Norbert Stein

Silent Sitting Bulls
PATA Music 20 CD

Bledsoe/Lapin/Poore/Schubert/Turner

Seek it not with your eyes

Red Toucan RT 9339

Recorded within eight months of one another, these CDs provide a revealing snapshot of the Köln-centred improvised music scene and coincidentally catch up with recent sounds created by two of the stalwarts of the recently dissolved James Choice Orchestra (JCO). Together for four years, the 20-piece plus JCO was a European aggregation which successfully mixed improvised and notated music performed by players whose primary allegiance was to Jazz, Rock, Improv or so-called Contemporary Classical sounds. Its four leaders/composers were saxophonists Frank Gratkowski, Matthias Schubert and Norbert Stein plus tubaist Carl Ludwig Hübsch.

On Seek it not with your eyes, tenor saxophonist Schubert, who is also one-third of Hübsch’s Longrun Development of the Universe band, is involved with a completely improvised session recorded live at Köln’s Loft. Featured are another ex-JCOer, Melvyn Poore, who plays tuba and euphonium; flutist Helen Bledsoe, a member of MusikFabrik, the city’s contemporary music ensemble; and two visitors: British drummer Roger Turner and Russian pianist Alexey Lapin. As point of comparison, Silent Sitting Bulls is a component of fellow tenor saxophonist Stein’s ongoing Pata Music projects that adheres strands of contemporary and World music to a Jazz and Improv base. Studio recorded, the eight pieces were all composed – and likely arranged – by the reedist, who was also a crucial member of the Kölner Saxophon Mafia. Other players are flutist Michael Heupel and Nicolao Valiensi on euphonium, who both had JCO connections, plus drummer Christoph Haberer whose background is mainstream Jazz as well as computer-aided percussion performances.

Electronics don’t figure into the music here, which under the firm direction of Stein appears mostly concerned with rhythmic interaction as well as the timbres created when brass and reed tones are initially allowed to soar multi-directionally and then simmer alongside percussion. With the emphasis on percussion and euphonium pedal point, at times the performances resemble those of American alto saxophonist Henry Threadgill, who has experimented with similarly constituted ensembles.

Throughout Stein exposes varied textures and moods with echoes of Andalusian music, bouncy dance-styled texts and the faint leavening of Arabic scales. The last appears when Heupel puts asides his more usual airy and lyrical tones to bray nasally. Fungible lines and multi-counterpoint among the horns is also common, along with irregular cymbal pops and drum drags and rebounds plus an overriding low-brass ostinato. Only Stein’s solos, with their worldly vibrating split tones, slice through the harmonies. In general, many of the tunes balance on techniques such as alp-horn-like reverberations from Valiensi or rubato brass asides; first unconnected and parallel and then blended with flute and saxophone lines; as well as cross-ticking percussion rolls and flams that seem almost ceremonial until a more swinging pulse is developed.

“Miao & Chiao” for instance, exhibits all of Pata’s attributes from multi-directional horn timbres to Afro-Cuban styled hollow pops from the percussionist. Again while Stein’s agitato reed-biting and Haberer’s cross-pulsed scattered strokes roughen the collective texture, before mass cacophony signals the finale, a simplified beat and moderato flute trills allow – as with most of the other numbers – a climatic recapping of the head.

Nothing as compositionally conventional arises on the other CD, whose five tracks were designed as improvisations pure and not-so-simple. Instances of catch-as-can extemporizing include the very circumstances. A saxophone-tuba piano gig was inflated to a quartet session since Turner was in town; and the flutist sat in unexpectedly during the second set.

By that time the quartet had already demarcated its parameters. St. Petersburg-based Lapin, who at home works with fellow Russian multi-reedist Yuriy Yaremchuk or tubaist Misha Kolovsky, was comfortable enough in this, his first-gig outside the federation, to create irregular circular harmonies and sympathetic dynamic vibrations. Fusing an original mixture of rumbling low frequency piano chords, scampering keyboard patterns plus stopped and strummed internal strings, he quickly makes common cause with the others.

Turner, who has worked with everyone from French turntablist Alexandre Bellenger to British sound-singer Phil Minton – plus seemingly half the Free Musicians in Europe – is similarly unperturbed. Knitting together rim shots, drags and ruffs with reverberating plunks, cymbal scratches and bull’s eye rim shots, he provides a context for Poore’s pedal-point yelps and snorts as well as Schubert’s squeaking split tones, flutter tonguing and staccatissimo slurs. By the completion of “Can’t Catch the Name” for instance, before the tune is squeezed to silence, it has been enlivened with constricted and slurry bird whistle-like bubbling from both the reed and brass players.

In truth, Bledsoe’s fine-boned flute pitches don’t make that much difference to the performance. On a showpiece such as “Little Ways to Perceive the Invisible” it’s Lapin’s stopped and flattened piano tones – plus some internal string plucks – and Schubert’s deliberately whiny diaphragm vibrations that define the narrative. Eventually though, Bledsoe’s birds-in-the-trees chirping and peeping add an elevated change of pitch that seem to encourage the pianist to unearth bass clef timbres by bowing and strumming the piano strings. Turner’s slaps, skips and shakes then join Poore’s disassociated wah wahs and harsh tenor saxophone flutter tonguing for an ending that is more summation than delayed climax.

Both CDs have much to offer. Those interested in more formal, tuneful and rhythmically oriented sounds will gravitate to Silent Sitting Bulls. Those whose preference is pure improv will find a lot of like with Seek it not with your eyes.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Seek: 1. Per aspera 2. Can’t Catch the Name 3.Blur/Fanfare for the Rational Man 4. Little Ways to Perceive the Invisible* 5. Animated Beings*

Personnel: Seek: Melvyn Poore (tuba and euphonium); Matthias Schubert (tenor saxophone); Helen Bledsoe (flute)*; Alexey Lapin (piano); and Roger Turner (drums)

Track Listing: Silent: 1. Silent Sitting Bulls 2. Nondual Action 3. Paradise Lost 4. This is You 4. Quantum Mechanics 5. Schleuderhonig (Strained Honey) 6. Miao & Chiao 7. Hapana Lakini

Personnel: Silent: Nicolao Valiensi (euphonium); Norbert Stein (tenor saxophone); Michael Heupel (flutes) and Christoph Haberer (drums and wave drum)

January 13, 2011

Norbert Stein Pata Generators

Direct Speech
Pata Music 19 CD

Given the circumstances that dominate jazz scene in the 21st Century, Rösrath-based tenor saxophonist and composer Norbert Stein and his band mates face a challenge typical for musicians of their age and stature: How far out should they go?

While the answer when listening to Direct Speech may be “not very”, this isn’t a criticism as much as recognition. One of the founders of Köln’s Jazzhaus musicians collective more than 30 years ago, a former member of the Kölner Saxophone Mafia and one of the composers for the 23-piece James Choice Orchestra, Stein’s more than 20-year-old Pata Music imprint –named for pata physics that is concerned with unreal logic and the science of imaginary solutions – has, despite the name, showcased his composing and playing in different ethno-centric, programmatic and straight big-band settings.

Obviously the saxophonist – and by extension his sidemen – have decided that they’d rather be eclectic than avant-garde. This is despite the fact that two other players – flutist Michael Heupel and bassist Sebastian Gramss –are in the Choice Orchestra, while Matthias Muche has been involved with minimalist sessions with pianist Philip Zoubek. Redefining the contemporary tradition is as valid a stance as hard-core experimentation. Yet while Stein’s 11 compositions on Direct Speech are competently played with numerous instances of professionalism and originality, this is no desert island disc. Not every CD has to be, but with the 21st Century’s overload of available improvised material Direct Speech is just another high-class session of contemporary jazz.

“Alice in der parallelen Welt (Alice in the Parallel World)” for instance, sounds as if the Lewis Carroll heroine has wondered into a planet influenced by Machito or even Santana. Thick, walking bass lines and stick-pressured back-beat drumming accompany a flute interlude that’s half-gritty in a Herbie Mann-like mode. In contrast, Stein’s tenor solo is very much-post Coltrane emotional with slurring glossolalia, squeaking altissimo and irregular vibrato. Muche’s blustery mainstream runs are more J. J. Johnson than Willie Colon, and he offers variations of that role at various junctures throughout the rest of the disc. Still, there is a point on the soulful “Music for Stand-alone Player”, where Muche appears to be playing Roswell Rudd-like plunger tones to complement Stein’s tough, splintered Archie Shepp-like output.

As a composer/arranger, the tenor man evidently prefers a polyphonic horn line up, with many of the tunes unrolling like “For: Get it!” On this track the lines modulate upwards from andante to a gallop, as Heupel outputs calliope-like slide-insinuations, while Haberer’s cymbal clacks, paradiddles and drags are less obtrusive then on other pieces which open up for drum solos. Conclusion is another common Stein trope, layering horn parts, which jerk the tune back to andante, then an even faster tempo change before a conclusive end.

To co-opt the CD’s title, in direct speech this is a good disc that shows off the talents of Stein and the others in their best light. It will likely give enjoyment to many. Those searching for definitive, innovative musical statements that will be remembered for years to come however should look elsewhere,

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Chameleon Nature 2. Music for Stand-alone Player 3. For: Get it! 4. Die Tochter des Papstes (The Daughter of the Pope) 5. Die Zen Gebote (The Zen Commandments) 6. Daily Life 7. No Bird beyond the Cage 8. Les Yeux de l´Oiseau de la Guerre (The Eyes of the Bird of War) 9. Direct Speech 10. Alice in der parallelen Welt (Alice in the Parallel World) 11. Borderline

Personnel: Matthias Muche (trombone); Norbert Stein (tenor saxophone); Michael Heupel (flutes); Sebastian Gramss (bass) and Christoph Haberer (drums)

April 13, 2009