Jamie Saft Quartet - Hidden Corners

[GA Russell]

The Jamie Saft Quartet Announces New Album   Blue Dream   On RareNoiseRecords   CD, DOUBLE-VINYL AND MULTIPLE DIGITAL FORMATS AVAILABLE IN STORES AND ONLINE ON JUNE 29, 2018 AND THROUGH WWW.RARENOISERECORDS.COM.   Jamie Saft  piano Bill McHenry  tenor saxophone Bradley Christopher Jones  acoustic bass Nasheet Waits  drums

Jamie Saft continues his collaboration with eclectic UK-based label RareNoiseRecords in 2018. On a roll after releasing his first ever solo piano album in January, the aptly named 'Solo A Genova', the Upstate New York-based artist presents a further facet of his seemingly boundless talent for composition, performance, invention and in this case, for acting as master of ceremonies to a group of exciting and innovative musicians. His latest formation, the Jamie Saft Quartet sees repeated collaborators, celebrated saxophonists Bill McHenry and bassists Bradley Christopher Jones as well as in rising star of the drums Nasheet Waits.   Recorded in the Autumn of 2017 in Jamie Saft's Potterville International Sound studio Upstate New York, co-produced by Saft and Chris Castagno, mixed and mastered by Chris Castagno in Colombia, Blue Dream showcases nine new vibrant, spiritual and energetic compositions by Jamie Saft, as well as three mesmerizing standards. The album will be released on 29th June and will be available on CD, double vinyl and digital download.       Plenty of connotations emerge in the album title, yet as soon as you start listening you will realize, that Blue Dream won't allow you to think about connotations. This is direct. The muscle is shown straight away in "Vessels," and not just in the playing but the tone: dark, with four musicians moving like ships in the night, a tenor sax echoing over the water between them. That's saxman Bill McHenry, and stirring the water beneath him is drummer Nasheet Waits, splashing into the basswaves of Brad Jones bellowing up, heavy and low. On the piano, Jamie Saft both holds it down and works in new melodies, like clouds in a rotation of sunlight and darkness. Blue Dream moves. "Equanimity" keeps it fast - punk jazz fast. The drums lead it off, and you get the feeling the other musicians aren't coming in until Waits lets them in. They know to hold off. The vibe into which Waits swings himself is a tunnel for one, only breaking daylight a minute and half into the song, when everybody explodes together at once in the record's biggest and brightest moment yet. But "Sword's Water" brings it back into the low light, opening with a hot flourish that swirls on for two minutes before Saft begins to follow the melody down one of his paths. Saft can slide effortlessly over the keys, to be sure, but it is when he lingers, teasing out perhaps the same several notes, that we get a sense of the restraint in place.   This sounds like a record of standards-yes, new standards-but there are only three oldies on here ... and they're goodies. Sinatra's "Violets For Your Furs" is the first, setting the second of this album's four sides alive with an interpretation that finds Saft digging into the melody as only its patent simplicity allows (there's that restraint again). Following that, Brad Jones finds room cleared out for him in the title track to pluck his heaviest path, accelerating through the heart of the record while Saft drifts overhead, clouds over boiling water. "Infinite Compassion"shoulders its way back into those big dark movements on the piano, both sustaining and running away past the margins wherever it is needed.   The second half of the album kicks off with Bill McHenry cooling it down, and he does it through "Sweet Lorraine," Cliff Burwell's 1928 standard recorded by the King Cole Trio in 1940, which is the version taught to Saft by the late Geri Allen. Some 90 years later it's a vehicle strong enough to summon a breeze into the whole second half of the album, carving out abundant room for "Walls." Building on the big air of "Sweet Lorraine," Saftgoes off into outer space without a care in the world, and all of them ride out the vibe. Saftcan flourish and arpeggiate with the best of them, but it's in his open spaces that he shows he can be sometimes shy, sometimes flirtatious, but always confident-quietly-and relaxed. That is the foundation on which the musicians around him can build, with Saft then almost pleading with them to follow him into uncharted territories.   Then there's the drums. Waits has both a shimmer and a modern architecture to his playing, the latter of which has him building a chess board in "Decamping,"where the band can check one another, trading on, trading off. Who's got the end game? We don't need to know. We only know they enjoy the field. The music nourishes the life beneath their feet. "Words And Deeds" feels like something by which each of them is living, expressing it through this music, right now, while "Mysterious Arrangements" furthers the language created by this quartet, bringing it into a new conversation that is obviously holding some tension in its palms.   You'll be relieved to know that tension all gets worked out in the end. Closing out the record is the 1937 Mack Gordon and Harry Revel classic "There's a Lull In My Life,"blissfully stretching out the last seven minutes of the album like a long holiday party full of old faces. Memories abound of the song's place in jazz history, and the voices that interpreted it in years past: Ella Fitzgerald, Chet Baker, Tony Bennett, Alice Faye, and Nat King Cole. The standard torch song, love ballad, classic, becomes buoyant in their hands. It does not wallow, but revels in its ache. Shouldn't we all?   TRACKS 1. Vessels 2. Equanimity 3. Sword's Water 4. Violets For Your Furs 5. Blue Dream 6. Infinite Compassion 7. Sweet Lorraine 8. Walls 9. Decamping 10. Words and Deeds 11. Mysterious Arrangements 12. There's a Lull In My Life   All Music written by Jamie Saft and published by RareNoisePublishing (PRS), except 'Violets for Your Furs' : music by Matt Dennis and lyrics by Tom Adair 'Sweet Lorraine' music by Cliff Burwell and lyrics by Mitchell Parish 'There's a Lull In My Life' written by Mack Gordon and Harry Revel   Recorded by Jamie Saft and Brian Gunn at Potterville International Sound, NY, Fall 2017 Mixed and Mastered by Christian Castagno in Minca, Colombia Art and Design by Steven Erdman Additional Layout assistance by Graham Schreiner Piano Tuned and prepared by Steve Greenstein R.P.T.

The Jamie Saft Quartet    Hidden Corners     CD, LP AND MULTIPLE DIGITAL FORMATS AVAILABLE IN STORES AND ONLINE ON JUNE 28, 2019 AND THROUGHWWW.RARENOISERECORDS.COM.   Jamie Saft   piano Dave Liebman   tenor & soprano saxophone, flute Bradley Christopher Jones   acoustic bass Hamid Drake   drums

On the transcendent new album Hidden Corners, visionary keyboardist, producer and composer Jamie Saft embarks on a spiritual journey along the searching path unveiled by such iconic forebears as John and Alice Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, and Albert Ayler. Inspired by concepts from Jewish mysticism, the album features an outstanding quartet of deeply exploratory musicians: Saft, longtime collaborator Bradley Jones on bass, the wide-ranging drummer/percussion master Hamid Drake, and legendary saxophonist David Liebman.   Due out June 28, 2019 via RareNoiseRecords, Hidden Corners is the latest manifestation of Saft's ceaselessly adventurous musical spirit, one that has allowed him to veer across genres with a staggering list of collaborators- a list that includes John Zorn, Beastie Boys, Bad Brains, John Adams, Iggy Pop, Donovan, and The B-52s. This new quartet focuses his intrepid imagination on the realm of the cosmic and consciousness, with results that are mind-expanding as well as sonically exhilarating.   "Hamid Drake, Brad Jones, and Dave Liebman are each masters of conjuring mystical states through music," Saft enthuses. "The re-arrangement of notes, tones, sounds, textures, timbres - each musician here has the power to transport the listener to higher realms through the music."   As elusive and strange as it is by definition, the mystical plane is hardly unfamiliar territory for any of these musicians. Liebman enjoyed formative experiences with such pioneers of the audacious as Elvin Jones and Miles Davis and has delved deeply into the work of John Coltrane, while his seeking nature is revealed through the names of his own bands, Quest and Expansions.   In addition to his work with such inventive jazz giants as Don Cherry, Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp and Alice Coltrane, Drake has long meshed his musical and spiritual lives. His lifelong study of the Chinese martial art and health exercise T'ai chi ch'uan has long informed his music, which has connected with his thorough investigations of rhythmic traditions from around the world, bringing him together with deep-rooted musical thinkers from master Gnawa musicians from Morocco to blues icons from his hometown of Chicago.   Jones, too, has collaborated with many of the most innovative minds in modern music, including Ornette Coleman, John Zorn, Muhal Richard Abrams, Elvin Jones, Dave Douglas and The Jazz Passengers, with an eclectic resume that includes work with everyone from Elvis Costello to Sheryl Crow to David Byrne. He's traversed similar terrain in league with Saft in the past as part of the keyboardist's spiritual jazz/roots reggae group New Zion Trio.     That trio is just one manifestation of Saft's enduring love for spiritual jazz, which is one thread that has woven throughout the rich tapestry of his multifarious career. He counts albums like Alice Coltrane's Ptah, the El Daoud and Pharoah Sanders' Thembi among his most profound influences; the title track of Thembi was a regular part of the repertoire of his high school jazz band, in fact.   "I've been fascinated and inspired by the Spiritual Jazz path for years," he explains. "Alice Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, John Coltrane, Albert Ayler - all of these artists seek ecstatic states of consciousness in the music. These transcendent experiences can be traced through art, music, spirituality, exercise and meditation. Jewish Mysticism considers these same paths."   In his liner notes, the Brooklyn-based rapper and producer Eden Pearlstein - better known as ePHRYME - cites the Sefer Yetzirah, "an ancient Kabbalistic text of unknown authorship" that explores the connections of music and numerology through the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. "Invoking practical methods of vibrational magic found in the Sefer Yetzirah," ePHRYME writes, "Jamie Saft and his esteemed collaborators take us on a multi-dimensional journey through the 231 Permutational Gates, allowing us passage through the Four Worlds by entrusting us with the Seven Sets of Double Keys, and inspiring us to Turn at Every Moment by revealing the Hidden Corners of Consciousness and Creative Potential concealed within."   Saft makes the connection between this source of inspiration and those jazz icons who've come before: "A critical element of this is Gematria, the mystical aspects of numerology. In Kabbalah, letters have numerical values - mystical numerical values. John Coltrane explored these mystical states within his arrangements of numbers and musical geometry. All of these paths converge at any number of points."   The session that became Hidden Corners was initially planned to be the latest recording of the New Zion Trio, in this incarnation comprising Jones and Drake. Having crossed paths at countless festivals over the years, Saft invited the drummer to join the band for recent dates, including the 2018 Tampere Festival in Finland. "Hamid is a legend of improvised music," Saft says. "Yet he has an incredibly broad range of musical and life experiences beyond jazz and improvised music. He'ss worked in every possible style and situation in music, and he comes from New Orleans, where much great American Roots music comes from. This range of experience and breadth of musical knowledge is rare and unique."   The universe interceded, however, when Saft was enlisted to perform a concert of John Coltrane's late works with Liebman as the featured saxophonist. "We quickly struck up a friendship and a musical connection," Saft recalls.   "When Liebman plays there is the greatest depth in every facet of his playing. His sound on his instruments, his tone, is otherworldly. Lieb has a true mastery of harmonic concepts at the very highest level. Suddenly I saw a possibility to connect all these masters together."   The long histories and interwoven network of associations that Liebman and Drake share - which most recently converged in their trio with master percussionist Adam Rudolph on the RareNoise release Chi - was among the influences that Saft drew upon for the music of Hidden Corners. "Historic associations are important when considering Dave Liebman and Hamid Drake," he says. "Musicians at this level believe in and understand the transformative powers of music and specifically improvised musical paths. There is a high level of trust at work here- in the process, in our mutual abilities, and in the respect and love we have for each other. So the music is merely a vehicle to continue this conversation amongst ourselves. But always with the goal of creating music that heals the listener. That makes us all feel better."   The healing intention of Saft's compositions is evident from the outset, with the transporting opening moments of "Positive Way," a brief meditative introduction that sets the stage for Jones' singing, soulful bass melody. The blissful and the combustible meet with the entrance of Liebman's piercing, muscular tenor. The tumultuous "Seven Are Double" follows, before Liebman switches to his soaring, diving soprano for "Yesternight," which seems to float atop Drake's ethereal rhythms and Saft's crepuscular chords.   The pianist crafts an air of mystery for "231 Gates," an elusive and shadow-shrouded piece that Liebman investigates with his probing, questioning flute. Jones' achingly bowed bass combine with the shimmering curtain of Saft's piano to cast the spell of "Turn at Every Moment," while the album's title track feels redemptive and prayerful. With Saft evoking Alice Coltrane's harp by strumming the strings inside his piano, "The Anteroom" fully conjures the liminal space suggested by its title, with delicate, pointillistic echoes rippling through the quartet. "Landrace" closes the album on a powerful note, its surging rhythm propelling Saft and Liebman into fierce ecstasies.   As these descriptions suggest, it's ultimately the interactions between these four distinctive voices that makes the music of Hidden Corners so majestic and transformative. "In the end," Saft says, "it's strong personal relationships that make a session like this work. We are all close friends and colleagues. There is great love and respect all around. These personal relationships make the process of creating music together easy and fulfilling."   The "Positive Way" mentioned in the title of the first piece is one key to the music's intent, Saft concludes - the proper mindset, perhaps, for discovering those Hidden Corners where beauty is created. "I'm always trying to make a record that I myself would enjoy listening to. When I'm able to make music with masters at this level, positivity and clarity of purpose are both just always right there in each moment. We follow the path of positivity in the music."   TRACKS 1. Positive Way 2. Seven are Double 3. Yesternight 4. 231 Gates 5. Turn at Every Moment 6. Hidden Corners 7. The Anteroom 8. Landrace   Produced by Jamie Saft and Christian Castagno. Executive Producer for RareNoiseRecords: Giacomo Bruzzo. Recorded by Jamie Saft and Brian Gunn at Potterville International Sound, NY. Mixed and Mastered by Christian Castagno in Minca, Colombia. Cover painting by Eugene Gregan. Additional Art and Design by Steven Erdman. Additional Layout Assistance Graham Schreiner. Piano tuned and prepared by Steve Greenstein R.P.T.. All music written by Jamie Saft & published by RareNoisePublishing (PRS).

Edited June 26, 2019 by GA Russell