The ultimate goal for most composers is to make the complicated seem effortless. It takes a great deal of individual talent and an incredible amount of trust in your ensemble mates to accomplish this feat. Pianist Russ Lossing’s brilliant work has long been appreciated for its complex blend of rhythmic, harmonic and chance elements that are highly approachable and resonant.
Lossing’s latest recording, Metamorphism, is an extension of his continually evolving compositional identity. Here he presents eight original compositions, each written with its own particular strategy for interplay among a stalwart ensemble of longtime collaborators. It is only with musicians with whom he has established a deeply felt musical connection that this music could actually be realized.
The members of the Quartet have been regular collaborators with Lossing for decades. Each member of the ensemble is a unique instrumentalist with a broad palette and ability to play many styles without conforming to established sounds. Lossing met Michael Sarin some thirty years ago when the drummer moved to New York City from Seattle. Sarin’s pairing with bassist John Hébert, already a longtime associate, provides a variety of rhythmic and harmonic feels necessary for Lossing’s pieces. Lossing was a member of Loren Stillman’s first recorded ensemble, when the saxophonist was only 14 years old, and their musical affinity has grown exponentially over the past 25 years.
The ensemble is crucial to the success of the pieces. The open, impressionistic sensation of Lossing’s tunes has been one that he has always aimed for. The only method of achieving a sensation of naturalness is by allowing the other players a freedom of choice, which means avoiding the temptation to over arrange the pieces. The key is to leave the technical stuff in the background, while focusing on ensemble communication and expression.
The recording begins with the insistent “Three Treasures,” a piece that utilizes call and response patterns based on a theme that repeats itself after variations over a dramatic pedal point in Hébert’s bass. The oldest and most difficult piece is “Sojourn” which features a very technical polyrhythmic motif and a melody that lays across bar lines, making for a particular out-of-time feel. Stillman’s singing alto and Sarin’s flexible drumming style are vital to the success of the performance. The title track is written as a tribute to, and in the intervallic composing style of, the late great drummer/composer Paul Motian. The title of the piece is not only a metaphor for the metamorphosis of an improvisational piece, like a stone - through heat and pressure, it was also Mr. Motian’s email address.
Unlike many of the other pieces presented here, the thematic “Mai” sticks to its tricky compositional form and changes rather than going free during improvisations, an aspect of jazz music performance that is amazing especially as it is carried out in the composer’s intended floating style, as it is done here. “Pileatus” is a short, rhythmic piece, used here as a drum feature for Sarin, and whose title is derived from the scientific name of the Pileated Woodpecker, a species that is common in Lossing’s backyard. The quietly introspective “Blind Horizon” is a tribute to the late pianist/composer Andrew Hill. The piece takes a single idiosyncratic chord that Hill played repeatedly throughout his career to generate the melodic content while transforming the arrangement from structure, where Stillman shines over harmonic changes, into an open, spacy place reminiscent of, but not owing to, Hill’s spacious style.
The dancing melody for “June Jig” was worked from an improvisation that Lossing recorded into his computer with a MIDI keyboard, which was then notated and reworked a number of times by hand and through the notation software Finale until it became this dynamic ensemble piece. The program ends with “Canto 24,” a piece that uses a 13 measure cycle, each measure with a different time signature (much like in Indian classical music), with each instrument playing the unison melody until the cycle breaks, allowing individual improvisations and only bringing back the melody with Stillman at the end while Hébert and Sarin continue to improvise.
Russ Lossing’s music reminds listeners of the importance of both a singular approach to composing and the importance of group interplay in order to carry the performances out. Metamorphism captures Lossing’s musical principles through spirited and ethereal readings from his incredible Quartet.
1. Three Treasures 08:54
2. Sojourn 08:13
3. Metamorphism (for Paul Motian) 12:24
4. Mai 10:51
5. Pileatus 02:30
6. Blind Horizon (for Andrew Hill) 09:21
7. June Jig 06:33
8. Canto 24 09:30
Russ Lossing - piano
Loren Stillman - alto saxophone
John Hébert - bass
Michael Sarin - drums
