KEITH JAFRATE / HERVÉ PEREZ - Tête-à-Tête
Noumenon Records CD N004
Keith Jafrate - alto saxophone (left channel); Hervé Perez - alto saxophone (right channel)
Recorded at Perez’ nexTTime studios, 18th.April 2019
The track listing for this album might suggest that it’s a comic conundrum (tracks 5 and 6 are Something Funky in The Sauce/And A Hair in The Pudding) but let track 3 reassure you. Nothing funny about Dropping Pebbles in An Empty Koan, a koan being an enigma or paradox used by Zen Buddhists while meditating, in order to penetrate and elucidate some truths about themselves and their world.
The music is certainly mysterious, cryptic even, but that is not to say impenetrable. Here are two saxophonists having a conversation and it helps that each has a dedicated channel (L+R) so one can follow either musician or both combined. There are few, purely lyrical passages, atonality taking the discourse to the highest possible level. The music is a crossbreed, an amalgamation of different forms of improvisation including, of course, jazz.
The duo performed in Sheffield’s ‘Over the Top’ feste in April 2019 and followed up with this take, laid down at Hervé Perez’ nexTTime studios.
Severally, each saxophonist works across divergent styles and genres, drawing down their own preferences to suit the individual structures of the moment and blending with each other and with the mood of the piece, such that one may be uncertain of the sound sources – free improv and folk or electro-experimental? Each piece is a delight.
Reviewed by Ken Cheetham
Noumenon Records CD N004
Keith Jafrate - alto saxophone (left channel); Hervé Perez - alto saxophone (right channel)
Recorded at Perez’ nexTTime studios, 18th.April 2019
The track listing for this album might suggest that it’s a comic conundrum (tracks 5 and 6 are Something Funky in The Sauce/And A Hair in The Pudding) but let track 3 reassure you. Nothing funny about Dropping Pebbles in An Empty Koan, a koan being an enigma or paradox used by Zen Buddhists while meditating, in order to penetrate and elucidate some truths about themselves and their world.
The music is certainly mysterious, cryptic even, but that is not to say impenetrable. Here are two saxophonists having a conversation and it helps that each has a dedicated channel (L+R) so one can follow either musician or both combined. There are few, purely lyrical passages, atonality taking the discourse to the highest possible level. The music is a crossbreed, an amalgamation of different forms of improvisation including, of course, jazz.
The duo performed in Sheffield’s ‘Over the Top’ feste in April 2019 and followed up with this take, laid down at Hervé Perez’ nexTTime studios.
Severally, each saxophonist works across divergent styles and genres, drawing down their own preferences to suit the individual structures of the moment and blending with each other and with the mood of the piece, such that one may be uncertain of the sound sources – free improv and folk or electro-experimental? Each piece is a delight.
Reviewed by Ken Cheetham
