John Hollenbeck - John Hollenbeck: The Claudia Quintet

Styles: Jazz, Post Bop
Year: 2001
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 67:27
Size: 155,8 MB
Art: Front

( 6:41)  1. Meinetwegen
( 6:53)  2. A-B-S-T-I-n-E-n-C-E
( 5:44)  3. Love Song for Kate
( 5:57)  4. Thursday 7: 30 PM (Holy)
(10:42)  5. Thursday 11.14 Am (Grey)
( 3:47)  6. Thursday 3: 44 PM (Playground)
( 6:17)  7. Burt and Ken
( 5:03)  8. ...After a Dance or Two, We Sit Down for a Pint with Gil and Tim...
( 9:17)  9. No D
( 7:01) 10. Visions of Claudia

Releasing three quite noteworthy CDs in as many months, drummer/composer John Hollenbeck certainly made what one might describe as an "auspicious debut" as a leader. Just consider the range of styles covered in this burst of activity. No Images, Hollenbeck's initial recording from October 2001, is the most avant-garde of the three, with drums and saxophones squaring off in free jazz territory and trombones and drums accompanying the taped voice of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; Quartet Lucy, hitting the street in January 2002, reflects Hollenbeck's attraction to the austere and spacious music of the ECM label. And The Claudia Quintet (released on the very same day as Quartet Lucy), a recording of subtlety, beauty, and a fair measure of fire smoldering beneath its surface. Hollenbeck may have an avant streak as wide as the pond between Tonic and Bimhuis, but he's surely not one to avoid a groove. In the Claudia Quintet's drum chair, he often locks into a rhythm and gradually builds the intensity of his attack, taking his own sweet time to reach the dynamic peak in a piece of music. Hollenbeck also propels the music forward with a crisp and clean style that doesn't overwhelm his bandmates, including Chris Speed, the noted N.Y.C. reedman who tends to prefer subtle expressiveness over displays of high-volume bluster. On this debut CD by the band, Claudia pursues a cool after-hours chillout vibe much of the time, and the instrumentation should suggest what Hollenbeck is after: aside from Speed (contributing a bit of tenor sax in addition to clarinet), the quintet features vibraphonist Matt Moran, accordionist Ted Reichman, and ubiquitous upright bassist Drew Gress. This lineup doesn't require listeners to stuff cotton in their ears to prevent hearing damage. The inclination is rather to pull out the cotton in order to best appreciate the clarity and nuance of this ensemble the round tones of the clarinet, shimmer of the vibes, earthiness of the accordion, and deep resonance of the bass. All the instruments are afforded room to breath, as unembellished melodic lines and shifting harmonics are drawn out across the sure and steady pulse and gathering rhythmic energy of "Meinetwegen" and the first and third of the album's "Thursday" compositions. Modalism and momentum are traded for spacy atmospherics on the second "Thursday" piece, with its ringing and sustained tones courtesy of Moran's bowed and struck vibes. But don't think The Claudia Quintet is entirely a space cruise, as the album includes the lovely downtempo ballad "Love Song for Kate," the swinging tenor-driven "Burt and Ken," the nearly cacophonous riot of voices during the improvised middle section of "a-b-s-t-i-n-e-n-c-e," and the angular stop-and-start "No D," in which Reichman fires off a solo on accordion that sounds about as wild as one could get without breaking the thing. Auspicious debut, indeed. One senses that a new and important voice has emerged on the New York creative music scene. John Hollenbeck's future output is cause for much anticipation, whether he chooses to release subsequent albums single-file or two and three at a time. [The Claudia Quintet and Hollenbeck's other CRI Blueshift recordings may be purchased directly from his website.] ~ Dave Lynch https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-claudia-quintet-mw0001273441

Personnel: Drums, Percussion, Composed By, Producer – John Hollenbeck; Accordion – Ted Reichman;  Acoustic Bass – Drew Gress; Clarinet, Tenor Saxophone – Chris Speed; Vibraphone, Percussion – Matt Moran

John Hollenbeck: The Claudia Quintet

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Laurie Antonioli - Foreign Affair

Styles: Vocal
Year: 2004
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 45:13
Size: 105,4 MB
Art: Front

(6:31)  1. Ballad For Djole
(4:05)  2. Holy Water
(4:50)  3. Where Flamingos Fly
(5:44)  4. Tschusch Chochek
(4:45)  5. I Know You
(3:40)  6. Mayana
(4:07)  7. Crni Narcis (Black Narcissus)
(3:27)  8. The Cure
(8:00)  9. Music Box

Foreign Affair is Laurie Antonioli's debut as a solo artist, although she has appeared on record with artists such as George Cables and Joe Bonner. Antonioli is a musical singer gifted with a flexible, darkish voice and soulful, natural phrasing and as witnessed on this record, she has surrounded her attractive vocal stylings with fairly interesting, though at times restrained and minimalistic arrangements. Throughout this record Antonioli's vocals direct and steer the musings of the supporting band, which consists of bassist Nenad Vasilic, guitarist Armend Xhaferi, drummer John Hollenbeck, and saxophonist Johannes Enders. The album is memorable mostly for slow and contemplative tracks like the opening "Ballad For Djole," "Holy Water," "I Know You," and "Mayana," while Enders' saxophone further enhances the album's overall moody emotions throughout. 

The opener is a slow track written by bassist Nenad Vasilic where a light, smooth feel blends with Antonioli's smoky vocals. "Tsuchusch Chochek" is a swinging piece with repetitive melodies where she seems inspired by the band to fully demonstrate her vocal possibilities. Her compelling, emotional performance on the final track, "Music Box," makes for a poignant duet with Enders' soprano sax. One would usually expect obvious references to Balkanesque melodies or rhythms from someone who originates from this region (since Antonioli's origins are in Montenegro). However, these influences are more sublime and deep, rather than ready-made or stereotypical. Antonioli's passsionate and soulful performances reveal an artist who is not afraid to stray away on occasion from the classical vocal jazz tradition in order to deliver performances that are accessible and enjoyable. ~ Nenad Georgievski https://www.allaboutjazz.com/foreign-affair-laurie-antonioli-nabel-review-by-nenad-georgievski.php

Personnel:  Laurie Antonioli-vocals;  Nenad Vasilic-bass;  Johannes Enders-saxophone;  John Hollenbeck-drums;  Armend Xhaferi-guitar

Foreign Affair

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John Hollenbeck - Songs I Like a Lot

Styles: Avant-Garde Jazz  
Year: 2013
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 69:08
Size: 158,8 MB
Art: Front

( 8:12)  1. Wichita Lineman
( 5:25)  2. Canvas
(14:34)  3. The Moon's a Harsh Mistress
(11:23)  4. Man of Constant Sorrow
( 9:35)  5. All My Life
( 5:39)  6. Bicycle Race
( 7:35)  7. Fallslake
( 6:41)  8. Chapel Flies

It's hard to resist, at the very least, looking at an album with as honest and unassuming a title as Songs I Like a Lot; but it's even harder to resist when it turns out that the instigator is John Hollenbeck, founder of and primary composer for Claudia Quintet the chamber jazz ensemble which has, over the course of six albums in nine years, completely defied definition and categorization, beyond combining improvisational prowess and the ability to subtly interpret through-composed music. When Hollenbeck releases a recording under his own name, it's generally in a larger-scale environment, and Songs I Like a Lot is no different, a collaboration with the 16-piece Frankfurt Radio Big Band. But what makes the album different than any that have come before is that, with the exception of one track, this is a collection of cover songs that cover a broad range of sources, from Jimmy Webb to Imogen Heap; from Freddie Mercury and Queen to traditional folk music; and from maverick Japanese composer Nobukazu Takemura to renegade free jazz progenitor Ornette Coleman. It should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with Hollenbeck's unshackled proclivities. It should also come as no surprise that Hollenbeck's intent was to interpret these songs with singers. Given the breadth of material, it's no surprise that Theo Bleckmann is one of two singers recruited for Songs I Like a Lot. Something of a renegade himself, Bleckmann is no stranger to Hollenbeck's recordings, having collaborated regularly, from 2005's A Blessing (OmniTone) through to Claudia Quintet's recent What is Beautiful? (Cuneiform, 2012). Hollenbeck also enlists another familiar face in Gary Versace, a keyboardist who, from guitarist John Scofield and composer/arranger Maria Schneider, to Claudia Quintet with whom he guested on Royal Toast (Cuneiform, 2010) has demonstrated the kind of versatility Hollenbeck's music doesn't just ask, it demands.

What is, perhaps, a bigger surprise is the appearance of singer Kate McGarry though, with Versace a regular collaborator since her third record as a leader, The Target (Palmetto, 2007), there's already a clear connection to the musical circles these players inhabit. McGarry is, in fact, the first voice heard on Hollenbeck's expansive version of Jimmy Webb's "Wichita Lineman," and his instincts are justified from the first note she sings, combining pure and reverent delivery with understated interpretation. It's a song that's been covered many times but never so cinematically. McGarry shares the tune with Bleckmann, and if the two are ideal on their own, it's how their timbres complement each other even though they rarely sing together that further makes them such astute choices. As for his arrangement, Hollenbeck's skill at taking small but defining motifs from an original song and use them as starting points for broader orchestrations is what makes this set of eight tunes so successful. If "Wichita Lineman" is cinematic, then Hollenbeck's arrangement of Webb's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" is positively IMAX. Opening intimately, with McGarry's voice and Versace's piano alone together, a layer of flutes slowly insinuates itself into the arrangement, followed by a minimalist Steve Reichian pulse from Hollenbeck, on marimba, and guitarist Martin Scales that soon becomes an undercurrent over which the episodic piece builds, over fourteen minutes, to a breathtaking climax of swirling melodies that, despite the seven-second gap between them, seems to run conceptually into an equally unfettered arrangement of "Man of Constant Sorrow," made popular in the new millennium by the Coen Brothers' popular film Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000). 

The traditional folk tune's tempestuous intro all low horns and tumultuous drums seems to make perfect sequential sense, even as it leads to a second section of strummed acoustic guitar and Bleckmann's delivery of the familiar tune: the call to McGarry's response. It is, however, more Midwestern, perhaps, than Deep South, especially when saxophonist Julian Arguelles' tenor solo soars over Scale's rapid strumming to recall the spirit of guitarist Pat Metheny's classic 80/81 (ECM, 1980). There's plenty more, from Hollenbeck's rubato arrangement of Ornette Coleman's "All My Life" laying bare the alto saxophonist's inherent lyricism, despite coming from the more extreme Science Fiction (Columbia, 1971) to a version of Queen's "Bicycle," which is clever without being coy, and Hollenbeck's sole compositional contribution, "Chapel Files," closing the album on a gentler note. These may be songs Hollenbeck likes, but it's how he hears them and, subsequently, arrange them for this large ensemble that's indicative of an unerring ability to find good music in any corner, nook or cranny, turning it into something personal without ever losing what made it so good in the first place. ~ John Kelman https://www.allaboutjazz.com/john-hollenbeck-songs-i-like-a-lot-by-john-kelman.php
 

Personnel: John Hollenbeck: arranger, conductor, mallet percussion, bicycle; Theo Bleckmann: voice; Kate McGarry: voice; Gary Versace: piano. Organ; Heinz-Dieter Sauerborn: alto and soprano saxophones, flute; Oliver Leicht: alto saxophone, clarinet, alto clarinet, flute; Steffan Weber: tenor and soprano saxophone, flute; Julian Argüelles: tenor and soprano saxophone, flute; Rainer Heute: bass saxophone, bass clarinet; Frabk Wellert: trumpet, flugelhorn; Thomas Vogel: trumpet, flugelhorn; Martin Auer: trumpet, flugelhorn; Axel Schlosser: trumpet, flugelhorn; Günter Bollman: trombone; Peter Feil: trombone; Christian Jaksjø: trombone, tenor horn; Manfred Honetschläger: bass trombone; Maretin Scales: guitar; Thomas Heidepriem: bass; Jean Paul Höchstädter: drums.

Songs I Like a Lot

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John Hollenbeck, Alban Darche, Samuel Blaser, Sebastien Boisseau - JASS

Styles: Avant-Garde Jazz 
Year: 2014
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 49:26
Size: 114,1 MB
Art: Front

(4:55)  1. Recurring Dreams
(3:07)  2. Saj's
(5:27)  3. Jazz Envy
(5:36)  4. Water
(6:38)  5. Limp Mint
(5:45)  6. Driving License
(6:16)  7. No D
(4:49)  8. Miss Universe 2031
(3:25)  9. It Began to Get Dark
(3:24) 10. Tricephale

J.A.S.S. as in the first letters of the names of American drummer John Hollenbeck, French saxophonist Alban Darche and double bassist Sébastien Boisseau and Swiss trombonist Samuel Blaser. But Jass also as the term used by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in March 1917 for the very first jazz-album recording or just the name of centuries-old popular card game in Switzerland and Austria.  All of the above references relevant to this quartet who first played together in Berlin in July 2011 and recorded its debut after an artist's residency in Nantes, France, the hometown of Darche and Boisseau. The music features the highly personal, distinct compositional skills of Hollenbeck, Darche and Blaser, observing in an amused manner on the history of jazz, and packed with strong, playful and nuanced melodies. This collective quartet keeps a delicate balance between its four musicians, emphasizing the organic highly melodic flow within its compact, well-constructed compositions. Darche and Blaser's playing stresses a beautiful singing and conversational quality while Hollenbeck and Boisseau vary the rhythmic basis constantly, alternating between loose pulses, exploratory sounds, and light swinging ones.

The quartet enables Hollenbeck to re-contextualize some of his past compositions within a new setting. "Jazz Envy," which he previously performed, and Jazz Bigband Graz on Joys & Desires (Intuition, 2005), is anchored within a strong pulse, but within this rhythmic framework the musicians have the freedom to keep exploring its theme. "Limp Mint," originally from Claudia Quintet's Semi Formal (Cuneiform, 2005) retains its dramatic story narrative, delivered now from four sonic angles that intensify its enigmatic story lines. "No D," from Claudia Quintet debut (CRI, 2002) has the most complex and demanding structure, shifting between pulses and cyclical loose, and dense forms of interplay. Darche's "Water" and "Driving License" highlights the immediate, intuitive bond with Blaser. Both exchanging back and forth ideas, constructing thick, detailed articulations. His ironic "Miss Univers 2031" and "Tricéphale" unfold like a dense stories with many twists. Blaser's two compositions, "Recurring Dreams" and "It began to get gark," stress his unique, searching vocabulary on the trombone. Highly impressive debut that calls for following meetings of this quartet. ~ Eyal Hareuveni https://www.allaboutjazz.com/jass-john-hollenbeck-alban-darche-sebastien-boisseau-samuel-blaser-yolk-records-review-by-eyal-hareuveni.php
 

Personnel: Samuel Blaser: trombone; Alban Darche: tenor saxophone; Sébastien Boisseau: double bass; John Hollenbeck: drums.

JASS

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John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble - A blessing

Styles: Avant-Garde Jazz 
Year: 2005
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 62:43
Size: 145,1 MB
Art: Front

(16:03)  1. A blessing
( 7:28)  2. Folkmoot
( 8:12)  3. RAM
( 5:55)  4. Weiji
(12:12)  5. Abstinence
( 7:23)  6. April in Reggae
( 5:27)  7. The Music of Life

One clear benefit of the global community we live in, with its inherently broad reach, is that many artists have developed into stylistic integrators. On a smaller scale, even people who live within the boundaries of the United States can experience greater artistic diversity than ever before. Only a century ago, people living in small rural towns would have no way of knowing what kind of music was developing in larger urban centres; now, with the broad reach of the internet, it's possible that someone who lives in the most remote town can not only hear what's going on outside their relatively small physical universe, they can incorporate the experience into their own musical development. That's one of the reasons why the definition of jazz is such a slippery slope. Reductionist thinking aside, the very assimilation of a multitude of cultural and stylistic concerns is what keeps jazz alive and well, living and breathing and, most importantly, constantly evolving. Drummer/composer John Hollenbeck has proven over the course of his relatively short career that it's possible to blend a multitude of approaches while working within an idiom that's still somehow indefinably jazz. His latest release, A Blessing, expands on the stylistic melange of his smaller Claudia Quintet with an eighteen-piece ensemble that offers greater textural possibilities and a grander vision. 

The recording explores the almost unlimited possibilities of one voice, five woodwind players, four trombonists, four trumpets, and a rhythm section that in addition to the more traditional piano-bass-drums triumvirate also includes a variety of mallet instruments. There's nothing excessive or bombastic about Hollenbeck's approach, which isn't afraid to let smaller subsets do the talking. Nor is Hollenbeck averse to finding organic ways to emulate ideas that other artists have developed through looping and other electronic means. All kinds of trace elements can be found scattered throughout A Blessing. The sixteen-minute title track unfolds gradually, beginning with Gary Versace's simple piano arpeggios, Matt Moran's bowed vibraphone, and Kermit Driscoll's bass creating a subtle ambient backdrop of gentle beauty for vocalist Theo Bleckmann's crystal pure evocation of "An Irish Blessing. The piece builds slowly, with Hollenbeck's drums developing an ever-strengthening forward motion underneath horn lines that start as long tones, but ultimately evolve into repetitive patterns that take on a rhythmic life of their own, resolving into a kind of post-minimalist Steve Reich-meets-Maria Schneider vibe.

Elsewhere there are elements of primal jungle rhythms ("Weiji ), Brian Eno ambience that builds into a free cacophony before heading for straight-ahead swing ("RAM ), and a kind of free jazz reggae ("April in Reggae ). While it's difficult to single out any one player, Bleckmann's voice while most often integrated into the overall texture of the ensemble, rather than standing out ranges from pristine beauty to percussive panting, and even some miraculous throat singing over the stasis of "The Music of Life. Captivating and compelling from a larger narrative perspective, A Blessing is continued evidence of Hollenbeck's unfailing instincts and endless imagination. A masterpiece. 

~ John Kelman https://www.allaboutjazz.com/a-blessing-omnitone-review-by-john-kelman.php

Personnel: Ben Kono (flute, soprano and alto saxophones); Chris Speed (clarinet); Tom Christensen (tenor and soprano saxophones, English horn); Dan Willis (tenor and soprano saxophones, English horn); Alan Won (baritone saxophone, bass clarinet); Rob Hudson (trombone); Kurtis Pivert (trombone); Jacob Garchik (trombone); Alan Ferber (trombone); John Owens (trumpet); Tony Kadleck (trumpet); Dave Ballou (trumpet); Laurie Frink (trumpet); Kermit Driscoll (bass); John Hollenbeck (drums); Gary Versace (piano); Matt Moran (mallets); Theo Bleckmann (voice)

A blessing

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