Chris Parker Vortex Jazz Club May 2006
Recorded at the CBSO Hall in Birmingham, 17 October 2004, this album
features pianist/composer John Law with the Cornucopia Ensemble (an
octet: two violins, viola, cello, trumpet, oboe, trombone and bassoon),
Andy Sheppard on tenor and soprano, bassist Chris Laurence and
percussionist Paul Clarvis.
The first section is devoted to an eponymous suite, which begins, appropriately enough, as a murky ensemble swirl that gradually coalesces into form and regular movement, Sheppard alternately roaring (tenor) and piping/wafting (soprano) over a supremely sensitive jazz rhythm section and the multi-textured contributions of the Ensemble.
As saxophonist Jon Lloyd points out in his excellent liner-notes, Law 'is comfortable with the full weight of classical history and [...] at similar ease with the rhythms and harmonies from world musics, the shifting styles of jazz and earlier, pre-classical religious music', and all these sources are beautifully balanced, both in the 46-minute, seven-part piece that forms the bulk of the album, and in the three shorter compositions that succeed it: 'Talitha Cumi' (a delicate, lilting melody featuring Sheppard's soprano juxtaposing sweetly agile time-playing with a circular-breathing free passage), the mesmerisingly attractive 'Nocturne' (written for the 1914 silent film South), and the jaunty closer 'The Loop', dedicated to French reeds player François Courneloup.
Achieving a
natural-sounding synthesis rather than an awkward 'bolted-on' effect
with the forces at his disposal must have presented a considerable
challenge, but John Law has succeeded triumphantly, and the album
provides an object lesson in the deployment of elements too often
considered incompatible. Recommended!
Chris Parker Vortex Jazz Club May 2006