Baars/Buis/Deman

Gerigk-Ianes-Mellan
Commons
LFDS Records 022

Low pitched brass textures don’t get enough respect. That’s because the practitioners usually function as pace setters and accompanists, puffing a continuous ostinato and not much else. Except for these trios. Showing off the full range of their instruments these singular players are fully integrated within the compositions and improvisations.

Cecil’s Dance features Belgian Berlinde Deman, who has worked with Dave Douglas, contributing novel textures to 10 compositions by Amsterdam’s Ab Baars, who also plays clarinet and shakuhachi. Ther third member is Dutch trombonist Joost Buis, who works with Ziv Taubenfeld. Deman plays both the tuba and its predecessor, the distinctively shaped serpent. Completely improvised meanwhile, Commons features Paris-based François Mellan, who often works with Yoram Rosilio, playing the sousaphone, the  tuba’s marching band cousin. His associates are German bassist Jonas Gerigk and Argentinean guitarist Luis Ianes, both of whom are part of the international improv scene.

With Baars and Deman able to move among instruments, the textures available to the Dutch-Belgian trio multiply. Again while Deman can wallow at the bottom of the scale to produce expected renal puffs, the polyphonic affiliations expressed on tunes like the title track and “Louange des dames” extend tones much further. On the latter a near-Baroque interface melds spiky reed and mellow brass outpourings. Meanwhile “Cecil’s Dance” finds the tuba’s watery growls moving up in pitch to thin snorts as Buis’ hand muted plunger notes trill, twist and turn as they intersect with Baars’ prestissimo squalls. Not to be left out, “This Nearly Was Mine” is almost a trombone concerto, allowing Buis to slur and slide through half-valve expressions on a theme which seems half a 1970s soul ballad and half a Duke Ellington 1920s curio. Helping out is a logical tuba ostinato and broken octave clarinet asides.

Other pieces are centered around contrasting timbres from the featherlight shakuhachi facing those from bugling trombone triplets and tuba burbles. The bouncy “Kikiriki” also confirms the versatility of what’s probably the serpent. That’s because the low brass pumps lyrically animate the composition along with moderated clarinet trills and gravelly trombone stop time.

With different string-playing partners, Mellan manages to exact even more tones from the slightly louder sousaphone. Although willing to supply a thickened ostinato when needed, his murmuring basement puffs and spiraling high pitches are used sparingly, but confidently throughout. Additionally he revs up the instrument’s strength on a track like the concluding “Acequias”. With burbling thrusts he gooses Gerigk’s bass string rubs and Ianes’ guitar string taps up to arco arches from the bassist and  shaking flanges and amp reverberations from the guitarist. Elsewhere he uses the flutters created by his tongue jujitsu in different ways. On “Gemeinschaftsweiden” for instance, his spreading molasses-like bottom tones seem to take on pseudo-electrification as his snarl gradations challenge the bassist to create hardened spiccato strokes and the guitarist to feature superfast projections.

Throughout it’s often Mellan whose blats and burbles manage the triple equilibrium and maintain the tunes’ horizontal flow. But that doesn’t means that discordant narratives such as “Oiseaux de passage” don’t rely more on his brass technique as the others’ string procedures. Ianes contributes whanging string stops while Gerigk bow stops produce a percussive undertow. Still. the timbres that fragment and finally draw together the exposition are from the sousaphone as they spiral from hunting-horn-like blasts to honking in-and-out breaths and finally to consistent honks.

When it comes to horn innovators, those playing the lowest brass instruments are often the least recognized. The exciting sounds on these fine CDs should change that situation.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Cecil’s: 1. For John  2. The Sky and the Sea 3. Kikiriki 4. This Nearly Was Mine 5. Shuffle for Tristan 6. Jackdaw 7. Portret van de Selfkicker 8. Faintly White 9. Cecil’s Dance 10. Louange des dames

Personnel: Cecil’s: Joost Buis (trombone); Berlinde Deman (tuba and serpent) and Ab Baars (clarinet and shakuhachi)

Track Listing: Commons: 1. Groundwaters 2. Language, Memory, Knowledge 3. Fablab 4. Gemeinschaftsweiden 5. Seeds 6. Oiseaux de passage 7. Unpatented Living 8. Acequias

Personnel: Commons: François Mellan (sousaphone); Luis Ianes (guitar) and Jonas Gerigk (bass)