Le parole di Anna Akhmatova, Samuel Beckett, Robert Creeley, Bob Kaufman e Judith Malina scelte a suo tempo da Steve Lacy (1934-2004) tornano nuovamente attuali nel secondo omaggio al celebre sassofonista offerto da Jean Derome con Karen Young, Alexandre Grogg, Normand Guilbeault e Pierre Tanguay, ovvero il quintetto Somebody Special: Le sourire, per Ambiances Magnétiques. 

"Steve Lacy a été, pour moi, une grande inspiration, une sorte de boussole qui a guidé mes pas et qui m’a montré la voie. Pourtant, depuis son décès en 2004, on en est à presque oublier que ce géant du saxophone soprano a composé plusieurs centaines de magnifiques chansons. Dans toute l’histoire du jazz, il est difficile de nommer un autre compositeur aussi prolifique, exception faite, évidemment, de Duke Ellington. Vingt-deux ans ont passé depuis que Lacy nous a quittés et l’on se met à s’ennuyer du trésor qu’il nous a laissé. Au fond, ce disque veut apaiser une sensation de manque. C’est à toute la communauté jazz que revient maintenant la tâche de garder cette musique en vie. À nous de jouer."

https://jeanderome.com

 

E dopo le illustri collaborazioni con Wayne Horvitz, Dave Douglas, Aoife O'Donovan e Theo Bleckmann, i magnifici quattro Westerlies - Riley Mulherkar, Chloe Rowlands, Andy Clausen e Addison Maye-Saxon - approdano alle musiche di Bill Frisell, loro amico e ispiratore, portando in piena luce una serie di inediti appena abbozzati dall'autore nel periodo più buio della pandemia: l'album è Have you Heard?, presentato in anteprima poche sere fa con un magnifico concerto a Brooklyn NY al Roulette.

Scrive Andy Clausen: "In 2020-2021, with concerts and tours cancelled due to the pandemic, Bill found himself at home for an extended period of time for the first time in many years. The way he stayed sane was to wake up every morning, have a cup of coffee, grab his guitar and a musical notebook, and start writing. Music-making with no agenda other than pure discovery and exploration. Around 2024, we started chatting about the potential of The Westerlies exploring some of that music, and a few days later, I received a folder containing dozens of new pieces. Combing through these notebooks, I had a feeling of excitement I can only equate to the experience of seeing an exhibition of Picasso’s sketches for the first time: a brilliant artist working through ideas and shaping the same subject matter through a process of transformation and revision. In the case of Bill’s notebooks, first a melody might appear, then a few days later shaded with a palette of harmony, only to be sketched into a fully formed structure a few days later. To see this process on paper was absolutely fascinating and deeply inspiring.

What followed was a year-and-a-half-long process of exploring and arranging the source material with the utmost reverence - a collective way of working and shaping material The Westerlies have been developing for 15 years now. In some instances, that led to a very direct realization of the notes on the page. In other cases, it meant cracking open the material with improvisation and building arrangements which felt like our most honest realization of what the material wanted to be. What you will also find is a musical chronicle of one of the most significant periods in recent history. The dates, titles, and music read like journal entries. “Madness Hopeless,” “Dose” and “Impeach” all the way through the most recent work, “A Wonderful Day” from January 2024. We are so grateful to Bill for the trust and honor to share the premiere recordings of these new works, and we hope you enjoy the music."

https://www.westerliesmusic.com
https://www.facebook.com/westerliesmusic
https://www.youtube.com/@RouletteIntermediumNYC

Tra i temi e le istanze valorizzati dalle vaste capacità interpretative di Theo Bleckmann non è raro trovarne di attinenti a guerra, resistenza, esilio, immigrazione, lotta di classe, diritti civili e autodeterminazione, in chiave storica o attuale: ne è un esempio l'album Berlin (Winter & Winter, 2007) prodotto con Fumio Yasuda citando i classici di Brecht, Weill, Dessau e Eisler - e non manca Über Den Selbstmord, naturalmente - così come il più recente This Land (WR, 2021) realizzato assieme all'eccezionale quartetto di ottoni The Westerlies con un repertorio di brani di Joe Hill, Woody Guthrie, Joni Mitchell e vari testi americani di denuncia e di protesta. Di quest'ultimo è documentato un intero concerto su YT.

https://www.youtube.com/this-land