Russ Lossing: Inventions – A Suite of Improvisations (Blaser Music SONGS 002CD)
American pianist-composer Russ Lossing has led his own bands in New York since 1986, and worked with such masters as Paul Motian and Tim Berne. In 2023 his band King Vulture released Alternate Side Parking Music, featuring frenetic rhythms and acidulous Wurlitzer and Rhodes electric pianos. His beautiful latest album Inventions reflects a change of scene and mood. Lossing now lives in rural isolation near Delaware Water Gap, where there are no parking problems, and it was there that he recorded the album on his own piano, at night, in 2023-4.
I reviewed Lossing’s superb trio album Moon Inhabitants recently, and the contrast is stark. There, he comments by email, “We are improvising based on compositions, so the improvisation grows out from the raw materials contained within the originals and standards.” In contrast, he continues, “The source material for Inventions is my imagination. All of the music on the record is improvised in the moment without any preconceived musical ideas or concepts.” He adds “I like working in both directions.”
“My influences are very broad,” he comments. “All western classical music, all jazz, folkloric music of the world, Indian classical music, electronic and musique concrète… gamelan…” Here, a pervasive influence seems – to my ears at least – to be the “wrong-note romanticism” of Alban Berg. However, when I put it to him by email, he replies “Although I am very familiar with Berg’s music, as well as the entire 2nd Viennese School (and the 1st, 3rd and 4th also), I’m not particularly influenced by his music. But if that’s what you hear, it’s fine with me…”
This album is in total contrast to Moon Inhabitants – it would be hard to recognise them as the same pianist, which suggests that Lossing doesn’t have a signature style, at least not an obvious one. I’ve been listening again to his wonderful ballad performance on that album of Harold Arlen’s Last Night When We Were Young – gorgeously lyrical, and distinct from the astringent post-tonal work on Inventions. A remarkable stylist.
Miles Davis Quintet: The Unissued Japanese Concerts (Half Nelson 44001 LP)
This deluxe gatefold set, pressed on 180g vinyl, covers one of the lesser-known episodes in Miles Davis’s career. In July 1964, he toured Japan for the first time, with what became the “second great quintet”, but with Sam Rivers in place of Wayne Shorter. Only three performances are known to have taken place: the 14 July show at Kohseinenkin Hall, Tokyo, and the lesser-known 12 and 15 July concerts found on this set. These were recorded live at Hibaya Yagai Ongaku-do Hall, Tokyo (LP1) and at Maruyama Ongaku-do Hall, Kyoto (LP2). Both concerts are excellent.
The rhythm section is the familiar one – Herbie Hancock, piano; Ron Carter, bass; and Tony Williams, drums. Saxophonist George Coleman had left the quintet before this tour, and on Tony Williams’ recommendation was replaced by Sam Rivers. (The drummer always favoured freer players – hence, finally, the arrival of Wayne Shorter.) Other than the three concert dates in Japan, no other collaborations between Davis and Rivers exist. As usual with the trumpeter’s live dates at this time, the programme is mostly standards, plus recent compositions that became jazz standards. On this release, the latter comprise So What and Oleo; you could also include The Theme, a bop contrafact on I Got Rhythm that was the band’s theme tune.
Sam Rivers was the finest of the younger tenor players to work with Miles during the interregnum between the first and second great quintets. It would have been great to hear him in place of Shorter, with the quintet of the later 60s, playing original compositions – with the band exploiting the freer approach that Shorter engendered. On this Japanese set, Rivers’ freer approach has not had the opportunity to fructify and develop the band, as Shorter’s subsequently did. But the more traditional material here, and its more traditional interpretation, is excellent nonetheless. A track from this double album would make a good blindfold test.
Duke Ellington: Piano In The Foreground (20th Century Masterworks 350275 LP)
Duke Ellington’s classic Piano In The Foreground on Columbia is one of his few trio albums. Released in 1961, it features Ellington’s regular bassist and drummer of the time, Aaron Bell and Sam Woodyard. The programme comprises original compositions and standards. A highlight is the jungle jive – if that phrase is still acceptable – of Cong-Go. Body And Soul gets a rather sentimental ballad treatment. Blues For Jerry – not sure who the dedicatee is – is a mostly minor blues in the master’s idiomatic style.
Duke Ellington was self-deprecating about his abilities as a pianist as opposed to composer and bandleader – “I’m just the piano player” was one comment. But this was false modesty. He is a superb jazz pianist, whose blues and stride playing absorbed later and freer influences as well as classical forms such as Debussy-Ravel impressionism. The tone poems Fontainebleau Forest and Springtime In Africa still sound modern, while Summertime is very free. Some reissues of this album have also featured tracks from 1957 with Jimmy Woode on bass, but this reissue is restricted to the original 1961 tracks, with the bonus of Lotus Blossom, recorded a day after the others.
I’d still regard Money Jungle,with Charles Mingus and Max Roach, as Ellington’s greatest trio album. The bassist and drummer on that album are the equal of the pianist as soloists, whereas on Piano In The Foreground, bassist and drummer are accompanists. But while Money Jungle – recorded in 1962, released in 1963 – is a work of genius, the earlier album is excellent nonetheless. Highly recommended.
Chris Cody: Mountain To Sea (Chris Cody Music CCM014)
Chris Cody’s new album features a quartet of leading Sydney musicians, including bassist Lloyd Swanton of The Necks. The Australian pianist-composer draws on a wide range of influences, from French impressionism – Debussy and Ravel – to African music. Tenor and soprano saxophonist Sandy Evans, with her longstanding interest in Indian music, is a stalwart of the Sydney scene. Young alto saxophonist Tessie Overmyer, from Newcastle New South Wales, is a powerful new voice. A further Necks presence is recording engineer Tim Whitten.
A drummerless quartet is unusual, and creates a novel and spacious soundworld. As Cody explains: “I wanted to have more space and freedom for a different sound and approach. Conceiving and playing the music without drums means that what we hear and play, or don’t hear and play, are different… the music is still rhythmic but also breathing.”
A highlight for me is the superb opener Stepping Out, which the leader describes as “an afro-beat conversation”. This is a catchy and memorable composition. After agile contributions from the saxophones, the leader’s piano solo is lucid and incisive. He’s supported here and throughout by Lloyd Swanton’s wonderfully strong “Song of the Earth” bass.
Piano is one of several short improvised interludes that has a more limpid and questioning feel; it’s followed by the plangent ballad Mountains. Another highlight is the upbeat South African-inflected finale Gathering. The album is notable for the rather equal balance between slow and uptempo numbers. Mountain To Sea is a colourful and original release, and makes me keen to hear more from this band.
