Playing to Win: Jason Robinson Harmonic Constituent

The mere fact that a team has an all-star at every position does not insure success. Ask the San Francisco Giants, Los Angeles Dodgers and Tampa Bay Rays, the three major league baseball teams with the most wins this year. Like the rest of us, they are watching the 2021 World Series on television. The same goes for music. Having the biggest names does not always translate to making the most convincing music. But when the best jells, as they did at the Northampton Arts Trust on Friday, October 15, the results can be transcendent.

Saxophonist Jason Robinson, who is a dear friend and a Board member of Pioneer Valley Jazz Shares, led a quartet of serious musicians in an evening of his compositions. This Jazz Shares concert, delayed over a year because of COVID-19, celebrated the release of Harmonic Constituent (Playscape, 2020). The four musicians on the recording: Joshua White (piano), Drew Gress (bass), Ches Smith (drums, glockenspiel) and Robinson, assembled at 33 Hawley St. to wow 65 rapt listeners.

The 70-minute set included most of the material on Harmonic Constituent, an album filled with intricate compositions and improvised magic. Robinson made the right call to convene a rehearsal the day before, giving everyone’s muscle memories a chance to refresh, and letting Joshua White catch his breath after travelling from San Diego. The music was composed by Robinson on a trip to the northern coast of his home state of California, inspired by the power of the Pacific Ocean. “Harmonic constituent” refers to the complex interaction between the sun, earth and moon that influence tides at different locations.

The music was a spirit-filled amalgam of knotty, swinging, provocative and melodious sounds that crossed multiple stylistic boundaries, all played with off-the-charts virtuosity.

Joshua White excites me more than any other pianist I can think of (Matt Mitchell, notwithstanding.) His approach is fresh and seemingly without limit, not tied to any “school” or style. “Jug Handle”, Robinson’s dedication to his grandfather, ended with a beautiful solo summation by White. His touch on this gorgeous lullaby was so delicate we all got quiet with him. On “Mountain in Your Mind”, White romped with be-bop intensity. At other points he used parts of his hands to create waves of sound.

Ches Smith is another all-star with extremely catholic tastes. He has experience in rock-inspired projects like Mr. Bungle and Mark Ribot’s Ceramic Dog, has worked with revolutionaries like Terry Riley, John Zorn and Wadada Leo Smith, and has led recordings like The Bell (ECM, 2016), an exquisite chamber-like work featuring Craig Taborn and Mat Maneri, and Path of Seven Colors (Pyroclastic, 2021), a ground-breaking mix of jazz and Haitian drum traditions. His playing on Saturday precisely framed each of the compositions and gave shape to the solos and I was impressed he left dinner early to work on some of the tricky sections. His accents on glockenspiel made the music pop, much like a few drops of bitters add complexity to a drink.

Bassist Drew Gress has played on all of Robinson’s various-sized Janus Ensembles over the last decade. On more than one occasion I’ve heard Jason remark what a comfort it is to have Gress behind him. Despite seven releases as a leader, (I’m especially fond of Spin & Drift and The Irrational Numbers), Gress has made his living as a sideman with Steve Lehman, Angelica Sanchez, John Hollenbeck, John Abercrombie and dozens of others. The concert was performed without sound reinforcement and Gress’ bass provided all the heft we needed. His resonant tone and his understanding of the composer’s aims were right on. He served as spotter for the evening’s musical gymnastics.

As trying as the last 18 months have been, Robinson has accomplished a lot. Along with finishing a three-year stint as Chair of the Amherst College Music Department, he released three different recordings, all of them outstanding. In addition to Harmonic Constituent, 2020 also brought us The Urgency of Now, a largely improvised set featuring Bruno Råberg and Bob Weiner, and Two Hours Early, Ten Minutes Late: Duo Music of Ken Aldcroft, featuring guitarist Eric Hofbauer. He is one of the few scholars who is also a monster musician. (Our mutual friend Michael Dessen is another.) Robinson played tenor saxophone almost exclusively and masterfully explored the instrument’s sonic possibilities, from roar to whisper, shrieks to cat purrs. After repeated listens to Harmonic Constituent, I’ve grown to love the writing as much as the playing. Each composition is individually crafted to evoke a particular mood, while referencing some part of the massive jazz legacy Robinson clearly cherishes.

The best teams are guided by a manager who has a plan, is clearly in command and gives his charges room to be themselves and to influence the outcome. Jason Robinson has hit a home run, turning this collection of all-stars into a winning aggregation.

Newcomers Welcome: Steph Richards Debuts in the Valley

After more than 30 years of producing creative music, it’s rare for me to host a concert where I’ve never met any of the performers. But that’s what happened on Tuesday, Oct. 12th when Pioneer Valley Jazz Shares gathered again at the Institute for the Musical Arts in Goshen.

Trumpeter Steph Richards led her band Supersense: James Carney, piano, Brandon Lopez, bass and Max Jaffe, drums, in a 60-minute immersion into a very personal sound world. I had poor answers to pre-concert questions about the music. I had never seen any of them perform and knew them only by name and reputation. What an opportunity then, for me to expand my musical universe.

Although there were long-standing connections between individual band members, this foursome had never worked together. In a music that emphasizes improvisation, that’s not as daunting a prospect as it seems. It also helps to have four nimble musical thinkers with chops. I suspect that as the tour continued on to Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Buffalo and Ottawa, the band grew into an even deeper understanding of Richard’s vision.

Richards is one of the rising stars of the trumpet with a big vision for what is possible. For this concert, she collaborated with flavor and fragrance artist Sean Raspert, who created scratch and sniff cards that corresponded to the compositions. Richards also screened abstract video by Vipal Monga that played above the heads of the quartet during the first part of the performance.

Beyond engagement with our other senses, the musicians wove a tapestry of sound around loose themes provided by Richards. Despite Lopez’ muscular pulse, the band leisurely explored nuggets of melody with an open-ended mindset. Richards’ tone was gorgeous and full-bodied, with flecks of bravado and vulnerability in equal measure.

Carney seemed to hold back, only occasionally asserting himself within the group. His shining moments came during a couple of passages when he had the stage to himself. I heard shades of Jarrett and Debussy in his approach, and the understated beauty of his solos served as a wonderful respite to the evening’s general busyness. Over a meal, Carney regaled us with stories of an afternoon spent with Wayne Shorter in 1999 when he won the Thelonious Monk Institute Competition in composition, as well as tales from his career as a high-end piano technician.

I’d been hearing about Brandon Lopez for a number of years. He’s a New Yorker, barely in his mid-30s, who was nurtured by William and Patricia Parker and grew up in the Arts for Art family. I love this line from his bio: “His music has been praised as ‘brutal’ (Chicago Reader) and ‘relentless’ (The New York Times).” He playing wasrelentless, emphatic and physical, as well as quite musical. Small of stature, Lopez’ kinetic approach to the bass reminded my wife, Priscilla Page, of Joe Fonda, an apt comparison.

Max Jaffe, a member of vocalist Amirtha Kidambi’s Elder Ones and a collaborator with Jessica Pavone and Peter Evans, received his Masters from CalArts last year. Richards and Carney also have degrees from this venerated hotbed of innovation. They laughed about the irony that the school’s two most important benefactors are Walt Disney and Herb Alpert. Jaffe is a strong player with just the right amount of off-beat to make things interesting. He has devoted a lot of his recent energy into combining drumming with various digital technologies. Hopefully we’ll get to hear that side of his talent soon.

I’m so thankful I got to meet and share the music of Steph Richards, James Carney, Brandon Lopez and Max Jaffe, four creative souls who I now know. Connecting the dots, making the connections, expanding the known universe through music and love, that’s what motivates me. “Peace and rhythm,” as my friends Andujar and DJ Bongohead put it. I feel grateful every day that I am in a position to facilitate rich exchanges of music and fellowship between artists and my friends and neighbors.

The Mary LaRose Ensemble Does Dolphy

Brooklyn Dodger manager Leo Durocher famously hypothesized that “Nice guys finish last.” Well, at least in the jazz world I inhabit, the opposite is true. Vocalist Mary LaRose and clarinetist Jeff Lederer are two of the nicest, most creative people I know. They top my list of life-affirming artists.

The two – partners on and off the bandstand – led a quintet on Saturday, October 9thin support of LaRose’s new release, Out Here-The Music of Eric Dolphy, at the Institute for the Musical Arts in Goshen. They were joined by vibraphonist Patricia Brennan, bassist Michael Formanek and drummer Matt Wilson in the second concert of Pioneer Valley Jazz Shares’ 10th season.

LaRose, who was born and raised and still lives in Brooklyn, wrote lyrics to tunes associated with the great reedman Eric Dolphy. Her lyrics were simple and sly. In 245, named for Dolphy’s Brooklyn residence, she sings: “And if the walls could talk at 245/what a story they would tell/so much music found its way here/conversations improvised there/music flowing free/Carlton was the place to be/and if I could have been that fly on the wall spying at 245/oh how much pleasure that would bring me/have that music going through me/it was so alive what was at 245.” And later in the song, she brings us back to today’s reality: “Now streets are paved with gold here and money talks/now Fort Greene is gentrified/and million-dollar condos rule there/priceless music filled the air here/but money can’t compete with what did happen on that street/on that street/245 Carlton Ave.”

LaRose was an unassuming muse, and happily shared the spotlight with her ensemble. This was not an evening of vocals and accompaniment; her voice occupied equal status with the rest of her band, and she shared with them a rhythmic suppleness and ease of delivery that won over the 70 listeners in IMA’s homey barn. Over the course of the concert, LaRose smartly incorporated short duo passages with each of her fellow musicians, allowing her to showcase her instrument. To my ears, Sheila Jordan serves as a reference point. Both are storytellers at heart and fearless improvisers with spot on intonation. As Jordan followed her lodestar, Charlie Parker, LaRose is hitched to Eric Dolphy.

Lederer, who eschewed his tenor sax for the clarinet and bass clarinet, wrote the arrangements for compositions recorded by Dolphy on landmark records of the early 1960s. (Dolphy’s passing at age 36 in 1964, remains a major jazz tragedy.) None of these tunes have entered the standard repertoire, but for those of us who grew up listening to Far Cry and Out to Lunch! and absorbing Dolphy’s massive contribution to the music of Mal Waldron, Charles Mingus, Booker Little, Oliver Nelson and John Coltrane, the melodies were recognized instantly.

The rhythm section was superb. It is always welcome to hear friends and established masters like Matt Wilson and Michael Formanek, but hearing a consequential newcomer like Patricia Brennancertainly provides a special jolt. Brennan grew up in Mexico playing Latin percussion and European classical music, and has since broadened her horizons considerably, playing with Matt Mitchell, Meredith Monk, John Hollenbeck and Mary Halvorson, with whom she just recorded. In fact, Brennan’s array of delays and bent notes, made possible with pedals and other gizmos, reminded me of the effects Halvorson achieves on guitar. She used four-mallets to rip off complex syncopated lines and string bows to conjure worlds of billowy electronic sounds.

Lederer reminded us that Dolphy’s parents were from Panama, then launched into “Music Matador,” featuring a deep Latin groove that supported a joyous melody. LaRose turned “GW,” which Dolphy wrote in tribute to Gerald Wilson, into a withering indictment of Chris Christie’s shameful political stunt to create traffic on the George Washington Bridge to hurt a Democrat.

The Jazz Shares concert, and one the previous evening at Firehouse 12 in New Haven, not only served as a CD release event, but a book launch, too. Last year, Priscilla Page and I commissioned Mary to contribute to an online project honoring Dr. Yusef Lateef on the centenary of his birth. The five portraits she produced of Brother Yusef spurred a pandemic-fueled flurry of work, depicting other saxophone masters of the 1960s. The result is “Out There,” a beautiful series of portraits using pastels on black paper.

On both sides of the bandstand there was genuine appreciation that the feedback loop, long interrupted by the pandemic, had been reestablished. I thought about the human connection that lies at the heart of this music, and remembered our first encounter with Jeff and Mary, a 2012 Magic Triangle Series concert featuring Shakers ‘n Bakers. That project, a deep dive into the praise songs of Mother Ann Lee and the Shakers, took place at the Unitarian Meeting House in Northampton. The concert included audience members ascending to the pulpit to read or sing phrases taken from Shaker “gift” songs while the band (Miles Griffith, Jamie Saft, Chris Lightcap, Allison Miller and Jeff and Mary) riffed behind them. That cherished memory cemented my admiration for the people-powered music making of Mary LaRose and Jeff Lederer. Two first-place nice guys.