BEST ALBUMS OF 2023

MASTERPIECES

JAMES BRANDON LEWIS QUARTET MSM Molecular Systematic Music Live Intakt

GEORGE COLLIGAN King's Dream

PJCE.

BRIAN BLADE & THE FELLOWSHIP BAND

Live From The Archives Stoner Hill

LISA MARIE SIMMONS

Notespeak 12 Ropeadope

METTE HENRIETTE Drifting ECM

SEBASTIAN ROCHFORD & KIT DOWNES A Short Diary

ANDERS JORMIN Past in Clear ECM

Stephen Micus Flash Thunder ECM

TONY KOFI & ALINA BZHEZHINSKA Altera Vita (For Pharoah Sanders)

BBE

EDMAR CASTAÑEDA WORLD ENSEMBLE Viento Sur Independent Release

AJA MONET when the poems do what they do drink sum wtr.

VILHELM BROMANDER This Forever Unfolding

Moment

Thanatosis Productions

STEVE LEHMAN Ex Machina Pi

PLUMB

Plumb Aug. JMI/Outside in.

VINNY GOLIA

Even To This Day Music For Orchestra And Soloists, Movement Two: Syncretism: For The Draw...

Ninewinds

Il sax infuocato di Lewis

Ritorna con un doppio album dal vivo il sassofonista tenore James Brandon Lewis: Msm Live (Intakt) è stato registrato a Zurigo il 15 maggio 2021 e presenta il suo eccellente quartetto con Aruán Ortiz al piano, Brad Jones al contrabbasso e Chad Taylor alla batteria.

L'acronimo Msm sta per Molecular Systematic Music, il metodo di organizzazione delle note usato da Lewis, ma non si pensi a qualcosa di cervellotico: i brani scorrono liberi, infuocati o lirici a seconda dell'ispirazione. I partner (tutti parecchio meno giovani di lui, un indizio sul suo carisma) interagiscono magnificamente con il leader, e in particolare Ortiz si mostra anche qui un pianista di inconsueta originalità.

In attesa di poter ascoltare tutto intero «Eye Of I», in uscita per la fine di febbraio (e stando ai tre brani disponibili in anteprima non si tratterà di un affare di poco conto), dalla Svizzera arriva questo doppio cd dal vivo (registrato alla Rote Fabrik di Zurigo), che rappresenta una sorta di definitiva messa a punto, per maturità e amalgama, del quartetto «Molecular», che ci aveva già offerto nel 2020 l’eccellente disco omonimo e, l’anno successivo, «Code Of Being» (registrato proprio nei due giorni successivi a questo concerto). Se il tenorista ci ha abituato a sfoggi di creatività esplosiva, con tutti i propri gruppi, e in ogni possibile declinazione immaginata per la propria musica, questo album brilla in particolare per una forza quieta e irresistibile, calata in una dimensione di colloquiale intimità, nella quale il quartetto, guidato con sicurezza dal leader, non per caso musicista del momento, rivela un interplay prezioso e fluido. Davvero nell’album si esprime un senso di intensità rara, che insieme alla dimensione di esaltazione melodica di molte delle composizioni e alla palpabile libertà nell’interazione dei musicisti, fa sembrare tutto molto semplice, riuscendo a stemperare anche i momenti più «ripidi». Il suono del sassofonista esprime una forte storicizzazione, nella quale tutte le influenze e le fonti di ispirazioni si trovano ben chiare e amalgamate, ma nello stesso momento, pur in questa manifesta classicità, lo spunto e l’impronta della autorialità di Lewis – la sua personale visione – non mancano mai. Il gruppo non è da meno – del resto formato da musicisti non soltanto affiatati, ma anche titolari di un riconosciuto magistero – confermandosi come uno dei quartetti più interessanti in circolazione: ad Ortiz, tuttavia, sentiamo di dover tributare un riconoscimento particolare, per la prestazione maiuscola. Disco da non perdere, nel quale la pienezza di contenuto non si fa mai satura.

https://www.musicajazz.it/recensione-james-brandon-lewis-molecular-live/

FROM the first bursting notes of msm Live, recorded at Rote Fabrik, Zurich, here is a quartet messaging its music with an intense soulfulness and passion. Buffalo’s James Brandon Lewis’s tenor sax romps furiously over Aruan Ortiz’s Cuban pianism, Brad Jones’s delving bass and Chad Taylor’s omnipresent drums.

This is a double album sounding elemental in its immediacy. The opening tracks, A Lotus Speaks and Helix attack and assuage the ears with a complex emotional drive, Lewis’s penetrating hornsong like a human voice in its urgency, and Ortiz’s chords stoking Caribbean fire and rebellion.

This Swiss concert has the pent-up energy of four brilliant artistes setting their musicianship free after a year's pandemic hiatus. They play with a profound sense of release. The reflective timbre of First Importance carries a deep quality of longing, and Cesaire remembers how poetic words and sounds express a unity of beauty. Stunning!

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/c/jazz-album-reviews-chris-searle-april-4-2023

For the past decade American saxophonist James Brandon Lewis has been gathering an impressive head of creative steam through his steady output as a bandleader and member of the collaborative group Heroes Are Gang Leaders. This twin set of releases, one by his band and the other by his quartet, confirms his status as a contemporary improvising artist with notable concepts as well as enviable chops, above all because each release is markedly different to the other. Eye Of I is possibly one of Brandon Lewis' most ambitious albums to date: a multi-faceted affair that sees his band move seamlessly from thrashy rock laced with fizzing electronics to freewheeling, hard-hitting interludes to resplendent melodies that approach the folkish timelessness of an Ornette or Ayler, the most striking example being 'The Blues Still Blossoms, a gorgeously loose ramble in which the sensuality of Lewis' broad tone takes centre stage. A soaring take on Donny Hathaway's 'Someday We'll All Be Free' also returns Lewis to the glowing spirituality of some of his previous work.

As for the MSM live album, it is a concert recording of the Molecular Systematic Music band that has already done excellent studio dates, such as Code of Being in recent years, and emphatically consolidates the deep musical empathy Lewis has established with pianist Aruan Ortiz, bassist Brad Jones and drummer Chad Taylor. There is an added intensity to what the group does on stage, especially when they take the tempo down, primarily because there is such a carefully paced, tightly controlled energy in the life cycle of each piece, and Lewis proves himself to be a master ballad player many times over. Yet this is very much about an ensemble as well as a soloist, and the swirl of polyrhythms and vaguely Spanish flavours that mark many tracks, not to mention the strength and fluidity of the Taylor-Jones axis, is as crucial to the work as the finesse of Ortiz's chords and the dignified grace of Lewis' themes, which have the depth of a blues for the 21st century. A significant artist just got more significant.

1 Oded Tzur Isabela (ECM/Universal)

2 The Delines The Sea Drift (Decor/Indigo)

3 Lyle Lovett 12th Of June (Verve/Universal)

4 Immanuel Wilkins The 7th Hand (Blue Note/Universal)

5 Maridalen Bortenfor (Jazzland/edel)

6 Michael Wollny Trio Ghosts (ACT/Edel)

7 James Brandon Lewis Quartet MSM Live (Intakt/Harmonia Mundi)

8 Jakob Bro & Joe Lovano Once Around

The Room (ECM/Universal)

9 Yosef-Gutman Levitt Upside Down Mountain (yosefgutman.bandcamp.com)

10 Huebner/Beirach/Huebner Testaments (o-tone/edel)

The music on Molecular, James Brandon Lewis' previous album for Intakt, almost ended up a casualty of the pandemic. Recorded in January 2020, two months before the virus virtually shuttered the concert industry, it came out to no small critical acclaim. But it wasn't until the following spring that Lewis and his quartet performed the album, at a festival in Zurich, and even that was almost scuttled by pandemic restrictions.

MSM Molecular Systematic Music Live not only captures that premiere but gives us a glimpse of Lewis and company at their absolute peak. Obviously, the exhilaration of finally playing together after a 16-month hiatus plays a part, but the album's greatest strength is the way it crystalizes Lewis' vision of his "molecular systematic music."

Lewis has written much about MSM, which draws parallels to the helix structure of DNA. Most of the tunes build off of melodic cells that sketch intertwining rhythmic and harmonic ideas, and develop them through repetition. Moreover, where his forebears relegated the rhythm to a supporting role, Lewis takes a more integrated tack, with all instruments emphasizing the music's rhythmic content.

As illustrated by the live "Molecular," this approach pays its greatest dividends in groove, building over 12 minutes from an insistent, bass-heavy throb to a funky, full-band stomp. Even downtempo material remains rhythm-focused, so that even with half the tracks clocking in at 10 minutes or more, the energy onstage never lags.

The 17th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Poll: A Profusion of Geniuses

Finding music that touches you is a very haphazard process, where intermediaries like the 151 voters in this Poll play an invaluable role. There is a vast wealth of little-heard jazz out there. We’re helping you find it.

This is the 17th annual edition of the Francis Davis Jazz Poll, finally named for its founder and guiding light. The Poll collates top-10 lists from 151 jazz critics and journalists, and as such provides a wealth of insight into and data about this past year in jazz. From its founding in 2006 through 2021, Davis wrote an introduction and summary for each poll. This year Davis asked me to run the Poll, leaving some very big shoes for me to try to fill. I don’t have any great cosmic insights into the evolution of the music or how it fits into our changing world. When I asked voters for comments, they mostly affirmed that jazz remains a vigorous art form that makes our lives better. True that is, even if it seems too mundane to mention.

I can offer a set of notes on things I found interesting in this year’s top results, with occasional reference to the complete results and individual ballots, which are available in archive. In doing so, I’ve often found myself referring back to past years. To help you better understand the present, I’ve written a brief memoir of the Poll’s founding and evolution (and my modest role in that history), and a guide to poll winners over that history. And finally, following Davis’s practice from early on, I’ve compiled a list of jazz notables who have passed in 2022.

If you want to read a comprehensive essay on 2022: The Year in Jazz, Ken Franckling has written one I couldn’t hope to improve on. It includes an “in memoriam” list that I’ve cribbed from, but haven’t come close to exhausting.

Mary Halvorson’s Amaryllis won the 17th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Poll rather handily, overcoming a division in her votes, with competitor Tyshawn Sorey’s votes also split between two albums, coming in fourth and fifth. Add Sorey’s two albums together and you get more points (389) than Amaryllis (349.5), but add in Belladonna (75.5) — a second Halvorson album released on the same day, a pairing that many voters thought should have been treated as one — and Halvorson again comes out ahead. She was also the prime mover in the trio Thumbscrew (with Michael Formanek and Tomas Fujiwara), which finished 42, and she played on several other albums that finished in the top 50: Myra Melford’s For the Love of Fire and Water (7), Tomas Fujiwara’s March (32), Nate Wooley’s Ancient Songs of Burlap Heroes (35), and Trevor Dunn’s Séances (39), as well as a couple more that didn’t make the top 50.

Halvorson is the third woman (after Maria Schneider and Kris Davis) to top the poll; also the first guitarist. But she’s contended many times before: including her work with Thumbscrew, she now has 17 albums in the top 50, including three previous top-five showings: Saturn Sings (3 in 2010), Away With You (4 in 2016), and Artlessly Falling (4 in 2020). No other guitarist has come close to her record: Nels Cline scored fourth in 2006 and seventh in 2016; Bill Frisell has two ninth places (one a duet with Jim Hall); Jeff Parker has a 10th in 2020. What separates her from the crowd has less to do with virtuosity, although she certainly has her moments, than with her surprising compositions and arrangements, where her guitar is just one element among many she keeps in constant motion. I suspect Amaryllis got most critics’ nod this time due to the more colorful mix of horns, compared to Belladonna‘s much starker guitar-plus-string-quartet, but some critics preferred the latter’s format (citing more prominent guitar).

Tyshawn Sorey is another brilliant musician — both he and Halvorson are recent recipients of MacArthur “genius” grants — who often leads with his compositions: he’s mostly a drummer, but his first charting album (That/Not, 32 in 2007) had long stretches of him playing piano. He has placed 11 albums in the top 50, plus two more on credit lines headed by Kris Davis and Vijay Iyer. But his records this year featured jazz standards, with Aaron Diehl on piano and Matt Brewer on bass, plus Greg Osby (alto sax) on the latter. I noticed a time split there, with early voters favoring Mesmerism — at one point early in the counting tied with Amaryllis — and The Off-Off Broadway Guide to Synergism closing fast over the final weekend: a difference possibly attributable to July 8 vs. October 28 release dates. The latter was easily my favorite album of the year, but I had it less than a week before I voted. The deadline for ballots this year was December 12, which puts a lot of pressure on voters to rush judgments on late albums, and strains them to remember early ones. (For example, Fred Hersch, who has placed records as high as 11 and 12, released an excellent album in January that only garnered three votes this year, landing at 97.)

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First off, if you've got Chad Taylor on your side, thrust is front of center. That's the case here. The leader's brawn is equal to his savvy, so the blowing is very wise, indeed.

-Jim Macnie

This live recording of the muscular, modal material released on Molecular not only offers the gruff-toned Lewis and his driving band room to stretch, it highlights their post-pandemic delight in playing the music live, including some chatter perhaps better left out.

-Paul de Barros

Stoked in the immediacy of live performance, Brandon's quartet easily harnesses the shifting cross-currents of real-time improvisation. Whether scorching through a post-bop rant or lost in an elegiac reverie, the group retains a singular focus on the moment at hand - and commands the same attention from its listeners.

-Suzanne Lorge

Het zit allemaal vervat in de toon van James Brandon Lewis. Die stalen onverzettelijkheid, die gloeiende intensiteit, maar ook: het majestueuze zingen. Lewis staat met twee benen in de blues en gospel, maar dit is hoorngeschal voor een verwarrend tijdsgewricht. Het was in mei 2021 de eerste keer dat de muziek van Molecular (2020) uitgevoerd werd en het samenspel siddert van ontlading. De composities groeien meer dan eens uit tot gulpende stromen van energie en ideeën, waarbij de saxofonist wordt ondersteund door een ritmesectie die hem in een comfortabele zetel plaatst, maar die ook een eigen smoel heeft. Lewis profileert zich daarbij niet zozeer als het geluid van de toekomst, maar als een doorgeefluik op de schouders van voorgangers. Zo zorgt hij, net als collega JD Allen, voor een waardevolle toevoeging aan een traditie die nog altijd spannend kan zijn. Geen over het paard getilde spirituele muzak hier, maar het spannende zoeken naar authenticiteit.