Tessa Souter Offers Some Enchanting Music from French Composer Erik Satie and More on "Shadows and Silence"

 

Tessa Souter-Shadows and Silence- The Erik Satie Project-NOANARA

The chanteuse Tessa Souter released her latest album Shadows and Silence- The Erik Satie Project on the NOANARA label on July 1, 2025. Having been a follower and fan of this stylistic vocalist, this may be the best of her releases to date.

Souter’s theme is the artistry of the classical composer/pianist Erik Satie, whose eccentric and minimalist approach to western music may have been an inspiration to the subsequent modal jazz and ambient music trends. Despite the influence to jazz and ambient genres, there is a great deal of classical, albeit modern, influence on this record.

Souter has the soul of a lyricist, and it is on display in spades on this album. She takes several songs from Satie-Gymnopedic No 1, No 2, Vexations, and No 3, Gnossienne No 1, No 2, and No 3- and retitles them with lyrics. She pens lyrics about love, loss, transience, fluidity, beauty and the futility of thinking you can capture the ever-changing present, and peace. This thoughtful compilation shows respect for the music of an artist whose work was so influential. My first exposure was back in the early seventies, when I fell in love with the Blood, Sweat, & Tears version of their Variations on Theme 1^st and 2^nd movements from Gymnopedic No 1, as arranged by multi-instrumentalist Dick Halligan and recorded by the jazz/rock band back in 1968.

On Souter’s version of this composition, she renames this lyric version “Rayga’s Song,” in dedication to the birth of bassist Yasushi Nakamura’s son, which happened during a snowfall. She is accompanied by Luis Perdomo’s delicate piano work and Steve Wilson’s soaring soprano saxophone. Bassist Nakamura’s plucky bass solo offers his own poignant comment. Souter’s lyrics and her sincere voice bring the element of hopeful love, to this piece that revels in the promise of a new life into this otherwise haunting piece.

Satie’s Gnossienne No1 was retitled with lyrics as Souter’s “A Song for You” (not to be confused by the Leon Russell song by the same name). On this one Souter tells the story of a disguised lover who hides his true intention and the effects it had on his befallen lover. Drummer Billy Drummond’s beat is hypnotic, Perdomo’s piano is splendid and Nakamura’s bass throbs like a beating heart.

Souter even knits in a song that recalls a Paul Gaugin painting of the same name “Du’O Venons-Nous” based on Satie’s Gymnopedic No3, which has some nice arco work by Nakamura and some airy soprano work by Wilson.

Clearly Souter’s exposure to Satie has been more studious and rigorous then mine. But this is not exclusively a Satie album. Souter finds other excellent pieces that seem to thematically weave into the fabric of this project seamlessly.  The Edith Piaf-inspired “Avec le Temps,” a Leo Ferre composition that Souter sings in French, with both emotion and verve, accompanied by Nakamura’s excellent bow and Perdomo’s crystalline piano.

Souter includes a Rod McKuen song, inspired by Jacques Brel titled “If You Go Away.” She does as an intimate duo with Perdomo in the intro, before she kicks it up a notch for a moment with her vocal energy, as she injects a cabaret feel. She follows with singing in French for a section before the trio takes the music to another level, eventually Souter returns to that intimate duo at the coda.

Jazzers should appreciate the song “Never Broken (ESP)” a collaboration written by vocalist Cassandra Wilson and saxophone/composer, legend Wayne Shorter. Souter is at her most fluid here. The trio percolates with Perdomo getting off on the zigzagging lines he introduces, as Nakamura and Drummond lock in like a fine-tuned timepiece, with Drummond getting a little freedom to offer some nice drum centric features on this one.

Perhaps one of my favorites is bassist Ron Carter’s “Mood,” which Souter’s worded version is called “Musica Universalis.” Instrumentally, this one includes a mesmeric metronomic beat that is laid down by Nakamura and Drummond, before Perdomo adds his own leading piano lines. The real tonal treat comes from Australian born New York-based Nadje Noordhuis’s moody muted trumpet lines as they interweave with Wilson’s sinewy soprano work, that at times almost sounds like a flute. The two show a great deal of magic and symbiosis when playing together. Souter’s vocal spells out the enchanting lyrics “Mood is a feather, just floating wherever, like change in the weather, all clouds in the sky’… “Now waits for no man, it’s gone in a moment, Belonging to no one.”  The lyrics nailing the transience, the fluidity, the beauty and the futility of never being able to keep things more than in the moment. 

Tessa Souter's Shadows and Silence- The Erik Satie Project is a splendid album that you will find yourself revisiting many times. 

Pete Malinverni Trio: "Heaven" The Spiritual Side of Jazz

I have had the pleasure of meeting pianist Pete Malinverni, and the fortune to have seen him perform his pianistic magic in some intimate and spiritual settings on several occasions. Malinverni is a thoughtful, serene man who brings a deep and abiding sense of reverence to his playing. He has been steeped in religious music for decades, with tenures as the musical director of the Devoe Street Baptist Church in Brooklyn, NY, the Westchester Reform Temple in Scarsdale, NY and the Pound Ridge Community Church in Pound Ridge, NY- where I went to several Sunday services just to see him play. He is also a eminent educator and currently is an assistant professor of jazz studies at SUNY Purchase. Pete was kind enough to entertain an interview for my blog back in 2013, which for those who are interested can be found here.

Make no mistake about it, Malinverni can swing, having played in trios with iconic drummer Mel Lewis and with Amhad Jamal drummer Vernel Fourier among others. His music has a naked honesty that sweeps you up in its sincerity and emotional content. 

On his latest release Heaven, Malinverni is joined by eclectic bassist Ben Allison and journeyman drummer Akira Tana.  Together these three make some beautiful and sensitive music. Not surprisingly, the album has a spiritual theme and explores two compositions from Duke Ellington, the title tune “Heaven” and “Come Sunday”; four traditional songs that have an enduring messages of hope and faith; two obscure gems a gorgeous arrangement of a song by Hannah Senesh titled “Eili, Eili” and an Ungar/ Mason composition “Ashokan Farewell;” the uplifting, gospel influenced Curtis Mayfield tune “People Get Ready” and one of Malinverni’s own “Psalm 23.”

“Heaven” is a swinging straight ahead rendering that features Malinverni’s fluid, sometimes Monkish, piano lines, Allison’s pulsing bass and Tana’s light comping. Allison and Tana each offer brief but potent solo work here, before the group returns to the melody line at the coda.

Malinverni’s “Psalm 23,” is based on the famous Biblical passage from David that starts with “The Lord is my Sheperd, I shall not want…” He uses a reverent musical treatment to portray a spiritual that acknowledges God’s grace and guidance given to his people even when they “….walk through the valley of darkness..” The pianist creates a delicate musical monologue that mimics the verse- each challenge met with faith in the higher being- and then he builds the musical tension to a tempest with a rumble created by the trio, until he resolves it to a peaceful conclusion at the coda.  

The bubbling “Down in the River to Pray” is given a buoyant 5/4 bounce with Allison’s pulsing bass line holding down the beat with Tana’s rim and cymbals, as Malinverni explores around the melody.

“Shenandoah” is given a sparse treatment, with vocalist Karrin Allyson lending her clear, light voice to Allison’s bass and Malinverni’s accompanying piano. Allison and Malinverni both take short probing solos before Allyson, whose vocal could bring a bit more emotional content to this song, returns to finish up this endearing American folk song.

“Eili, Eili” is a composition I ‘ve never heard before, apparently based on a poem written by a Hungarian woman, a Jew who fought the Nazi’s in WWII and died trying to save concentration camp prisoners. True to the feeling of the poem, Malinverni and Allison do a marvelous job of making this one of the most moving pieces on the album. The pianist is at his most emotive here and bassist Allison’s plump lines are in beautiful counterpoint to the piano and to Tana’s masterful brushwork.

The lyrics of Curtis Mayfield’s “People, Get Ready” have an uplifting message to an oppressed people and Malinverni deftly finds an elevating experience in this enduring melody, which he and bandmates play with great spirit and elation.

Ellington’s “Come Sunday” is a gorgeous composition that embodies the maestro’s sense of what is spiritual. Guest Jon Faddis’s longing trumpet solo is a case in point. There is a poignancy to his slurring, voice-like horn, a human cry that transcends formalized religious context and unifies us all no matter what our beliefs. The trio expertly backs Faddis exemplary playing of this gem and there is no way one can’t come away from this unmoved.

Another traditional song “A City Called Heaven” features a moving bass solo by Allison at the opening. The bassist has a tremendous feel for this music and it shows here. His tone is clear, his attack is clean and his ideas seem in line with the pianist’s own inclinations-warm, sensitive and uncluttered.

Alto saxophonist Steve Wilson is about as in demand as anyone on the scene today. On “Wade in the Water,” a song made popular by Ramsey Lewis, Malinverni plays a darting solo that floats above his rhythm sections steady pulse. Wilson’s angular alto brings some swinging bop to this one, and he and Malinverni play off each other effectively for a brief section before returning to the head.

The final song on the album is “Ashokan Farewell” a song made famous as the theme to documentary filmmaker Ken Burns “Civil War” series on PBS. The funny thing is despite its melancholy, old-worldish sound, it wasn’t written until 1982 and by a man from the Bronx. 

Notwithstanding the origins of this song- which is based on a Scottish lament- it has been heard by millions and construed to be a part of Americana folk music. Malinverni finds, as many of us do,that the song has a spiritual core to its tender, moving theme. He plays this as a sauntering slow waltz and it seems like the perfect tune to end this album of music on.

You can hear "Heaven"  here : https://soundcloud.com/bk-music-pr/heaven-pete-malinverni