[TR24][OF] Michael Blake Sextet - Amor de Cosmos - 2007 (Jazz, Avant Garde)

Born: May 19, 1964 in Montreal, Canada

Saxophonist, composer and arranger Michael Blake has established his presence in the jazz world, while his work gracefully erases the borders between different areas of music. Highlights of 2008 include a special guest appearance on Ben Allison’s Man Size Safe and performances with Blake Tartare at the Rochester, Vancouver and Copenhagen jazz festivals. Michael’s new band Hellbent recently played at Milano’s esteemed Mito Festival. His soprano sax work was recognized in the 2008 Downbeat Reader’s Poll.

Michael’s two latest CD's Amor de Cosmos (Songlines), starring an all-Canadian cast of west coast talent and The World Awakes/A Tribute to Lucky Thompson (Stunt Records), featuring his Danish band Blake Tartare, portray a diverse and original artist. Blake Tartare has been performing and touring internationally since 2002 and have two other albums out: Blake Tartare and More Like Us (Stunt Records). His previous releases show that he is a restless and creative visionary: Right Before Your Very Ears (Clean Feed) is an off-the-cuff improvised album for Trio. Elevated (Knitting Factory Records) is a traditional quartet album. His critically acclaimed debut CD Kingdom of Champa (Intuition) was released in 1997. Produced by the legendary Teo Macero, it is an empathetic musical travelogue of Vietnam featuring a brilliant cast of NY players. His follow-up album Drift (Intuition) was chosen by Jazzthing Magazine’s Critics Pick as Best CD of 2000.

From Soul and Reggae to traditional African and Vietnamese music - Blake is always exploring music that inspires him while staying true to himself. One of the best examples of this is the unique group effort of the co-operative band Slow Poke. In 1997, while playing in the Lounge Lizards together, Michael and slide-guitarist David Tronzo shared a similar aspiration to perform a reflective repertoire of American roots music. Who better to grab then the Sex Mob/Bill Frisell bass and drum team of Tony Scherr and Kenny Wolleson? It wasn’t long before the quartet was recording Slow Poke at Home in Tony’s living room. A year later they toured Canada and recorded Redemption for Michael’s German based label Intuition Music. After being out of print for over 5 years Slow Poke at Home is now available on Palmetto Records.

For almost two decades the New York City resident has presented an array of innovative bands and compositions that display his ability to simultaneously embrace jazz history while challenging it. That, along with a natural and relaxed approach to improvisation, is the reason he received a grant from the Doris Duke Foundation’s New Works for Jazz Program. He has also received various grants from The Canada Council for the Arts for studies, composition and touring.

Michael continues to tour and record internationally while remaining rooted in the NY downtown music scene. His tenure with John Lurie and the Lounge Lizards spans over a decade and includes numerous record dates, TV appearances, a live concert film from Berlin, and film soundtracks such as the Grammy nominated score for Get Shorty. He was a Composer in Residence in the Jazz Composers Collective, a nonprofit, musician-run organization dedicated to presenting original works. He still participates in many Collective activities, including Ben Allison’s groups as well as their repertoire ensemble The Herbie Nichols Project. He performs frequently with his organ based MB3 trio, Hellbent and the Eulipion Orchestra an 18 piece big band bringing together some of the most respected musicians from New York’s diverse musical community.

Among the many artists he has recorded and performed with are Oliver Lake, Grachon Moncour III, Medeski Martin and Wood, Ray LaMontagne, The Gil Evans Orchestra, Ben E. King, Neil Sedaka, Tricky, Prince Paul, Roscoe Gordon, The Groove Collective, Jack McDuff, Steven Bernstein, Chris Brown/Kate Fenner, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Hal Wilner, Sir Coxsone Dodd and Pinetop Perkins.

Rising Star Jazz Artist of the Year in the 2002 DownBeat critics poll, Michael Blake has been a resident of New York for almost 20 years - but he grew up in Vancouver, and on a visit to his hometown in 2005 he organized two gigs with somewhat younger players from the jazz and creative music scene, most of whom he had not played with before. The upshot is this all-Canadian sextet featuring classical/new music/Latin percussionist Sal Ferreras and several of Canada's most acclaimed and forward-looking jazz musicians improvising on Michael's wide-ranging compositions (there are also two highly expressionistic improv duets between Michael and Chris Gestrin).

Intrigued by reading about the life of 19th century British Columbia newspaperman and politician William Alexander Smith, who renamed himself Amor de Cosmos, Michael was inspired to re-explore his roots and forge new musical connections. It's another new departure in a career devoted to revitalizing his own playing and composing by drawing broadly on the whole history and resources of the music as well as on music of other cultures. As a long-time member of the Lounge Lizards and co-leader of Slow Poke, Michael developed an approach that valorized funk, the blues and pop music, as well as paying tribute to the saxophone greats of swing, bop and free jazz, by combining old school elegance and lyricism with downtown eclecticism and innovation. On his subsequent records as leader he has also worked with musical ideas from Africa, the Caribbean and Vietnam.

Here "The Wash Away" has a joyful African groove, but with a twist - the A section is in 11/8. Creating these change-ups allows new things to happen: "I personally find most jazz 'under imagined.' The artists might play great solos but after a few tunes you hear the same rhythms and systems in play. By changing the formulas in my compositions I get inspired to come up with new ideas as a soloist and arranger. But I like rhythm and melody, so after a while I find any 'method' too static....I love to improvise without any written music, but again it would become boring after a while. I'd miss playing a good standard, blues, or through-composed piece. Now that doesn't mean I don't practice and study and keep it together because I take my jazz history very seriously."

"I feel very satisfied that I wrote this music, some of which is very different from my previous work," Michael adds. Indeed, several of the more highly composed pieces (including "Paddy Pie Face" and "Temporary Constellation") seem like moves towards the realm of contemporary/new music, but Michael always leaves plenty room for improvisers to stretch out in solos and duos. The unusual instrumentation offers novel possibilities for voicings, bringing for example a witty, brilliantly executed free time duet between Sal on marimba and Chris on prepared piano in "So Long Seymour." Despite rather limited time together before the recording, the band really jells. In part this is because most of these players have such a long shared history together: Andre and Dylan are members of Chris' trio and the two of them plus Brad are part of Chris' Stillpoint project (Songlines SA1540); Brad was part of the international quintet Dylan organized on The Definition of a Toy (SA1554) and Dylan and Andre are in Brad's long-running quartet, etc.). Combine their fluent interaction with the challenges Michael sets them (and himself), and the result is a record that revels in creative interplay and speaks with its own unique accent.

Amor de Cosmos might suggest a wildly romantic "Lover of the Universe," but a more accurate translation would be "Love of Order." There's both heart and intellect in these grooves, and more than a touch of insouciance to lighten the proceedings. For audiophiles, the hi-res recording and multi-channel mix add further texture and dimension.