Clovis Nicolas - Freedom Suite Ensuite (feat. Kenny Washington) SUNNYSIDE RECORDS January 19, 2018

The concept of freedom in music relates to many things. Bassist/composer Clovis Nicolas didn’t eschew formal jazz harmony and rhythm in the search for freedom but found a measure of added purpose and space for his bass playing in a chord-less band format without piano or guitar. Freedom Suite Ensuite is a recording of Nicolas’s efforts in this formation and a tribute to the musician who exemplifies playing free within a form, saxophone great Sonny Rollins.

Nicolas has been an important voice in the New York music scene since his arrival from Paris in the early 2000s. Having already established himself as a first-call bassist in Europe, he quickly garnered attention with many of the music’s most noted players, including Peter Bernstein, Jane Monheit, Frank Wess, Joe Magnarelli, Behn Gillece, and Samora Pinderhughes. 

The concept behind Freedom Suite Ensuite came from a succession of regular gigs that Nicolas participated in with a two saxophone, chord-less quartet. He began to find a new identity for his bass within this assemblage, including an increased influence on the music’s direction, expanded range of expression and an added focus on soloing. There were also many examples of similar ensembles whose recordings began to inspire his conception more and more, including John Coltrane and Don Cherry’s Avant Garde, Ron Carter’s Etudes and Ben Wolfe’s 13 Sketches. 

The sound identities of these ensembles were definitely in Nicolas’ s head as he chose who he would record with. Drummer Kenny Washington was a faculty member at Juilliard while Nicolas attended; Washington had a tremendous impact on Nicolas when the two played together. Nicolas’s appreciation for Washington’s breadth and taste were echoed by the master drummer, who recommended the bassist to many. Tenor saxophonist Grant Stewart has been playing with Nicolas since the bassist’s arrival in New York and proves to be an excellent foil and soloist, who is incredibly articulate within the changes. The trumpet duty is split between the introspective Brandon Lee, a supportive bandmate and focused soloist, and the fiery Bruce Harris, a soulful player suited for the recording’s blues and standard tunes.

Nicolas wanted to achieve a few things with the recording. He wanted to attempt a new version of Sonny Rollins’ s incredible “Freedom Suite,” a piece that has been done almost exclusively by saxophone. Here he wanted to add the trumpet to freshen up the piece in a respectful way. The “Suite” would be followed by the “Ensuite,” or in French, “afterwards,” the following program of original compositions and standards. 

The ensemble’s sound is established quickly on the easy-going “The 5:30 PM Dive Bar Rendezvous,” with its title and form emulating the quirkiness of Thad Jones, with a perfect ambiance for happy hour, featuring Harris on trumpet. Rollins’ s “Freedom Suite” is broken down into three parts, which provide different approaches to reorganization of the piece, separated by two “Interludes” without solos. The slightly angular blues of “Grant S” was written for the saxophonist by Nicolas and is a great soloing vehicle with some subtle changes in the harmonic form. The off kilter “Nichols and Nicolas” is inspired by Herbie Nichols’ s idiosyncratic style, the melody springing to Nicolas in an hour while the changes took nearly a month within an unusual AABC form. 

The bouncy “You or Me?” is a contrafact of the Irving Berlin standard “The Best Thing for You (Would Be Me),” while Nicolas’s “Dark and Stormy” is a noir inspired waltz, the composer imagining Montmartre in the rain. A dynamic take on Kay Swift’s “Fine and Dandy” injects energy into the program with some brilliant solos from Stewart, Harris and Washington. The bassist’s “Speak a Gentle Word” (the title is taken from Oscar Wilde’s “Ballad of Reading Gaol”) traverses three sections with separate tonal identities with lyrical solos from Stewart and Lee. The program concludes with Nicolas’ s beautifully played solo rendition of Richard Rodgers’s “Little Girl Blue.” 

Progress in jazz music has come through both addition and subtraction. While Clovis Nicolas retained the elements of formal jazz harmony, his experiments with removing piano and guitar from his ensembles enabled a different side of his playing to emerge. Freedom Suite Ensuite encapsulates all of the elements of Nicolas’s fascination with this system, from inspiration, to composition and to presentation.

1. The 5:30 PM Dive Bar Rendezvous

2. Freedom Suite Part I

3. Interlude

4. Freedom Suite Part II

5. Interlude

6. Freedom Suite Part III

7. Grant S

8. Nichols and Nicolas

9. You or Me? 04:29

10. Dark and Stormy

11. Fine and Dandy

12. Speak a Gentle Word

13. Little Girl Blue

Clovis Nicolas - bass

Brandon Lee - trumpet (except 1 & 11)

Bruce Harris - trumpet (on 1 & 11)

Grant Stewart - tenor saxophone

Kenny Washington - drums

NYC CD Release Gig @ Minton's on Feb. 8th!

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Phil Stewart: Introducing Phil Stewart - Melodius Drum (CELLAR LIVE February 9, 2018)

Too often, over the last twenty years or so, jazz has drifted from the rhythmic hipness of the blues-drenched, dance-inflected tenacity of its origins.

Regardless of ambitions toward artistic seriousness in multiple shapes and iterations, jazz began as good time fun entertainment is driven by propulsive allure. Its fundamental identity never strayed too far from an incisive swing.

No matter what name was hung on it, jazz was a music of surging uplift. Listen to Pops late-’20s sessions, Earl Hines, Bechet, Ellington, Lunceford, Basie and the astonishing depth of melodic brilliance and percussive joy that emerged when Monk and Diz, Bird and Roach revamped expressive possibilities. Bud Powell galvanized that revolution. It’s not a stretch to say that jazz gained full maturity in the era that explored tonal, metrical and harmonic options at Minton’s in the early ’40s.

This album introduces an astute percussionist in the line of Max Roach, Art Taylor, Philly Joe Jones and Louis Hayes . . . PHIL STEWART. This is his professional recorded debut, but anyone paying attention here locks into the explicit grooves delineated across this disc – sharp and beguiling, more seductive than admonitory – that carve understated trenches, each inviting welcome.

Stewart is the sort of leader who goads and teases, His beckoning rhythmic clarity shines an unobtrusive laser somewhere out beyond. That’s a good trick. Vernel Fournier made a career of such prescient stealth in his time with Ahmad Jamal. So did Jo Jones with Basie and Ed Thigpen with Oscar Peterson. Those with this album nearby probably know Phil’s brother Grant, one of the most lyrical, flat out joyful tenor saxophonists on the scene. I regard Grant as one of the three or four essential players on his instrument at present. On Bud Powell’s Dance of the Infidels, Grant takes the first sax solo. On George Coleman’s Apache, a revision of the classic blowing vehicle, Cherokee, Grant lets loose. His noir peek-a-boo swagger on Josh Benko’s The Sumo brings out a previously suppressed Charlie Rouse vibe from Grant’s willing

Monkishness. Gordon Jenkin’s chestnut, This Is All I Ask, reveals amor’s compelling amoroso. Joe Magnarelli’s trumpet virtuosity brings rare octane to the feel underway: a horn that carries its own message while, without derivation, invoking steadfast others . . . in this instance, Booker Little, Stu Williamson and Kenny Wheeler. Notice, too, Chris Byars’ sax along with Grant on Infidels and Apache. More to the point, Byars digs in with serious ferocity on his own tune. The Doctor Is In as well as on Sacha Perry’s jaunty recollection of Minton’s jam scene, Erratic. A final word about Phil Stewart’s inaugural album: Sadik Hakim’s long mis-attributed line, Eronel, recalls the impish flair and cheerful outlook of the era that brought Minton’s to the fore and, with it, bop’s intrepid self-confidence. Paul Sikive’s arch bass pulse drives this foxy supple ride.

Perhaps the subtle genii in this masterful convivium are the nimble brilliance of Sacha Perry’s effortless magnificence. This is not routine piano work . . . it demands careful witness. Play this album. Then punch up the concluding blues, Livin’ With Hobson, once more.

01 Manteca

02 Dance Of The Infidels

03 Far Sure

04 The Sumo

05 Erratic

06 This Is All I Ask

07 Apache

08 Eronel

09 The Doctor Is In

10 Livin With Hobson

Phil Stewart drums

Grant Stewart alto & tenor saxophone

Chris Byars tenor saxophone(tracks, 2, 5, 7, 9)

Joe Magnarelli trumpet (tracks 1, 2, 7)

Sascha Perry piano

Paul Sikivie bass

Recorded at Church Street School for Music and Art on July 2, 2017 by Paul Sikivie

Grant Stewart Trio - Roll On (CELLAR LIVE RECORDINGS 2017)

A trio session of standards to match the best of the late ‘50s classics, with exquisite drumming by Phil Stewart.

The name of this excellent jazz label Cellar Live conjures up a pleasing image. It is a Saturday night, we descend the few stairs, slip a sawbuck into the can at the door or give it to the man with the tattoos, and seek a table facing the bassist. Anon the frothy refreshments appear and the three musicians take their places. One, two three… and the air is quickened by tone, feeling, idea. Hush, chattering youngsters, for these are musicians of outstanding merit. And so the glorious evening rolls on to its conclusion. And ascending the few stairs into the evening air we know the world to have been repaired by art and something like love. Preserve the image folks, for the jazz clubs are not well. Like the macaw and the whooping crane they have retreated to the verge of extinction. Even in Portland, Oregon, a town oversupplied with musicians, the last jazz club closed its doors in 2016.

Cellar Live productions is dedicated to preserving the art form and nourishing the creative impulse. It helps that they draw on the considerable talent of the still thriving New York Jazz scene. On the record under review, we have Grant Stewart, a transplanted Canadian (Scarborough, Ontario) leading a trio that includes his younger brother Phil Stewart on drums as well as Paul Sikivie on bass. We at Audiophile Audition were deeply impressed by a recent Cory Weeds recording on the same label, and it is a good sign that he is the producer of this session as well.

Of the many good things that can be said about this record, the first is that it assembles nine stellar tunes, none overly familiar. Three bebop charts by Fats Navarro, Bud Powell and Elmo Hope find the trio in an early ‘50s groove. The tenor style, however, tends towards a relaxed playing off the beat rather than the impatient straining forward which is characteristic of the style and gives bebop its neurotic zaniness. The exemplar here, as cited in the notes, is the Sonny Rollins at his most relaxed on one of his Riverside trio outings. Although, Stewart’s tone is not as hoarse as his predecessor.

The drumming is outstanding throughout, but on Fats Flats the traded fours attain a magnificent hilarity of inspiration. Un Poco Loco balances a straight tenor statement of them with more melodic drumming, the brothers playing together with accord and humor, while the bass holds things together. It is an extravagant seven minutes of fun and inspires me to nominate this track for an award as Best Drumming Performance of 2017.

On the first of three ballads, Here I’ll Stay, the tenor shows great confidence in the melodic line, playing almost without embellishment. His improvisational choruses seem to plumb the meaning of the lyric, rather than to stir up harmonic agitation. On Just As Though You Were Here, he leaves ample space for the rhythm mates who share the leader’s fine sense for both timbre and melody. On Thinking of You, the tenor directs his thinking apparatus toward the construction of some fine thematic choruses with nary an excessive note. Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans channels more mid ‘50s Sonny. Slow but not lethargic, the ballad drifts on currents of longing but the sound of the tenor is so assuring that we don’t feel forsaken by time or loved ones. The title track, Roll On, is just one more display of group rapport on a fine chart. After You’ve Gone is taken at a bright clip; the bass exerts both thews and sinews on a brisk trot, while the saxophone flies ahead on a torrent of crisply articulated 16th notes, reminiscent of the great Sonny Stitt.

This trio has made a deeply satisfying recording, relying on the elements of form and a communication which are products of a specific ‘50s musical aesthetic yet are flexible enough to allow for a spontaneous and fresh treatment like this. You would be stupendously lucky to see a trio like this at your local cellar jazz club.  Kudos to the musicians and the producers for a stand-out release.

Thinking of You

Here I’ll Stay

After You’ve Gone

Just as Though You Were Here

Un Poco Loco

End of a Love Affair

Fats Flats

Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans

Roll On

Grant Stewart: tenor saxophone

Paul Sikivie: bass

Phil Stewart: drums

Fabio Miano - Fabio Miano New York Quintet (BLAU RECORDS 2017)

Fabio Miano New York Quintet es el resultado final de una provechosa gira llevada a cabo en abril de 2008 por distintas ciudades españolas, pero como casi todos los buenos discos tiene raíces más sólidas.

Miano, Stewart y Rotondi son amigos y colaboradores desde hace muchos años. El pianista ha sido su acompañante preferido en las numerosas visitas a España de ambos; además con Stewart ya grabó “Buen rollo” (Fresh Sound, 1999), en cuarteto. Aunque Miano no había tocado nunca con ellos, Webber y Farnsworth fueron una elección natural, por su afinidad musical y su excelencia artística.

Al oyente le queda la sensación de haber asistido durante cincuenta minutos al encuentro de unos viejos amigos que conocen el secreto del jazz y disfrutan compartiéndolo.

1. Blues for Rojo 8:47

2. Head and Shoulders 4:52

3. Shades of Jackie Mac 5:41

4. Farewell Pulcinella 6:27

5. Reverence 6:06

6. Sweet and Lovely 6:43

7. End of a Love Affair 7:10

8. The Touch of Your Lips 5:04

9. Skippy 0:48

Fabio Miano piano

Jim Rotondi trompeta y fliscorno

Grant Stewart saxo tenor

John Webber bajo

Joe Farnsworth percusión