ALEXANDER HAWKINS & MEKA REID - Shards And Constellations
Intakt: CD344
Alexander Hawkins: piano; Meka Reid: cello
Recorded 13th April 2019 by Will Biggs at Challow Park Studios, Oxfordshire
Knowing that Reid has performed and recorded extensively with members of Chicago’s AACM and that Hawkins has a history with European free-jazz players (as well AACM musicians) creates a strong expectation that their pairing on this recording will produce music that is spiritually uplifting, mysterious and completely fresh. Two of the tunes are from AACM stalwarts, ‘Peace on You’ (track 5) from Muhal Richard Abrams and ‘Albert Ayler (his life was too short’) (track 9) from Leroy Jenkins. Translating these ballads from ensemble to duo pieces loses nothing of their energy or poignancy. As ‘Peace on You’ shifts from its dreamy opening to rambunctious closing, Reid’s cello becomes increasing a mass of instruments, and her playing of the ‘Albert Ayler’ sounds like a duet of this beautiful lament. The pieces perfectly blend the spontaneity of improvised playing with intricately constructed compositions. Of course this sounds a contradiction, but the players are continually seeking the furthest reaches in the sounds of their instruments or the bars of the composition in ways that continually create tension in the playing and find release of that tension. What I particularly like is the ways in which Hawkins so often sounds as if he is playing distinct tunes with each hand and the ways in which uses her cello to create distinct sounds that are both percussive and melodic. The set opens and closes with a piece entitled ‘Is becomes If’ – which hints at the ways in which the tunes so often move from a definite statement (perhaps lines which suggest a blues or post-bop tune played with purpose and rigour) and then shift into different possibilities.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
Intakt: CD344
Alexander Hawkins: piano; Meka Reid: cello
Recorded 13th April 2019 by Will Biggs at Challow Park Studios, Oxfordshire
Knowing that Reid has performed and recorded extensively with members of Chicago’s AACM and that Hawkins has a history with European free-jazz players (as well AACM musicians) creates a strong expectation that their pairing on this recording will produce music that is spiritually uplifting, mysterious and completely fresh. Two of the tunes are from AACM stalwarts, ‘Peace on You’ (track 5) from Muhal Richard Abrams and ‘Albert Ayler (his life was too short’) (track 9) from Leroy Jenkins. Translating these ballads from ensemble to duo pieces loses nothing of their energy or poignancy. As ‘Peace on You’ shifts from its dreamy opening to rambunctious closing, Reid’s cello becomes increasing a mass of instruments, and her playing of the ‘Albert Ayler’ sounds like a duet of this beautiful lament. The pieces perfectly blend the spontaneity of improvised playing with intricately constructed compositions. Of course this sounds a contradiction, but the players are continually seeking the furthest reaches in the sounds of their instruments or the bars of the composition in ways that continually create tension in the playing and find release of that tension. What I particularly like is the ways in which Hawkins so often sounds as if he is playing distinct tunes with each hand and the ways in which uses her cello to create distinct sounds that are both percussive and melodic. The set opens and closes with a piece entitled ‘Is becomes If’ – which hints at the ways in which the tunes so often move from a definite statement (perhaps lines which suggest a blues or post-bop tune played with purpose and rigour) and then shift into different possibilities.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
