Flashpoints And Undercurrents

イギリスのサックス/クラリネット奏者、ジョン・サーマンの1969年の未発表音源が初出♪

60年代後半の英国ジャズ界の名だたるミュージシャンが集結したこのコンサートは、1969年4月18日にドイツで録音され、これまでリリースされたことはありませんでした。このショーの録音当時、サーマンはリーダーとしての 2 枚目のアルバム「How Many Clouds Can You See」のレコーディングを終えたばかりだったので、これはリーダーとしての彼の形成期の作品や、ここで彼と一緒に登場する音楽仲間の初期の作品を見るまたとない機会です。

サーマンは、「素材の選択は私次第でした... 特にワークショップのためにいくつかの曲を書きましたが、参加者数名に希望があれば自分の曲を持ってきていただくのが慣例でした。そのため、ケニー、エリック、フリッツの曲が収録されています」と述べています。

In 2011, the venerable Cuneiform label released Flashpoint: NDR Jazz Workshop - April 69, an audio and video document of John Surmans live ten-piece jazz orchestra delivering five hard original tracks that reveal his canny depth and diversity as a young composer, arranger, and bandleader. The saxophonist was busy throughout 1969: Hed just completed recording his second album, How Many Clouds Can You See (released in 1970) and played on 11 additional albums in 1969, including John McLaughlins Extrapolation. 2025s Flashpoints and Undercurrents amounts to a historic document. It contains the five selections from the 2011 release -- here, all are extended takes -- and replaces the video with a second audio disc from the same sessions that includes eight additional tracks, most of them unissued. Surman assembled a cast of peers and mentors. He played baritone and soprano saxes alongside tenorists Ronnie Scott and Alan Skidmore with Mike Osborne on alto. The brass section was composed of trumpeter Kenny Wheeler and trombonists Malcolm Griffiths and Erich Kleinschuster. Fritz Pauer played piano in the rhythm section with bassist Harry Miller and drummer Alan Jackson. Set-opener "Jack Knife" is offered in driving, big-band hard bop style with a knotty head for the horns; Wheeler solos hard, first over the rhythm section before the saxes and trombones engage one another in conversation. Trombonists solo next with incendiary gusto. The harmonic counterpoint Surman builds allows for all the voices to be heard. Osbornes alto solo here is one of his early best. The gorgeous midtempo ballad "Gratuliere" appeared on the 2011 set, but its two-and-a-half sumptuous minutes longer here, revealing the detail in Surmans soprano as a guide to the tunes expressionist swing. (The tune owes a bit to both Tony Scott and Oliver Nelson.) "Hallo Thursday" is a modal jazz tune that relies more on open piano chords and unassuming bass vamps before Wheelers flugelhorn -- joined by Scott and Osborne -- add flow, heft, and eventually, as the other instruments fall in under him, resonance and poignancy. "Mayflower" is a full minute longer here and introduced by Miller before the band -- heavily under the influence of the John Coltrane Quartet -- adds dynamic and color while falling back from the free jazz edge, transforming the tune into a kinetic exercise in exploratory swing. Other highlights include a nearly 12-minute version of "When Fortune Smiles." It leans heavily on the nearly spiritual interplay between the rhythm section, Osbornes alto, and Surmans soprano. "Aqua Regis" follows with big-band fierceness that colors mostly inside the lines. "Dallab" is an eerie modal blues (think Gil Evans) with gorgeous piano, bass, and trumpet play, while the brass and reeds underscore it with unintrusive authority around Wheelers melodic theme. Whether you have the 2011 set or not, Flashpoints and Undercurrents is a major contribution to the British jazz canon that further fleshes out the early profile of Surman as a musical giant.~ Thom Jurek