INTAKT RECORDS – REVIEWS

ANNA WEBBER
SHIMMER WINCE

Intakt CD 407 / 2023

Cover Web:ANNA WEBBER. SHIMMER WINCE. Intakt CD 407

 

On Shimmer Wince, composer, saxophonist and flautist Anna Webber makes an inspired foray into the world of just intonation.

Stewart Smith, The Wire Magazine UK, September 2023 (EN)


Ain’t nothin’ Lowdown Brown can’t do on his debut. Cat’s 70, kickin’ ass, playing the blues, struttin’ some soul, and with the help of producer/drummer Ardie Dean, guitarist Microwave Galaher, bassist Tony Grady, and keyboardist Dan Hochter, admits Blues Is Calling Me (Music Maker Foundation). Born in Arkansas, raised in Indiana, and settled in Texas, it’s been four decades of roadside honky-tonks before blowin’ ‘em away at the Houston Blues Festival in 1988.

Mike Greenblatt, The Aquarian, Oct 11, 2023 (EN)


For a long time, “academic” has been an epithet in the jazz community, referring to music that lacks spontaneity and fire. But Caroline Davis and Anna Webber, two saxophonists and composers with deep roots in academia, rebut that negative stereotype. Both make recordings built around concepts—and Ms. Webber in particular dotes on arcane theories and approaches—yet their music is engrossing and invigorating. Each has a new album out this month—Ms. Davis’s “Captivity” (Ropeadope, out now) and Ms. Webber’s “Shimmer Wince” (Intakt, Oct. 20)—that bristles with fervor and urgency.

Martin Johnson, The Wall Street Journal, Oct 18 2023 (EN)


Flecistka, saksofonistka i kompozytorka Anna Webber jest centralną postacią nowojorskiej sceny jazzowej i uważana jest za jedną z najbardziej innowacyjnych artystek młodego pokolenia. Jej dotychczasowa twórczość została okrzyknięta „wizjonerską i fascynującą”. Saksofonistka doskonale odnajduje się na styku awangardowego jazzu i nowej muzyki klasycznej, a jej poprzednie albumy zajmowały czołowe miejsca na listach najlepszych albumów jazzowych (NPR Jazz Critics Poll i New York Times). W 2021 roku Anna Webber została stypendystką Berlin Prize Fellow i wybrana najlepszą flecistką (kategoria Rising Star) magazynu Downbeat Critic Poll 2020. Autorskimi kompozycjami doskonale wtapia się w świat muzyki improwizowanej i współczesnej kompozycji klasycznej. Flecistka i saksofonistka doskonale dobiera muzyków, którzy precyzyjnie realizują jej artystyczne koncepcje. Wraz z trębaczem Adamem O’Farrillem, wiolonczelistką Mariel Roberts, perkusistą Lesley Mok i klawiszowcem Eliasem Stemesederem przygotowali sesję „Shimmer Wince” skupiając się na innowacyjnym głosie amerykańskiej sceny improwizowanej i jazzowej. Muzyka eksploruje zastosowania nowych koncepcji oraz intonacji w kontekście jazzowym/improwizowanym. Muzycy kwintetu określają to jako „Just Intonation”, upatrując podobieństw w starożytnym systemie strojenia opartym na naturalnych harmoniach i rezonansach nut.

Dionizy Piątkowski, ERA JAZZU, Oct 2023 (PL)


Flutist, saxophonist, and composer Anna Webber has made some of the most fascinating music of the last few years. Binary, Clockwise, Rectangles, and Idiom, all released between 2016 and 2021, are works that start with a strictly enforced set of compositional or performance parameters, but gradually make that seem less and less important as the music takes on a life that has nothing to do with the rules set up to govern its existence.

Phil Freeman, Stereogum, October 19 2023 (EN)


2021 steckte die Tenorsaxophonistin, Flötistin und Komponistin ANNA WEBBER als Fellow an der American Academy in Berlin bis über beide Ohren mit in den Corona-Troubles. Doch sie nutzte die Widrigkeiten für intensive Überlegungen über Polyrhythmik und Tonintervalle und entwickelte ein intensives Interesse an Just Intonation als Möglichkeit, ihre eigene Musik zu gestalten.

Rigobert Dittmann, Bad Alchemy Newsletter, October 2023 (DE)


Some mechanical wristwatches have clear faces which allow the owner to observe the inner workings of the marvelous object. It is a wonder just how the timepiece utilizes its mainspring and gear train to drive the harmonic oscillator which keeps near perfect time. The same can be said of composer, saxophonist and flautist Anna Webber's investigation into unique tunings using the overtone series known as Just Intonation (JI). It is an ancient system based on the natural vibration of physical objects. Modern practitioners range from Harry Partch to the experimental rock quartet Horse Lords. It might take an advanced degree to explain the inner workings of pitch, rhythm, multi-phonic frequencies, intervallic ratios, and the subdivision of octaves. This music just works, and works perfectly on many levels.

Mark Corroto, All About Jazz, October 31 2023 (EN)


When musicians who have come up through Western musical systems embrace “just intonation” (the more mathematically consistent system that was replaced by standard “equal temperament” in the 18th century), they may inject an element of cultural and/or moral critique into their work. Composer Lou Harrison, for example, held that equal temperament “destroys everything and is not for the human ear.”

Bill Meyer, Magnet Magazine, October 27 2023 (EN)


When musicians who have come up through Western musical systems embrace “just intonation” (the more mathematically consistent system that was replaced by standard “equal temperament” in the 18th century), they may inject an element of cultural and/or moral critique into their work. Composer Lou Harrison, for example, held that equal temperament “destroys everything and is not for the human ear.”

Christoph Wagner Music, October 2023 Germany (DE)


Ana Webber (Vancouver, 1984), sassofoni sta/flautista, dopo aver inciso per diverse importanti etichette (Pi, Pirouet, Greenleaf...) approda alla sempre stimolante Intakt con Shimmer Wince. Lo fa in quintetto, con Adam OFarrill alla tromba, Mariel Roberts al violon-cello, Elias Stemeseder al sintetizzatore, Lesley Mok alla batteria. Formazione tutto sommato ormai ortodossa, che potrebbe far immaginare perfino una qualche forma di fusion.

Claudio Sessa, Corriere Della Sera, Italy, October 2023 (IT)


I have long been an ardent admirer of reedist and composer Anna Webber, one of the most ceaselessly inquisitive and restless figures in improvised music over the last decade. She has routinely looked beyond jazz for inspiration, repeatedly striking gold with her research into contemporary music. I’ve loved just about everything she’s done, but her 2019 album Clockwise (Pi) convinced me that she was a major figure: that rare breed that’s actually changing the way I take in sound and potentially altering the trajectory of creative music. On that septet album she isolated specific ideas gleaned from composers like Xenakis, Cage, Varese, Feldman, Stockhausen and Babbitt, triangulating those concepts within her own compositional voice to produce one of the decade’s best recordings.

Peter Margasak, Nowhere Street, November 27 2023 (EN)


I have long been an ardent admirer of reedist and composer Anna Webber, one of the most ceaselessly inquisitive and restless figures in improvised music over the last decade. She has routinely looked beyond jazz for inspiration, repeatedly striking gold with her research into contemporary music. I’ve loved just about everything she’s done, but her 2019 album Clockwise (Pi) convinced me that she was a major figure: that rare breed that’s actually changing the way I take in sound and potentially altering the trajectory of creative music. On that septet album she isolated specific ideas gleaned from composers like Xenakis, Cage, Varese, Feldman, Stockhausen and Babbitt, triangulating those concepts within her own compositional voice to produce one of the decade’s best recordings.

Paul Medrano, Best of 2023, bestofjazz.org, November 2023 (EN)


Anna Webber geeft haar eigen interpretatie van JI (Just Intonation), een methode van stemmen (“tuning”) gebaseerd op onder meer elementen als intervallen, “pitches”, natuurlijke harmonieën en de resonantie van noten.

Georges Tonla Briquet, Jazz'halo, November 2023 (DE)


 

 

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