Ewart, Douglas R

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    Review: A Contemporary Music Group’s Next Era Begins

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    George E. Lewis’s tenure with the International Contemporary Ensemble began with a tribute to the multitalented artist Douglas R. Ewart.Some artists earn the “multi-hyphenate” label by doing two or three things. But Douglas R. Ewart works on a whole other level.That much was clear when this composer, visual artist, poet, multi-instrumentalist and instrument-maker put on a true multimedia event at the Chelsea Factory on Friday night. He gave a thrilling tour of his varied creativity in the company of a violist, cellist, bassoonist and two percussionists from the International Contemporary Ensemble — whose new leader, George E. Lewis, organized the concert, making his curatorial debut with the group.In the lobby were three of Ewart’s sculptures (including one dedicated to the jazz musician Eric Dolphy), and inside the hall hung five of his paintings (including one titled “Rasta in Sun Ra”). Underneath those canvases, the concert featured some shimmering, percussive work from Ewart, 76, himself — on a tall wooden staff outfitted with a sequence of Bundt cake pans, which he called “The George Floyd Bunt Staff.” (More on the chiaroscuro effect of that Bundt/bunt ambiguity later.)From left, the International Contemporary Ensemble players Wendy Richman, Aliya Ultan and Rebekah Heller.Jeenah Moon for The New York TimesAlso on offer was Ewart’s piping, ecstatic approach to the sopranino saxophone, informed by bebop and the avant-garde alike. And there was plenty of meditative yet tuneful chamber music writing for the full ensemble, which the composer sometimes underlined with performances on a series of flutes.Elsewhere, Ewart gave somber, spoken-word testaments to Floyd’s memory, in addition to more slyly humorous commentaries on contemporary discussions of race. One such aperçu involved his interrogation of the phrase “unapologetically Black,” with him saying, “I am not unapologetically anything, because when I say that I have already apologized.”Other compositions offered space for Ewart to celebrate the practice of “sound sifting” — which he defined as a dedicated process of studying music’s mysteries — alongside playing from the ensemble members that emphatically endorsed his poetry’s quality of exultation.Clockwise, from top left: Ewart’s “Eye of Horus” (2017-18); “Sonic Stroller” (2006); his elaborately decorated performance outfit, which has bells stuffed in its pockets; and “Eric Dolphy Sonic Dread” (2017).It sounds like there’s a lot going on here. But while undeniably jam-packed and charged with grave themes, the evening progressed with a sense of unhurried equanimity. That was in large part thanks to the figure cut by Ewart; when he paced the stage to grab a new instrument, you could hear bells — tucked away in the pockets of his colorful, homemade concert suit — jangling peaceably.The International Contemporary Ensemble had commissioned the evening’s first through-composed piece, “Songs and Stories of Hopes, Dreams and Visions,” and throughout, the players were on Ewart’s same wavelength: intense yet generous. At the outset of the concert’s first half — a 40-minute set that included three works played without a break — the percussionists Nathan Davis (on vibraphone) and Clara Warnaar (on marimba) collaborated on dreamy, interlocking mallet-instrument patterns that recalled past Ewart projects that have involved choirs of similar instruments.Rebekah Heller, the ensemble’s bassoonist, responded to the upward-swooping graphic notation of “Red Hills” with a peppery excitement that rivaled earlier interpretations of it. (This piece was previously documented during a 1981 concert in Detroit, which has recently been reissued digitally on Bandcamp.)

    Beneath Detroit / Ewart . Barefield . Tabal Trio by Geodesic DisquesEwart, center, performed spoken-word portions of the show alongside musicians including Ultan, left, on cello, and Heller, on bassoon.Jeenah Moon for The New York TimesThat members of the International Contemporary Ensemble could stack up so well against the recorded legacy of an artist like Ewart was no small thing. Credit also to Lewis, the ensemble’s new artistic director. This pathbreaking trombonist, composer and scholar literally wrote the book on the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, the organization that provided schooling to Ewart in the 1960s, after he immigrated from Jamaica. (Ewart later served as chairman of that influential organization.)During the intermission on Friday, Lewis interviewed Ewart, a longtime collaborator, onstage. They amiably referred to moments in their history together, which includes a memorable 1979 duo recording on the Black Saint imprint.Given that relationship, Lewis was an ideal figure to extract more from Ewart about the ambiguities only hinted at in the performance’s staging and program notes. Such as: Why was the percussion instrument that Ewart employed during “Homage to George Floyd” billed as “The George Floyd Bunt Staff,” when it was clearly built from a series of Bundt pans? Channeling the serious-and-witty ingenuity of his music, Ewart responded with a sports analogy. He noted that Floyd’s death had catalyzed protests that had helped the national conversation to advance, like the sacrifice bunt in baseball.Nathan Davis, left, and Clara Warnaar on percussion. The performers played against a backdrop of visual artworks by Ewart.Jeenah Moon for The New York TimesSuch poetic abstraction risks sounding flip out of context, but the qualities of Ewart’s compositional practice made the gesture seem more like an authentic celebration of multiplicity and invention. The variety of tones he elicited from this instrument helped make the ambit of the tribute clear. When rapidly twirling it, and dragging the edges of a particular pan against a drumstick, he created a haunting, skittering effect — a restless signal of warning. When striking it directly, he could produce profoundly resonant gong-like sounds.This elegant shift from the grave to the exultant was heard again during the finale of the concert’s second half, which reached a climax with a fully notated piece for the ensemble players, “Truth is Power,” in which Ewart improvised on sopranino saxophone.It was a raucous, exciting conclusion to the show. And it was just a taste of what Lewis’s directorship of the International Contemporary Ensemble could bring. How many other artists like Ewart might benefit from having their larger works receive this kind of attention? The possibilities are extensive, and tantalizing.Douglas R. Ewart and the International Contemporary EnsemblePerformed on Friday at Chelsea Factory, Manhattan. More

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      Best Jazz Albums of 2021

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      In a year of continued uncertainty, musicians held their colleagues, and listeners, close.Esperanza Spalding, Pharoah Sanders and Jason Moran made some of the year’s strongest jazz releases.Clockwise from left: Will Matsuda for The New York Times; Sam Polcer for The New York Times; Heather Sten for The New York TimesEven the big-statement albums made by jazz musicians this year had a feeling of intense closeness: of large-scale problems being worked out within an enclosure, with limited tools and just a few compatriots. No surprise there, I guess. Twelve months ago, the year began with promise, but we’ve hardly returned to old comforts. Rather than breaking out, we spent 2021 getting used to a feeling of unquiet, making the most of being mostly alone. The best improvised music of the year understood that, and met us there.1. Pharoah Sanders, Floating Points and the London Symphony Orchestra, ‘Promises’Why fight it: This year’s big talker in the experimental-music world ended up being just as powerful as we’d hoped. Not really jazz, not exactly classical, definitely not electronic music per se, “Promises” is the first-ever collaboration between Pharoah Sanders, the octogenarian spiritual-jazz eminence, and Floating Points, nee Sam Shepherd, a 30-something British composer and polymath. They each use music to get at questions of healing — Shepherd typically as a solo musician, Sanders as a communitarian — and although “Promises” was recorded before the coronavirus pandemic began, it arrived a year into lockdown, just when we needed it most.2. Jason Moran, ‘The Sound Will Tell You’A pianist, visual artist, curator, writer and guiding force in jazz, Jason Moran has been quietly releasing albums on his Bandcamp over the past few years, after ending a lengthy relationship with Blue Note Records. He doesn’t have a publicist, and barely self-promotes beyond his personal social media feeds, but these releases are worth seeking out. Moran recorded “The Sound Will Tell You” alone in January, just as he was mounting an exhibition of deep-blue works on paper at Luhring Augustine in Tribeca. This is an intimate and tender, harmonically lush piano record, heavily inspired by the writings of Toni Morrison, blurred occasionally by electronic effects but always clear in its melodic intent. (Listen to “The Sound Will Tell You” on Bandcamp.)3. James Brandon Lewis Red Lily Quintet, ‘Jesup Wagon’The tenor saxophonist James Brandon Lewis tends to blow hard into his horn, but he likes to save up extra breath in the bottom of his lungs, so that his notes don’t necessarily fade, but sometimes grow louder and stronger over time. It’s a way of broadcasting patience and urgency all at once, and reminding you that he’s in control. After years of mounting buzz, Lewis cashed in his chips with “Jesup Wagon.” The album’s seven original compositions — composed for an unorthodox quintet, with the life of George Washington Carver in mind — are built around yawning, polyphonic melodies (Lewis’s saxophone intertwined with Kirk Knuffke’s cornet) and layers of rhythm stacked underneath (William Parker’s bass and guimbri, Christopher Hoffman’s cello and Chad Taylor’s drums and mbira).4. Patricia Brennan, ‘Maquishti’Twinkling and mesmeric, the debut album from this Mexican-born, New York-based vibraphonist and marimba player mixes composed material with tracks that were improvised in the studio whole cloth. Some are retouched with echoey, scrambling effects, but none is particularly lush or layered. Moving way outside the standard language of jazz vibraphone, Patricia Brennan has created something like a landscape of vapor, full of wandering melodies lost in the fog.Patricia Brennan’s “Maquishti” blends composed tracks with improvisation.Noel Brennan5. Adam O’Farrill, ‘Visions of Your Other’Weaving, pulsing, fine-grain complexity, intense focus: They’re all at play in the trumpeter Adam O’Farrill’s tangled compositions. On “Visions of Your Other,” his third album with his quartet, Stranger Days (featuring Xavier Del Castillo on tenor saxophone, Walter Stinson on bass and Zack O’Farrill on drums), the group slips into the music like a perfectly tailored suit.Adam O’Farrill’s “Visions of Your Other,” his third album with his quartet, Stranger Days, is a study of intense focus.Camilo Fuentealba for The New York Times6. Sam Gendel and Sam Wilkes, ‘Music for Saxofone & Bass Guitar More Songs’Sam Gendel, a saxophonist, and Sam Wilkes, a bassist, are millennial pals who seem equally interested in using music for the purposes of comfort and disruption. In 2018, they put out “Music for Saxofone and Bass Guitar,” a stealthy little album that might have spluttered out of a vat where time, space, genre and the titular instruments themselves had all melted down into a roux. Recorded live to tape and released on Bandcamp, it became an underground obsession. Their follow-up LP, “More Songs,” contains nine additional tracks in the same vein, and it’s at least as hypnotic as the first.Sam Gendel and Sam Wilkes followed up their 2018 release this year.Marcella Cytrynowicz7. William Parker, ‘Migration of Silence Into and Out of the Tone World’The bassist, composer and organizer William Parker’s five-decade career sends a galvanizing message: Yes, you can do it all. You can play in and outside of any improvising style you choose; you can lead and you can follow; you can play the bass like a heavy rhythm instrument while coaxing grace and lyric from it. “Migration of Silence Into and Out of the Tone World” is not one new LP, but in fact 10, each featuring Parker’s original music recorded with a different collaborator or band. So it works as a measure of his enormous range, and an index of his network on the downtown avant-garde — a scene that would hardly be the same without him.8. Sara Serpa and Emmanuel Iduma, ‘Intimate Strangers’Sara Serpa, a Portuguese singer whose voice is both small and bold, has spent the past few years immersing herself in the shocking history of Portugal’s colonial misadventures on the African continent, and responding through music. On “Intimate Strangers,” she collaborates with Emmanuel Iduma, a Nigerian memoirist and critic, who has written in evocative detail about the experiences of migrant laborers on the continent today. Through him, Serpa found a way to explore the present-day legacy of colonialism, while usefully decentering her own perspective. But the music remains distinctly Serpa’s: cool-toned, vocal-driven, abstract and yet immediately beautiful.9. Wadada Leo Smith/Douglas R. Ewart/Mike Reed, ‘Sun Beams of Shimmering Light’Nearing 80, Wadada Leo Smith retains one of the fullest and most arresting trumpet sounds around. But playing alongside him means getting in touch with silence, too, as if there might be energy coming from his horn that hasn’t yet become sound but still needs room to breathe. The saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist Douglas R. Ewart — who, like Smith, moved to Chicago in the 1960s and became an early member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians — brings a similarly restful approach to improvisation. Working with the younger Chicagoan drummer Mike Reed, Smith and Ewart created an album of expanse and vision that lives up to its name. (Listen to “Sun Beams of Shimmering Light” on Bandcamp.)10. Esperanza Spalding, ‘Songwrights Apothecary Lab’“Songwrights Apothecary Lab” takes the form of an album here, but it began as more than that (and it’s likely to continue as more, too). Esperanza Spalding, the bassist, vocalist and self-described “songwright,” held residencies in New York and her native Oregon during the pandemic, bringing together a mix of healers and artists in search of new and therapeutic methods of making music. Each of the LP’s 12 tracks is a “formwela,” blending lyrical and wordless vocals, instrumental textures and hooks that condense out of thin air.Esperanza Spalding held residencies during the pandemic.Will Matsuda for The New York Times More

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      Phoebe Bridgers Reworks Paul McCartney, and 11 More New Songs

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      Hear tracks by Andra Day, London Grammar, José González and others.Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.Paul McCartney featuring Phoebe Bridgers, ‘Seize the Day’Don’t take Paul McCartney’s enduring gifts — natural melody, succinctly surprising lyrics, sly chord progressions, tidy arrangements — for granted. Other songwriters don’t. Lest anyone has, the 78-year-old Sir Paul enlisted younger admirers (Beck, St. Vincent, Blood Orange, Anderson .Paak, Josh Homme, Dominic Fike) to rework the songs from his 2020 solo-in-the-studio album, “McCartney III,” as the new “McCartney III Imagined.” Phoebe Bridgers took on “Seize the Day,” a manifesto of unironic good intentions: “I’m OK with a sunny day when the world deserves to be bright.” She brings her own spirit of hushed discovery to the song, keeping McCartney’s march tempo but toning down his electric guitars. She ends her version with church bells, like a blessing. JON PARELESLucy Dacus, ‘Hot & Heavy’Since joining forces as boygenius, two-thirds of the band, Phoebe Bridgers and Julien Baker, have released searing solo albums that took their already strong songwriting to the next level. Now, it appears to be Lucy Dacus’s turn. “Hot & Heavy” begins in a synthesized glow, for a moment seeming like it might be a continuation of the stark sound she conjured on the recently released “Thumbs.” But it doesn’t take long for “Hot & Heavy” to kick into a gallop, coming alive with chiming guitars and gleaming pop-rock flourishes that recall “Full Moon Fever”-era Tom Petty. “You used to be so sweet,” Dacus sings on this tale of stinging nostalgia, “Now you’re a firecracker on a crowded street.” LINDSAY ZOLADZFiona Apple, ‘Love More’Ten years ago, Sharon Van Etten released her first great album, “Epic,” an enduringly wrenching account of a troubled relationship’s dissolution. To commemorate its anniversary, an impressive and eclectic array of artists — Lucinda Williams, Courtney Barnett, Shamir — contributed to a covers collection called “Epic Ten.” The ultimate co-sign, though, comes from the indomitable Fiona Apple, who offers her own interpretation of the album’s beautiful closing track, “Love More.” Van Etten’s version was a sparsely poignant dirge, buoyed by gentle waves of harmonium chords. Apple, instead, anchors hers to an almost chant-like rhythm accompanied by playfully layered backing vocal runs — though her delivery of the song’s verses provides the smoldering intensity these lyrics call for. “Chained to the wall of our room,” goes the opening line. Leave it to Fiona to fetch the bolt cutters. ZOLADZAndra Day, ‘Phone Dies’“We can feel these vibes until my phone dies,” Andra Day offers, casually pitting the promise of romance against limited battery life. In Anderson .Paak’s blithe, tricky production, a frisky Brazilian beat carries Day’s multitracked vocals through a maze of chromatic chords that gives the illusion of climbing higher and higher, all the way to a sudden, giggly end. PARELESTirzah, ‘Send Me’It’s been three years since the London artist and Mica Levi collaborator Tirzah released her hypnotic debut album “Devotion,” but the new single “Send Me” transports the listener right back to that singularly chill head space. “Send Me” is built from simple materials — a repeated guitar lick, a hi-hat loop and Tirzah’s sultry, Sade-like vocals — but combined they somehow create a dense, enveloping atmosphere. “Let me heal and now I’m sure, now I’m sure,” Tirzah sings, her words seeming to turn to vapor on the exhales. It’s a whole vibe. ZOLADZSaweetie and Drakeo the Ruler, ‘Risky’It’s only April, but Saweetie is already wishing you a very pretty summer. Her new single “Risky” is at once effortless and exuberant, patiently waiting for whenever the weather permits you to roll the windows down. Drakeo the Ruler’s murmuring flow provides a perfect counterpoint to Saweetie’s bombast (“All this ice drippin’ on my body like a runny nose”), while a minimalist beat provides plenty of space for her personality to shine like a freshly painted ride. ZOLADZMick Jagger with Dave Grohl, ‘Eazy Sleazy’For Mick Jagger, quarantine fatigue has curdled into sarcastic exasperation. “Eazy Sleazy” is a late-pandemic rant, a stomping, mocking checklist of sloppy rhymes and coronavirus-year phenomena, from “Cancel all the tours/football’s fake applause” to “TikTok stupid dance” to “Way too much TV” to wacky conspiracy theories. Dave Grohl, an accomplished student of classic rock, reconstituted the full Rolling Stones sound behind Jagger’s rhythm guitar, and every few lines there’s a scream tossed into the mix. The chorus looks forward to a “freaky” reopening, when “It’ll only be a memory you’re trying to remember to forget”; this song will be a throwaway souvenir. PARELESLondon Grammar, ‘Lord It’s a Feeling’Hannah Reid, London Grammar’s singer, plays a not-so-impartial observer in “Lord It’s a Feeling.” She stacks up the misdeeds of a friend’s callous, cheating lover — “I saw the way you laughed behind her back” — before revealing, “I can admit that I have been right here myself.” A decorous string orchestra backs her at first, as she sings in her purest tones. But when her own stake becomes clear, a beat kicks in, her voice hardens and the observer becomes the accuser. PARELESJosé González, ‘Visions’It’s a small world. José González, born in Sweden to Argentine parents, carries on a British tradition of folky, meditative singer-songwriters. “Visions,” built from vocal harmonies and acoustic-guitar picking, takes an eternal perspective on “sentient beings” who should “look at the magic of reality/while accepting the honesty that we can’t know for sure what’s next.” Accompanied by his guitar drone, distant electronics and bird song, he notes, as a kind of mantra, “We are here together.” PARELESLea Bertucci, ‘An Arc of the Horizon’Place is central to the music of Lea Bertucci, a multi-instrumentalist and sound artist whose recordings often spring from questions about how physical environments express themselves through sound. But her work isn’t meant to just document the sonic qualities of a place; through a process of layering and abstraction, Bertucci gives us something closer to the residue of an experience or a vanished memory. On her new self-released album, “A Visible Length of Light,” ambient recordings she captured in New York, Rio de Janeiro, California and Nebraska haunt tracks featuring lightly droning organ, bass clarinet, wood flute and saxophone. It’s not clear where the sounds on “An Arc of the Horizon” were captured, but instead the music — spatial more than melodic — becomes an environment of its own. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOWadada Leo Smith, Douglas R. Ewart and Mike Reed, ‘Super Moon Rising’Rustle, resonance and attentive listening are the coins of the realm when the trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, the multi-reedist Douglas R. Ewart and the drummer Mike Reed come together. They’ve performed as a trio only rarely, but all three are improvisers and organizers with roots on the Chicago avant-garde and histories of involvement in the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. “Super Moon Rising” is the centerpiece of their new album, “Sun Beans of Shimmering Light,” which connects to a long tradition of recordings by AACM-affiliated musicians that treat sparse and spacious free improvising as a style unto itself. RUSSONELLOSpirit of the Beehive, ‘Rapid & Complete Recovery’“Rapid & Complete Recovery” passes, briefly, as one of the milder, more approachable songs in Spirit of the Beehive’s catalog of dense, overloaded, compulsively morphing and often nerve-racking songs. It’s from the Philadelphia band’s new album, “Entertainment, Death,” and with its jazz-tinged opening bass vamp and acoustic-guitar syncopations it could pass for Laurel Canyon pop-folk — if not for its nagging high synthesizer tones, its cranked-up drums, its swerve into spoken words and the way instruments and vocals echo and melt at the end. “No limitations, you know what I’m after,” Zack Schwartz and Rivka Ravede calmly sing, perhaps as a partial explanation. PARELES More