura, Dawn, and Island, cutting seven solo albums between 1968 and 1974 on those mainstream pop-oriented labels, as well as recording with Morning Glory on Island. One of England's top jazz players of the past several decades, Surman is particularly strong on the baritone. Surman played in jazz workshops while still in high school. He studied at the London College of Music and London University Institute of Education in the mid-'60s, played with Alexis Korner and Mike Westbrook until the late '60s, and recorded with the latter until the mid-'70s. He was voted best soloist at the 1968 Montreux Festival while heading his band. Surman worked with Graham Collier, Mike Gibbs, Dave Holland, Chris McGregor, and John McLaughlin in the '60s, and toured Europe with the Kenny ClarkeFrancy Boland big band in 1970. Surman toured and recorded with Barre Phillips and Stu Martin in the late '60s and early '70s, and again in the late '70s, adding Albert Mangelsdorff to the group. They called themselves the Trio, then Mumps. Surman played with Mike Osborne and Alan Skidmore in the sax trio SOS in the mid-'70s. He also collaborated with the Carolyn Carlson dance company at the Paris Opera through the mid- and late '70s. Surman recorded with Stan Tracey and Karin Krog, while working with Miroslav Vitous and Azimuth. He led the Brass Project in the early '80s, and played in Collier's big band and Gil Evans' British orchestra. Surman toured with Evans again in the late '80s. He began recording as a leader for Pye in the early '70s, and did sessions for Ogun and ECM. Surman continued recording in the '80s, mostly for ECM. He worked with Terje Rypdal, Jack DeJohnette, Pierre Favre, Bengt Hallberg, Archie Shepp, Warne Marsh, and Red Mitchell, among others. Surman has made many recordings for ECM, spanning from free form to mood music, and he remains one of the label's most consistently stimulating artists.
---Ronn Wynn & Bruce Eder, All Music Guide |
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