Maxwell Gualtieri, For Los Angeles

It's time for a bit of very electric solo guitar from Maxwell Gualtieri, specifically his album For Los Angeles (pfMentum 088). This consists of two long segments that capitalize on extreme distortion, feedback, multiple effects and/or unconventional playing techniques for extended noise-pitch real-time extensions.

It may be a bit abrasive to those not into the extreme avant guitar realm. Some may run out of the room screaming, in fact, sometime shortly after they put it on. For those who dare, however, there is much to hear and experience.

What strikes me with this program is the sense of structure to be had among the chaotic noise walls. There is periodicity to be heard; there are recurring elements; there is a sense of total adventure in the complex sonic structures created.

And there is contrast. Part one, "A Dance," has noisy density; part two, "Possession/Blossom," is much quieter, more introspective, more concerned with delicate extended string manipulations and unconventional techniques, less concerned with effects masses.

I find it quite interesting. If you like a totally out sort of electric guitar, Maxwell Gualtieri has his own vision and adds to the possibilities in differing ways.

Gregg Belisle-Chi, Tenebrae

Is there nothing new under the sun? Ironically that expression was uttered at the very moment when catalclysmic change was about to transform the world. So yes, there is always something new under the sun, especially where music is concerned.

Take Gregg Belisle-Chi, electric guitarist-composer of great imagination. His album Tenebrae (Songlines 1613-2) finds him alone with his guitar, some spacious audio headroom and in three out of seven numbers, the hauntingly appropriate vocals of one Chelsea Crabtree.

Gregg gives us some very memorable ambient, harmonically informed, melodically acute numbers that show him a guitarist and musicsmith of singular originality. Sure, this may remind you at times of some of the ECM guitar classics, but then, no, it goes forward into a special place.

This is music of great finesse, now and again real song form, logic, symmetry and touchingly ruminating spaciousness. There are some very magnetic soundscapes too.

From a technical point of view Gregg has a schooled way of picking through, among other things, but the technique is consistently subordinated to the musical ideas at hand.

This is music that, little by little, grabs you and does not let go. I am entranced by it.

Daniel Fortin, Brinks

Today another brick in the wall of good sounds out there to be heard. Consider contemporary jazz bassist-composer Daniel Fortin and his album Brinks (Fresh Sound New Talent 473). OK, so with all the new releases coming out weekly, why do I think this one deserves you ear? This may be review number four-thousand and something on these blogs, but I as always only pick out the ones I think you might want to hear, that I myself like. Why this one? I'll try and explain.

Start with the instrumentation/players. It's Daniel on acoustic and electric bass, David French on tenor sax, Michael Davidson on vibraphone and Fabio Ragnelli on drums. When you think about it, you may realize that such an instrumentation is not as common as perhaps it might be. More importantly Fortin has chosen his mates wisely and given them music that gives life to who they are. Davidson is a complete vibist harmonically and line-wise; French plays a straightforwardly clear-toned tenor that gives us the compositional impact of the melody and comes up with nicely turned solos that follow the changes but not in any cliched way; Ragnelli plays often enough quietly but busily in a loosely swinging fashion that is filled with good percussive ideas.

This is foremost an expression of Daniel Fortin, his involved and often brilliant complexities, his nicely wrought tunes. If you listen just to the bass once through, you will appreciate the artistry there, because it is very present! He is something.

In the end everybody contributes with good playing. And the whole stands out as slightly cool but never vapid, always full of content.

That all makes this one stand out as a recording of definite merit!

Daniel Barbiero, Cristiano Bocci, Vootos

Today we consider an unusual and interesting offering, a series of eight electroacoustic works born of some accomplished and original acoustic bass solos by Daniel Barbiero and their deft electronic manipulation and transformation by sound artist Cristiano Bocci. Vootos (self-released) (Greek for "returning home") is the result.

The project was accomplished via long-distance, by audio files traveling back and forth via the internet, with Barbiero in the USA creating foundational bass solos that Bocci received in Italy and constructed/deconstructed into soundscapes. One piece involves a bass duet with Barbiero on double bass and Bocci on six-string electric bass.

All that having been said, what matters ultimately of course is that Daniel creates intrinsically interesting arco and pizzicato bass source sounds that Cristiano re-narrates into an ambient flow sequence--a set of open, multi-part, always sonically provocative electroacoustic poems, a contrabass ensemble in space, so to say.

The music works well in creating a contrabass orchestra/chamber ensemble of sounds that have vivid sound-color-timbral singularities.

Those who eschew electronic manipulation may not appreciate such music on principal. But those who open themselves to the possibilities that lie outside real-time reality will find this very well done and musically alive, and increasingly interesting the more one hears it.

Recommended for sure!

Seckou Keita, 22 Strings

There is a West African legend, an oral history about the origins of the kora, a many-stringed harp with a highly developed instrumental practice centered around it. According to the story, back many centuries ago the spirits of the savannah constructed the first kora and gave it to the griot Jali Mady Wuleng, who mastered it and gained renown. The original instrument had 22 strings, so the story goes. When Wuleng died his fellow griots took up the instrument but removed one string in his memory. And so the instrument thenceforth was standardized with its 21 strings. But the 22-stringed kora tradition lived on in its place of origin, southern Senegal and northern Guinea.

Seckou Keita is a living master of this, the 22-string kora. He is a griot in an illustrious line of professional traditional musicians of southern Senegal and the heir to the 22-string kora tradition. The CD 22 Strings (ARC EUCD2585) gives us a full program of his solo playing, at times enhanced by his ornate and very musical vocals.

The kora music tradition of West Africa is highly developed, as anyone familiar with it will attest. The best players rival in technique and artistry some of the finest instrumentalists in the world. Seckou Keita exemplifies that tradition. He is a master among masters. The ten pieces on the album are mostly compositions of his own making; a few are traditional. His playing shows the highly evolved, ornate style to perfection. The tradition often calls for the counterpoint of an ostinato pattern and a ornate solo style in the second line, and when called for a third vocal line added atop all that.

Seckou Keita has fully absorbed that tradition and gives us some of the most involved solo work of any contemporary master. At times there is less of the ostinato and more in an expressive fanfare-like virtuosity. Other times he locks into a strong riffing groove and uses the entire range of the instrument to express all that he feels.

It is an extremely well-recorded album that showcases his mastery in great depth and with a fullness that puts him at the forefront of world virtuosity. But make no mistake, this is African music to the core, with a rhythmic and melodic vitality that has deep roots yet also shoots highly upward with a fully branched trunk of great beauty, so to speak.

It is a very stunning album that must be heard by anyone with ears to hear it. All those who appreciate great string playing will fall under its spell. It is absolutely stunning! Seckou Keita should not be missed!

Modou Toure & Ramon Goose, The West African Blues Project

Senegalese music master Modou Toure and British blues guitarist Ramon Goose create a very hip melding of stylistic universes on their album The West African Blues Project (ARC Music EUCD 2591). It is a very engaging and successful on all levels, combining the West African folk and Afrobeat grooves with traditional percussion plus drums, bass, and the fine blues-rock-Afro guitar work of Goose, in a rootsy blues meets contemporary African style. Toure handles the vocals and percussion throughout and is exceptionally strong, with overdubbed call-and-response segments and impressive lead vocalizing. Each song has much going for it. There are no fillers.

Toure comes out of the legacy of the Toure Kunda band. His father is Ousmane Toure. Goose made an impact on the UK blues scene as a member of NuBlues and went on to produce some acclaimed blues albums in the US.

The music is a cooperative venture, with the compositions showing strong African foundations and the blues element sometimes coming to the forefront, other times an underlying constant via the magnetic Goose guitar style.

It all works in impressive, moving ways. The grooves are irresistible and the blues element is a natural fit with the West African contemporary orientation. The two talents fashion a music that puts a smile on your face and makes you want to move. Very cool, indeed!

Flow, Duos Trios Quintet

Flow is an international collective ensemble devoted to ambient, progressive electric-acoustic jazz. I've covered their music here before on these blogs. Now there is a new one, or a new one to me anyway, Flow: Duos Trios Quintets (Intrinsic).

As before the ensemble appears in various groupings for a free-flowing eclectic program that runs from lyric improvisations to song-like sequences. The lineup for this outing is Cheryl Pyle on flute and poetic mantras, Oddrun Eickli on vocals and song melodies/lyrics (which are sometimes extremely attractive and at any rate always fluent), Axel Weiss on acoustic and electric guitars, compositional structures and a bit of electric piano and bass, Arne Hiorth on trumpet, Stan Zaslavski on piano and organ, and Sean O'Bryan Smith on bass.

They cover much ground, getting into free-tonal playing, sometimes a quasi-Brazilian feel, a bit of rock electricity, and a general anything goes kind of mellowness.

Cheryl's flute and Axel's guitars take on important roles with the stylistic resonance one might come to expect from them, happily. But then Oddrun comes in with a sort of post-Flora-Purim lyricalness, and Stan and Arne have very good moments.

The vocals every now and again might have benefited from one more take, but Oddrun has a most pleasant voice and it is in the end a minor consideration.

This may not be the very best album they have made, but it is musically substantial while being easy on the ears. Axel gives us his vision and some guitar brilliance. And it all most certainly does flow! Hear it!