PAOLO VINACCIA ARILD ANDERSEN TOMMY SMITH

25 Pages·2009·4.52 MB·English

by  Dr T

PAOLO VINACCIA ARILD ANDERSEN TOMMY SMITH

th
The HERALD, Rob Adams, Dec 5 , 2008

Andersen.Smith.Vinaccia, The Lot, Edinburgh
Star rating: ****
Louis Armstrong's assertion that jazz is folk music gets much support in this trio. Themes from the Scottish,
Middle Eastern and Scandinavian traditions suggest themselves, form the glue that binds various
movements and inspire the high-level solo improvisation and quick-witted intercommunication that make it
one of the most revered groups working in Europe.
If this gig didn't have the visceral excitement produced when bassist Arild Andersen and saxophonist
Tommy Smith drafted in Scots drummer Alyn Cosker for the absent Paolo Vinaccia at this year's Edinburgh
Jazz Festival, it did show how much more deeply the cast has grown into the script, even since they
recorded their excellent album, Live at Belleville. It's all about masters at work: Andersen creating big,
warm structures through real-time double tracking and his fingers scampering gleefully over the strings;
Smith variously understated, magisterial and venomous; and Vinaccia a brilliantly responsive, subtly
propulsive livewire whose dynamic range enhances quiet atmosphere and charging tempo alike.
Familiar though they are with this material, there's a real sense of enjoyment and of creating it anew every
time. Smith's Prelude to a Kiss, with its questing intro and soulful, downward slides, was a gorgeous re-
reading of Ellington's melody and the encore of Andersen's beautifully gliding, ethereal Dreamhorse would,
alone, make the final dates of this Scottish Arts Council Tune-up tour in Glasgow and Lanark this weekend
unmissable.

The SCOTSMAN

Gig review: Arild Andersen, Paolo Vinaccia, Tommy Smith
KENNY MATHIESON
Published Date: 05 December 2008
ARILD ANDERSEN, PAOLO VINACCIA, TOMMY SMITH

THE LOT, EDINBURGH

THIS stellar European trio served up a memorable performance for a full house. The shimmering bass
harmonics that open Arild Andersen's Independency launched a gripping and unbroken performance of the
four-part suite that ebbed and flowed in compelling fashion.

If the concert lacked the final edge of one-off adrenaline-pumping energy that fuelled Andersen and Smith's
Edinburgh Jazz Festival performance with deputising drummer Alyn Cosker at The Hub back in August, the
level of musical engagement, responsive interaction and subtly co-ordinated dynamics never faltered.

It was a sustained display of high-level musicianship in which Andersen took the acoustic bass (plus some
additional electronics) into territory that remains inaccessible to most players, while Smith demonstrated
once again that he is a saxophonist of world-class standing in any company. His flow of musical invention
combined with a rich, lustrous sonority on tenor saxophone to dramatic effect. Vinaccia's probing
drumming played a full part in the three-way musical conversation.

They opened the second set with a determined but unsuccessful attempt to find the music for a new tune
by Smith with a distinctly Scottish melodic feel that they were playing for the first time – but then played it
anyway.

Duke Ellington's Prelude to a Kiss nodded to the standard jazz repertoire, the fierce Outhouse allowed them
to pump up both the tempo and the heat, and Andersen's Dreamhorse provided a limpid, hauntingly beautiful
encore. They play Glasgow RSAMD tomorrow and Greyfriars Parish Church, Lanark, on Sunday.
Moment's Notice
Recent CDs Briefly Reviewed (continued)

Arild Andersen Live At Belleville ECM 2078
The great Norwegian bassist is capable of almost anything, as his ambitious Hyperborean,
and his Electra for the Athens Olympics both demonstrated, but he always seems at his
best in a trio context. One thinks of Triptykon with Jan Garbarek and Edward Vesala a
quarter of a century ago and now surely a modern classic, or more recently The Triangle
with Vassilis Tsabropoulos and John Marshall, or, away from ECM, the searching Hues with
Sam Rivers and Barry Altschul on Impulse! These records propose a very different
Andersen from the gentle watercolorist all ‘ECM artists’ are presumed to be, or even the
avuncular bandleader and mentor of Masqualero twenty five years ago. The bass playing is
firm and well-founded, closer to Wilbur Ware than to Eberhard Weber, with a clear line on
every piece and no gestural wastage.
This new trio teams Andersen with Italian percussionist and composer Paolo Vinaccia and
with Scottish tenor saxophonist Tommy Smith, who having concentrated largely on his
own groups and his own Spartacus imprint now once again seems willing to bring his
distinctive voice to other leaders’ situations. Smith is at the height of his powers. There
are few saxophonists of any age capable of what he does on “Prelude To A Kiss,” which
manages to sound lyrical and iron-hard, free and logically watertight. For years he
struggled under an inevitable comparison with Jan Garbarek. One has to pick one’s
Garbarek sets carefully – though Triptykon would certainly be one – to make the parallel
or the influence work. These days, Smith sounds like no one but himself, a supremely
confident artist working in the company of his peers.
The four-part “Independency” suite which dominates this live set from Oslo ’s Belleville
club was written to mark the centenary of Norway ’s peaceful political secession from
Sweden . Norway ’s newness as a sovereign country does still resonate through the work
of its artists, and critical responses that equate “Nordic” with something atavistic, chthonic
or rigorously traditional miss that point entirely. “Independency,” which seems to
reference the anthem, Ole Bull, folk song and other national references, including a
passage by Andersen which evokes the hardfele or Hardanger fiddle, is an affirmative work
that doesn’t lack for ambiguity. Strategically and culturally, Norway has never considered
itself to be on the fringes of continental Europe, but at a particular nexus of east and west,
north and south, and in Andersen’s piece one hears him stretching the stylistic geography
of the music to a remarkable degree. In this, Vinaccia is a willing accomplice, his
polystylistic approach and background brought to the fore on almost every track. Smith to
some extent has the easiest job: stand at the front and improvise. However, he’s also in
listening mode here, highly responsive to the players on either side of him, brokering
translations and compromises, asserting himself when space allows (as on the Ellington
piece), working high up in his instrument’s stratosphere much of the time but with such
ideal control you wonder at it. As you do at the whole record: a contemporary
masterwork. –Brian Morton
Live at Belleville
ALLABOUTJAZZ.COM

Arild Andersen | ECM Records (2008)

By John Kelman Discuss

The general international perception of Norway's jazz scene as "Nordic Cool,"
is, like most generalizations, inevitably distanced from truth. Atomic, The
Coreand Motif may possess no shortage of heat, but ECM has undeniably
helped define that unmistakable Norwegian aesthetic. One of the "big four,"
brought to international attention in the early 1970s alongside guitarist Terje
Rypdal, saxophonist Jan Garbarek, and drummer Jon Christensen, bassist
Arild Andersen's ECM releases have largely avoided the kind of burning
improvisational energy of his powerful trio disc Triptykon (1973), with
Garbarek and Finnish drummer Edward Vesala. Live at Belleville—Andersen's
first live album for ECM since his equally potent but stylistically
different Molde Concert (1982)—recalls Triptykon's fiery intensity, but also
reflects the same assimilation of traditional Norwegian music of albums
including Sagn (1991).
Live at Belleville is, like Triptykon, a trio date, featuring expat Italian
drummer Paolo Vinaccia and Scottish saxophonist Tommy Smith. Andersen
couldn't have made better choices. When Smith graduated from Berklee
College of Music in the 1980s, his sound was a cogent combination of Jan
Garbarek's biting tone and Michael Brecker's Americanized soulfulness. Since
then his voice has become his own, but Garbarek and Brecker still loom and,
while Garbarek's Mai Jazz 2008performance in Stavanger, Norway made
clear he's still capable of edgy spontaneity, Smith has stayed more clearly
within definable jazz borders, playing with a stunning combination of
measured lyricism and inspired improvisational abandon.
Vinaccia, a Norwegian resident for over 20 years, works regularly with
Andersen and Rypdal, heard on the bassist's Electra (ECM, 2005) and
guitarist's Vossabrygg(ECM, 2006). Capable of the unabashed energy
required to propel Andersen's fiercely swinging "Independency Part 2"—part
of the bassist's four-movement "Independency" suite celebrating Norway's
100-year liberation from its Swedish union—Vinaccia also paints with the
sparest of colors on the closing "Dreamhorse," as Andersen and Smith play a
folkloric melody reminiscent, in spirit, of Jim Pepper's classic "Witchi-Tai-To"
over the bassist's gentle, real-time looping.
Despite its clear virtuosity, Live at Belleville demonstrates a compelling
balance between reckless unpredictability and careful construction.
"Independency Part 1" unfolds slowly, Andersen's robust bass tone creating
such an expansive sound that, even when he's not tastefully employing
electronics, it often feels larger than a trio, as he simultaneously anchors the
sound and provides a melodic foil for Smith. Smith's solo builds with piercing
inevitability, harsh screams balanced with economical melodicism. His
thrilling duet with Vinaccia at the center of "Part 2" channels hints of Albert
Ayler, an early Garbarek influence, and is an early highlight of the 75-minute
set, as is the equally galvanizing bass/drums duet that follows.
With enough form to lend cohesive shape to the entire set and plenty of
freedom to allow Andersen, Smith and Vinaccia to take the music where they
will, Live at Belleville is Andersen's most exciting release to date. Even more,
balanced with its lyrical and, at times, near-orchestral tendencies, it's the
best disc of Andersen's long and varied career.
Arild Andersen at All About Jazz. Visit Arild Andersen on the web.
Track listing: Independency Part 1; Independency Part 2; Independency Part
3; Independency Part 4; Prelude to a Kiss; Outhouse; Dreamhorse.
Personnel: Arild Andersen: double-bass, live electronics; Tommy Smith:
tenor saxophone; Paolo Vinaccia: drums.
The SCOTSMAN

JAZZ

ARILD ANDERSEN: LIVE AT BELLEVILLE *****

ECM RECORDS,

MY JAZZ album of the year. Norwegian bass maestro teams up with
saxophonist Tommy Smith and Italian drummer Paolo Vinaccia in a trio that is
brimming over with compelling ideas and creative invention. Other than an
unusually abstract reading of Ellington's Prelude to a Kiss, the music is all
composed by Andersen. The disc opens with the four-part, 45-minute suite
Independency, written in 2005 to mark the centenary of Norway's liberation from
the union with Sweden. The music never flags for an instant, whether in slow-
moving, atmospheric explorations or fiery up-tempo jousting. Outhouse is a
fierce workout, while the closing Dreamhorse is simple and very beautiful – the
applause at the end seems rudely intrusive on the lovely mood it invokes.
Andersen's extended playing technique and use of electronics places his
approach to the double bass on a different level to most other players, while
Smith's keening saxophone work and Vinaccia's supple, responsive drumming
make their own essential impact. Scottish audiences had a taste of what to
expect at the Edinburgh Jazz Festival, with Alyn Cosker standing in superbly for
the drummer, and the album personnel will be heard here next month –
needless to say, not to be missed. KENNY MATHIESON