Eberhard : An Orchestral Homage by Lyle Mays

Lyle Mays : Eberhard Self Produced

The pianist/composer Lyle Mays, shockingly to many of us, transitioned on February 10, 2020. His niece Aubrey Johnson, a talented jazz vocalist, said only that his untimely passing was the result of

 “…a long battle with a recurring illness.”  No further clarification of Mays’ medical condition has ever been revealed publicly.

Lyle Mays Photo credit  Wayne Scott Jones

During his closing days, Mays devoted himself to honing, polishing, and completing a musical project that had consumed him over the years, a recordable dedication to one of his early inspirations, the progressive double bassist Eberhard Weber. Mays first started playing the armature of this composition back in 2009 at a festival in his home state of Wisconsin. The German bassist had suffered a stroke in 2007, and so Mays’ first public performance of this piece was as much a healing, a musical encouragement to Weber to recover, as it was a homage to the man, his work, and its influence. Sadly, Weber’s medical setback was more permanent than originally hoped for. The now eighty-one-year-old bassist has never played again. 

Mays came to national prominence for his work as the collaborator and co-composer of the Pat Metheny Group.  During that period Mays always left his unmistakable imprimatur on some of the group’s most endearing records. The artist won ten Grammy Awards and was nominated twenty-three times over the years.  Despite his importance to the success of the PMG, Mays was satisfied to work his musical and technological magic, mostly avoid the spotlight and be satisfied to play the sidekick to Metheny, his Doc Holiday to Pat’s Wyatt Earp at their musical OK Corral. Throughout his life he was always fascinated with technology, chess, architecture and mu

Mays was playing piano and organ from a young age. He attended North Texas State University (later University of North Texas) and won his first nomination as the composer/arranger for his work on the album Lab ’75 with the school’s One O’clock Lab Band.

North Texas State University Lab'75

While still a student, Mays performed at the Wichita Jazz Festival in 1975 and it is interesting to look at the festival’s performer list from that year as this event proved to be pivotal to Mays' future career. Exploring a musician’s trajectory is always of interest and timely intersections with other musicians often lead to life-changing paths.

 

From WJF 25 years of Great Jazz Compilation by Gary Hess

Mays’ Student Quartet included bassist Marc Johnson, drummer Steve Houghton, and woodwind player Pete Brewer.

It was unpredictable the way new connections casually made at venues like the WJF could be so important to a young musician’s future. For the bassist, Marc Johnson stars somehow cross each other’s paths and the festival likely served as an informal entre to the pianist Bill Evans. Johnson was eventually chosen to replace a departing Gomez in Evans’ last trio with drummer Joe LaBarbera, and he did so from 1978 until Evans’ death in 1980. No doubt a life-changing experience for the bassist. Johnson went on to a stellar career as one of jazz’s most respected bassists. He remained associated with his classmate Mays for years with his sonorous double bass heard on six of the keyboardist’s recordings as a leader including  The Ludwigsburg Concert from 2015. 

Drummer Steve Houghton continued his career as a respected sideman, eventually turning to academia, becoming a respected associate professor of percussion at Indiana University among other institutions. Woodwind artist Pete Brewer would continue his career as a successful freelance musician.

If you look at the artist roster for the 1975 Wichita Jazz Festival, the lineup had s a plethora of great drummers that included Max Roach, Ed Soph, Mickey Roker, and Bob Moses (with Burton), but you will also see other important acts including Woody Herman’s Young Herd, Bill Evans Trio, and Gary Burton’s group which included the young guitarist, Pat Metheny. Woody Herman, the legendary bandleader, and clarinetist must have liked what he saw of the Lyle Mays Quartet in Wichita. Shortly thereafter Mays, Brewer, and Houghton were recruited to become new members of Herman’s traveling Thundering Herd later in 1975. Mays was to be the keyboardist for Herman for eight months into 1976 until another Wichita twist of fate would change his path again. Mays and the Metheny first met at the Wichita festival in 1975. They mutually found that they had musically compatible goals. Metheny would leave Burton and Mays left Herman and the two decided to start a new group.  The group would record and release their first collaboration Watercolors in 1977 under Metheny’s name. The collaboration would be a rich one and it would last for most of twenty-eight years through their last recording together as the Pat Metheny Group This Way Up in 2005. By that time, traveling and presumably, health issues induced Mays to call it quits.

Watercolors ECM 1977

Watercolors would be Mays' first opportunity to work with the progressive European bassist Eberhard Weber. Metheny had worked with Weber while he was with vibraphonist Gary Burton on his albums Ring from 1974 and Passengers from 1976.  Mays again played with Weber on the bassist’s album Later That Evening from 1982. There is little doubt that the German’s playing influenced both these young American pioneers.

Despite being strongly influenced by his classical training, a musical history that he shared with Mays, Weber created his own minimalist, ostinato-based, ethereal, and melancholic approach to his work. He was most likely influenced by the avant-garde composers Steve Reich and Terry Riley. By the early seventies, Weber designed and preferred a five-string-electric bass that extended the instrument’s range, adding more depth and drama to his playing. He was never a boisterous performer who commanded attention. Instead, he wanted his music to speak for itself.  Like the free-jazz movement that went off in one direction that veered away from traditional hard bop jazz, or even the frenetic fusion of the early seventies, Weber’s music was a detour that embraced a gentler, more thoughtful approach. There is no doubt Weber’s musical approach, almost chamber-like, was a serious signpost that caught Mays’ attention.

Eberhard is a thirteen-minute opus of pure Mays’ magic. It is a splendid piece of mostly through-composed music. Mays explores elements of classical, jazz, chamber, minimalism, vocalization, and cinematic musical qualities. Typical of Mays’ work, the piece has a tonal depth and emotional reach that displays the man’s expansive concept of what music should be. While the work is a homage to Weber, the music is pure Mays.

Mallett artist Wade Culbreath opens the piece with a repeating tonal movement that creates an almost other-worldly atmosphere upon which Mays solemn pianistic probing floats. Jimmy Johnson’s electric bass bellows beautifully with authority and poignancy in what I have read is a fully composed part. Mays’ niece, the vocalist Aubrey Johnson, enters the scene with a feathery vocalization that has angelic elements as she vocally traces the music lines emphatically. At one point, Mays’ piano has a very bluesy crossed with Americana feel to it that has always been part of his style. Steve Rodby’s beautiful double bass anchors the time with its fluid bottom tone. Bob Sheppard’s flute is introduced for another tonal factor that adds to the orchestration along with some electronic synthesizing effects that seem to be a identifiable part of Mays’ signature style. A quartet of cellos seamlessly adds to the pallet of tonal possibilities. Mallett, piano, flute, bass, and drum interact swelling with energy, and Bill Frisell’s twangy guitar voice briefly makes its appearance. The separate voices of Johnson and Rosana and Gary Eckert almost conjoin. They meld like three pieces of gold transforming into one brilliant ingot by the heat of a scorching crucible that is Mays' music. Jimmy Branly’s drum work erupts like percolating lava, and Alex Acuna adds perceptive percussive accents that just increase the temperature of the rhythmic brew that Mays compositionally constructs. Culbreath and Johnson beautifully match each other’s notes like two empathetic savants.  Mays introduces a jazz septet that gets into a fiery vibe section that is the apex of the piece. The section includes some perceptive organ work by Mitchel Forman, with Mays on piano, the explosive Branly on drums, subtle Acuna on percussion, Steve Rodby’s strong acoustic bass, and the multi-reed master Bob Sheppard’s tenor saxophone. 

Sheppard’s improvised solo runs for a little over two and half minutes and starts at about the 8:24 minute mark. It is a masterwork of controlled passion powered by a internal sweltering fire that he can call on at any time as is needed. Mays’ orchestrates the music to the summit and then allows Culbreath’s gorgeous, resonant mallet work and some of his own synth accents to melt the piece away, like a fading crimson sunset, turns the sky into a brilliant pastel haze.

The more I listen to this, the more I aurally observe the nuances of his orchestration, the more I realize how much we will miss Lyle Mays and his beautiful world of sonic colors. Eberhard could certainly be positioned as Lyle Mays epitaph, his crown jewel, but while it certainly is his last recorded work, I am sure that Mr. Weber will listen to this piece, love it and it will certainly put a bittersweet smile on his face.  This work should excite those of us who have loved Mays'work for so long, to go back and revisit the body of this exceptional artist's life work. If we do this, we will undoubtedly honor this man’s legacy in the fashion he intended it to be listened to, with joy.

"A Conversation:" Orchestral Communication by Tim Hagans and the NDR Big Band

Tim Hagans and the NDR Big Band  A Conversation  Waiting Moon Records

I have followed the trumpeter, Tim Hagans, for years and I always found his playing to be fiery, at his best exploratory, and always inventive. His musical horizons were never limited by his acumen as an accomplished trumpet player. Hagans has produced seventeen recordings as a leader. He has honed his skills and expanded his musical challenges to include composition, arranging, and now conducting. His latest release on Waiting Moon Records titled A Conversation, matches Hagans up with the excellent NDR Big Band for the fourth time. This five-movement piece of work is conversational, dynamic, at times cinematic, often raucous, and by any measure an important achievement.

Hagans has taken the instruments of the NDR Big Band, here nineteen pieces plus his trumpet, and formed four ensembles to play his challenging music. Instead of the instruments being deployed in traditional sections by type- Hagans has formed three mixed ensembles, each containing trumpet, woodwinds, flutes, and trombones in various configurations and one rhythm section that includes guitar, piano bass, drums, and percussion. He has written and arranged these groups like independent jazz ensembles that are directed to communicate in cooperation and at times vie with each other for sonic attention in his works. Hagans’ ensemble voicings are more related to their sonic identity and emotional effect.  Essentially, A Conversation explores possibilities of musical conversation in new, exciting, and perhaps unexpected ways. The music is a amalgam of elements from classical, jazz and orchestrated film music disciplines.

Hagans’ music is progressive, orchestral, and musically rich. Each movement is between twelve to sixteen minutes; each like an aural theatrical presentation that use the four groupings to create a vibrant, and at times, competing approach to the music.

"Movement I" utilizes alternating brass, flutes, and woodwinds in ascending statements that cascade with the help of Jukkis Uotila’s percolating drums and Marcio Doctor’s complementary percussion to maintain a perceptible direction. These ensembles are powerful and boisterous. They converse like friendly neighbors at a street party where multiple voices add their own identity to the gathering. Vladyslav Sendecki fires off an energetic and angular piano solo that has the lead voice of this conversation before the music stops abruptly and moves into a gentler stage, flute whispering over a throbbing rhythmic base. Individual voices, trumpets, flutes, trombones, and percussive accompaniment are orchestrated to build to a robust conclusion.

"Movement II" opens with modulating sections swelling into a raucous interchange of exchanging musical ideas. There seems to be no melodic anchor to these pieces, the music is more like vignettes that open and expand like a cinematic scene from one act to another. But in "Movement II" there is a repeated line in at about the three-minute mark that is maintained by one section and accompanied by others. This unfolds into a gorgeous, extended bass clarinet solo by Daniel Buch that follows the same established theme, improvising on it. The movement also features a beautiful and buoyant bass solo by Ingmar Heller whose sound is tonally rich and fluid and carries on to the coda. Here Hagans seems interested in the darker, lower tones and the aural effects they can evoke.  

"Movement III" starts off with a Heller meandering bass line upon which Sendecki offering an angular piano line that is accentuated by sectional accompaniment in ascending steps.  Hagans adds rash, boisterous trombone accents by Dan Gottshall and a high register squealing trumpet solo by Stephan Meinberg. At about the four-minute mark the rhythm section starts a swinging section that is lead by Uotila’s intrepid drum work and sections entering the fray. There is a searing and inventive trumpet solo that is followed by Buch’s rousing baritone solo, some powerful drum and bass work, and an impressive alto sax solo by Pete Bolte. This one joyously swings leading to an expressive muted Hagans trumpet at the coda.  

"Movement IV" is one of my favorite tracks on the album. It features an opening with the composer on his open trumpet.  Hagans has impressive control, modulating to create microtonal slurs of expression before opening the music up to the entire group. Fiete Felsch offers a rousing, Phil Woods-like alto solo that lights it up with his excitement. Marcio Doctor’s percussive skills make this one  move with a noir-like feeling that is delightful. The sections compete at one point in a boisterous, cacophonous outreach for attention, and it losses the flow a little for me, but Felsch’s strong sax voice maintains the drive. The movement ends with a rhythmic display of sonic riches by Doctor’s wind-like creations.

"Movement V" opens with an island-inspired rhythm that evokes memories of the cinematic work of master composer/arranger Henry Mancini. There is no doubting the theater-like qualities of some of Hagans' music on this album. His muted trumpet soars over the music like a clarion bird overwhelmed by the sight of approaching land. The section work is most unified here, lending tonal support to the ostinato sway. Sendecki’s piano comp is astute and minimal. A splash of Uotila’s cymbal opens an entry to a more robust section that features some vibrant solo trombone work by Klaus Heidenreich.  The sections are orchestrated to play sequentially in a explosive ending that is like a sonic eruption before ending in a structured fade.

Take a listen for yourself: https://timhagans.bandcamp.com/track/movement-iv

Balance by Adam Unsworth, Byron Olson and John Vanore ; Orchestral Jazz At Its Finest

Balance : AC-48

The French horn is an unusual instrument in jazz, first prominently used by Claude Thornhill in his Orchestra of the late 1930’s and early 1940’s. Thornhill employed Sandy Siegelstein and John Graas to play French horn at various times in his band. Their symphonic tone along with a powerful woodwind section gave that band its distinctively cool sound.  Gil Evans , a Thornhill arranger who used the distinctive instrumentation as a laboratory for developing his own sound,  famously commented on the Thornhill Orchestra’s unique sound.  “The sound hung like a cloud.” 

On Balance,  French Horn player Adam Unsworth, a member of Ryan Truesdell's Gil Evans Centennial Project,  teams up with  conductor/ arranger Byron Olson and trumpeter John Vanore and created an eminently listenable experience. They seamlessly  integrate a sumptuous symphonic sound with the exhilarating excitement of improvisational ensemble playing. The music has an ethereal beauty with cinematic undertones mostly provided by Olson’s deft arrangements and Unsworth’s  billowy sound.. With songs like the title track “Balance,” composed by Unsworth, Olson’s arrangement is resplendent with strings and counterpointed by some masterful soloing by Unsworth, pianist Bill Mays  and saxophonist Bob Mallach. The song transports you to a place of mental balance and tranquility interspersed with a dynamism that is kinetic and revitalizing.

On “Flow”, another Unsworth composition,  the lyrical pianism of Bill Mays and the warm clarinet work of Jeff Nichols carries you into the slipstream of this piece with effortless ease.  The rhythm section of Mike Richmond and Danny Gottlieb are propulsive but unobtrusively  supportive. John Vanore’s warm flugelhorn, Unsworth’s richly expressive horn and the brilliant string arrangement of Byron Olson make for pure magic.

“Bittersweet” an Olson composition, is the musical invocation of the word. Trumpeter Vanore lifts this tune from its melancholy into a more spirited ensemble playing that includes a tasteful tenor solo by tenorman Mallach.

“Tilt” starts out with an ostinato line by pianist Mays and saxophonist Mallach. The orchestration by Olson gives this piece a cinematic feel of action. There is a section of controlled cacophony that is punctuated by Gottlieb’s precise drumming. The tune takes a film noir turn with Mallach and Unsworth playing in unison before Mays enters with a stirringly original piano solo. Unsworth returns with a French horn solo that almost pulsess like a rombone. The tune ends with a bounty of multiple instruments all working in controlled frenzy.

“Blues Nocturne” features exquisite ensemble playing with Vancores muted trumpet, Unsworth’s bellowing horn surrounded by Olson’s swelling strings. Pianist Mays dances on the keyboard with a marvelously floating crescendo of notes leading into a soulful solo by bassist Mike Richmond, including his expressive sighs.  Saxophonist Bob Mallach's playing is robust and fluid. Olson’s ” Michele” is a mournful ballad played to perfection by Unsworth’s moving horn and made all the more poignant by arranger/conductor Olson’s deeply emotive orchestration. Vancore offers a subdued but effective muted trumpet solo.

The album finishes  with Olson’s “One Last Fling” a swinging ensemble piece that showcases some nice individual playing by Unsworth, Mays, Mallach, Gottlieb and Richmond and  “Find Your Way” an Unsworth composition that features Mallach’s lyrical playing along with Unsworth’s own emotive French horn work, supported by a the full orchestra arrangement by Olson.  Balance is orchestral jazz at its finest, a feast for the ears that can be enjoyably left in your cd player’s rotation without losing its appeal over multiple listenings. 

Personnel: Adam Unsworth, French horn; John Vanore, trumpet and flugelhorn; Bob Mallach, tenor saxophone; Bill Mays, piano: Mike Richmone, bass; Danny Gottlieb, drums, Byron Olson, arranger/conductor Philadelphia Session: Violins: Richard Amoroso (solo); Jose Blumenshein, Jason Depue, Daniel Han, Dana Morales, Yayol Numazawa, William Polk, Paul Roby, Marc Rovetti; Violas: Che-Hung Chen, Kerri Ryan, Burchard Tang; Cellos Efe Baltacigil, Yumi Kendall; Bass Harold Robinson; Clarinet/Bass Clarinet: Paul Demers; Bassoon, Holly Blake; New York Session: Viola Richard Brice, Cello Allison Seidner; Bass, David Kuhn; Flute/Alto Flute, Pamelea Sklar, Obe English Horn, Charles Pillow; Clarinet, Jeff Nichols; Bassoon, Kim Laskowski, Vibraphone, Bill Hayes.

Here is a link to adam Unsworth's website where you play selections from his album Balalnce

Chuck Owen's & The Jazz Surge Take You Down the Rapids in River Runs

I have never had the opportunity to listen to Chuck Owen’s music so as is my usual practice I placed the cd on my changer and plopped myself down on my couch clutching the liner notes that I usually read as I listen.  As I started to read Mr. Owen composer’s notes , where he will go on to describe the genesis of his creation for those who wish to have a more enhanced  understanding of his creative process, I quickly come across his “spoiler’s alert” shrouded appropriately  in white water rafter’s language “For those who prefer a single-person kayak to a guided raft or who simply want the experience of their first trip to be as pristine as possible…I understand, Meet you at the take out point.”  Translation: forget where it comes from or how you got there just enjoy the ride! I immediately put the notes down and settled a little more comfortably into my well-worn couch and immersed myself in Owen’s fantastic river journeys.

Chuck Owen conducting

A little background on Mr. Owen,  he is currently a distinguished professor of Jazz Studies at the University of Southern Florida, Director of the USF  Center for Jazz Composition and  Director of the USF Jazz Ensemble for the last twenty-two years. He has over fifty published compositions and has composed for orchestras as diverse as the Netherlands Metropole Orchestra to the Tonight Show Orchestra  to Dave Liebman’s Big Band. 

Apparently Mr. Owen has also done his share of white water kayaking and rafting and his experiences on various trips and down several rivers are the grist from which he has made this delicious work of art. The five piece movement is a Concerto for jazz guitar, saxophone and orchestra and Mr. Owen has created a masterpiece of aural sounds; a dazzling array of prismatic colors and textures that envelop the listener in a splendidly evocative way.

The prologue starts your aquatic journey and is titled “Dawn at River’s Edge”, a reference to the early morning breaking camp ritual of most white water expeditions.   As the yawning bowed bass of Mark Neuenschwander stirs this pre-dawn scene, Owen brings in the rest of his strings, what sounds like a celeste, some willowy reeds, a harp and a tingling triangle. The orchestra is awakening just like the rafters are awakening to the day’s journey ahead.

The First movement is entitled “Bound Away” and is a reference to a one time journey down the Greenbriar and New Rivers of West Virginia.  The title is a reference to a line from the American folk song “ Shenandoah”  which the composer says is a source for some of the melody  in the piece.With a crash of drummer Danny Gotlieb’s cymbals , dancing chimes, piccolo’s , flutes and some violin accents, composer Owen’s introduces the dual lead voices of tenor saxophonist Jack Wilkins and guitarist LaRue Nickelson. The melody takes on a distinctive Americana feel with the addition of some tasteful fiddle-style violin accenting of Rob Thomas. The orchestra charges forward  like a boundless river in a determined path down from its source to its mouth, never to be thwarted only to be marveled at and given over to.  This orchestra is amazingly tight and yet marvelous supple to Owen’s demands. Wilkins has a hard-driving sound that darts up, down and around in flurries of eddy-like currents, typical of any river route that only shows you it’s hidden mysteries when you dare to release yourself to it. About ten minutes into the piece guitarist Nickelson, with his Metheny-like sound, creates a sense of wonderment with his probing and melodic runs.  His mellow toned sound is like a brief calm a midst the rush. A deceptive calm appears, just like when a river widens for a stretch giving you a sense of peace that lulls you for a bit before it reveals its next series of trickery. Nickelson switches to a more searing guitar sound and trades licks with Wilkins. Mayhem occurs as the travelers go down a particularly rough spot. The piece builds with an escalating sense of urgency, brilliantly paced by Gotlieb’s driving drums and the tautly controlled orchestra.

The Second Movement is titled “ Dark Waters, Slow Waters” inspired by the Hillsborough River in Florida. He describes it as  a spring fed waterway that lazily snakes through swamps that are covered with Spanish moss and drooping Cypress.  The delicate guitar of Nickelson  and the poignant violin of Rob Thomas pierce the shadowy scenery created by Owen’s hauntingly eerie orchestration. A journey that is decided more languishing but filled with apprehension and mystery that  abounds around every bend in the river.  The movement eventually takes on a Latinized beat which allows Nickelson and Wilkins to trade ideas over the resplendently lush orchestration. Owen’s masterfully creates his cinematic music in such a way as to seamlessly meld modern jazz improvisation with more traditional orchestrations and the result is a marvelous amalgam of the two.

The Third Movement “Chutes and Wave Trains” is a reference to terms well known by white water rafters.  In this case Owen is referring to his experience on the Chattanooga River in Georgia and South Carolina. Chutes are rock formed narrows that concentrate the water from a large body of water to a more narrow body of water creating an increase in flow and rapid acceleration through the chute. Waves trains are a series of bumps or waves that occur at the end of a rapid and give the rider a pleasant roller coaster type ride.  Owen starts the piece with a series of pizzicato strings and Gotlieb’s crisp snare. The excitement of the upcoming cascade through the chute is built up by a series of string and bass created ostinato lines over which Rob Thomas plays an urgent and compelling violin solo. Funky guitar accents by Nickelson add to the delight of the sound. Saxophonist Wilkins trades lines with both electric bass and electric guitar building the tension to the musical pinnacle of the piece. Rob Thomas’s poignant violin is deftly inserted to release tension before the pizzicato violins create a series of waves in sync with Gotlieb’s snare drum. Brass and reeds slowly enter building the tension once again as bass and cellos create a dark, foreboding background over which Wilkins and Nickelson create modernistic counterpoint. The interjection of such seemingly disparate sound elements work to great effect in the most dramatic piece on the cd.

The Fourth Movement “Side Hikes-A Ridge Away” is a beautifully conceived representation of the composer’s experience of floating down the Colorado and Green Rivers in Colorado, Utah and Arizona to find himself in hereto for unreachable places, climbing to the top of a ridge along the way and experiencing the magic of unknown vistas and natural beauty. The piece is played with emotional power by Jack Wilkins whose tenor soars atop Owen’s lush orchestral arrangement.  For anyone who has exerted the effort to  climb a peak to experience the unparalleled feeling of mystery, excitement and accomplishment one has in reaching the top, Owen’s music will surely ring true.

The final movement in this suite is titled “Perhaps the Better Claim,” a reference to a line from one of my favorite poems, Robert Frost’s “ The Road Not Taken,”  a copy of which is printed in the liner notes. The poem ponders on the choices we make in life and how they ultimately affect our outcomes. This is perhaps the most dazzlingly orchestrated piece in the concerto. The orchestra is remarkably precise as it navigates the quick changes in tempo and color that is demanded of them by Owen’s marvelously powerful score. These talented musicians weave in and out of their parts never muddying each other’s roles, working like a precision time piece and producing as beautiful a piece of music as Mr. Owen’s fertile memory has composed. To anyone who believes that great orchestras don't exist beyond the big city markets this talented orchestra dispels any such notion.

For anyone who has experienced the beauty and awe of white water rafting, kayaking or even just climbing a peak, Mr. Owen’s concerto is the next best thing to being transported there. With River Runs Mr. Owen has proven himself to be a compositional force to be reckoned with.