#James Brandon Lewis

[soundgrammar]

Listen/purchase: Swerve by JAMES BRANDON LEWIS QUARTET with Aruán Ortiz, Brad Jones and Chad Taylor

[jgthirlwell]

03.20.24 Ches Smith's Laugh Ash with Shara Lunon voice and vocal processing, lyrics, Anna Webber flute, Oscar Noriega clarinets,James Brandon Lewis tenor sax, Nate Wooley trumpet, Jennifer Choi violin, Kyle Armbrust viola, Michael Nicolas cello, Shahzad Ismaily bass, Moog and Ches Smith electronics, drums, percussion. At Roulette Intermedium NYC.

[musicmags]

[dustedmagazine]

Alan Braufman — Infinite Love, Infinite Tears (Valley of Search)

Photo by Gabriela Bhaskar

A veteran of the New York loft jazz scene, alto saxophonist and flautist Alan Braufman is best known for his 1975 album Valley of Search notable as the only recording from the free jazz performance space founded by Braufman, Cooper-Moore, David S. Ware and Chris Amberger at 501 Canal St. On his latest album, Braufman smooths off some of the rough edges of his early work and his collaborations with Cooper-Moore whilst retaining a joyous, exploratory tone. Braufman takes a heavily rhythmic approach to his music both in his choice of line-up and his own playing. On alto, he favors a reedy staccato approach whether building intensity in unison with tenor player James Brandon Lewis or soloing, Braufman tends to circle his themes, adding detail, darting through the register.

The two longest tracks illustrate the album’s title. “Spirits” is the love. This up-tempo major key piece opens with Chad Taylor’s straight ahead beat as Ken Filiano lays down a funk bass line. Patricia Brennan’s vibraphone floats almost pianistic above them before the reeds enter, bright. Braufman takes the first solo, pushing high in short bursts. His clarity and harmonic control remain as he extends his notes and skirts dissonance. Lewis follows his tone in a muscular fashion, his solo pitched somewhere in Coltrane’s mid period, melodic but moving outward as he piles ever more notes into each bar, the rhythm section responding in rumbling waves. Patricia Brennan’s vibraphone evokes Bobby Hutcherson with its warm tone and oblique routes through the polyrhythms of Taylor and percussionist Michael Wimberly. Braufman and Lewis reenter circling one another before merging into a triumphant fanfare.

“Liberation,” the tears, is darker. The track builds from Filiano’s resonant arco and a febrile clatter of percussion. The horns sound a foreboding lament, before branching into impassioned solos that evoke struggle against binding chains. Brennan works beatific figures over the rising register of the bass before Braufman and Lewis return to the fray, freer now as Filiano drops his bow to allow his fingers to roam the fretboard. Each reiteration of the lament is met with increased resistance. It ends ebbing back to the beginning. Whatever progress made mired in the ahistorical stasis of the present. Bleak as a history, it is a graceful tribute to forbearance and a magnificent piece of music.

Andrew Forell

[burlveneer-music]

Mendoza Hoff Revels - Echolocation - a blast of instrumental skronk rock

Ava Mendoza: electric guitar, compositions Devin Hoff: electric bass, compositions James Brandon Lewis: tenor saxophone Ches Smith: drums 'Echolocation' is the astonishing debut album from Mendoza Hoff Revels, a formidable new unit led by Ava Mendoza & Devin Hoff and featuring James Brandon Lewis & Ches Smith. While Mendoza and Hoff have floated around each other's musical orbits for decades, and have been friends for some time, this is their first work together on record. It is an electric & holy harmonic fusion of highly estimable musical forces; wholly rendered. The original impetus of this group was Mendoza’s, based on the love she and Hoff shared for aggressive and polyglot electric avant-garde ensembles – artists like mid-80's Black Flag (w/ Roessler & Stevenson) and Ornette Coleman's Prime Time bands revolutionized the way they heard music. As stated in their liner notes, "we shared the writing of these pieces, though without the sizable stamps of both James and Ches, they would sound nothing like they do here.” The result – 21st Century progressive rock played by punk rockers with serious improv skills and a deep jazz feel. And vitally – non-stop wicked catchy tunes, riffs & grooves. Strong sonic references on our initial hearing at AUM Fidelity were The Stooges’ Funhouse, rendered by an entire band readily adept at rapidly swinging rhythmic & harmonic shifts (plus tenor sax on every track!) -&- minutemen, both their entire body of music & their fundamental egalitarian punk ethos. A higher combo accolade to any "rock-adjacent" band playing with electricity we at AUM cannot bestow. Art & Design by William Mazza Studio

[chez-mimich]

JAMES BRANDON LEWIS: “EYE OF I”

È stato detto, quasi sempre in tono dispregiativo, che il jazz è un genere musicale per intellettuali, anzi per “intellettualoidi”. Antonio Gramsci in uno dei suoi più noti passi dei “Quaderni dal carcere”, scriveva che “tutti gli uomini sono intellettuali, ma non tutti svolgono la funzione di intellettuali”. Essendo io di stretta osservanza gramsciana, non posso che condividerne il pensiero. Se poi qualche dubbio in proposito vi resta e lo volete fugare al più presto, non dovrete far altro che acquistare “Eye of I” l’ultimo disco di James Brandon Lewis, uscito da qualche giorno per l’etichetta “ANTI-Records” e che vede, oltre che Brandon Lewis al sax tenore, Chris Hoffman al violoncello e Max Jaffe alla batteria e percussioni. Certo che chi avesse ancora nelle orecchie le storie dell’agronomo George Washington Carver, raccontato in “Jesup Wagon”, probabilmente penserebbe che si tratti del disco di un altro musicista, sia per sonorità che per tematiche, ma questo ribaltamento di obiettivi poetici e musicali, questa concezione diversa della musica, insomma questa versatilità multiforme, non sono segno di debolezza, ma anzi punto di forza di James Brandon Lewis. E non solo questo, poiché “Eye of I” è anche la dimostrazione teoretica che il jazz, non è affatto esclusivamente cibo per la mente contorta di eccentrici “intellettuali”, ma una prova di forza della musica stessa e delle capacità dell’uomo di crearla e veicolarla. Come si dice in certi casi questa era la doverosa premessa, prima di ascoltare il suono nudo e crudo di James Brandon Lewis, semplicemente ciclopico sassofonista che come il famoso “bacio come un rock” della canzonetta, ci tramortisce sul ring. “Selvaggio e spontaneo” lo definisce il comunicato stampa che accompagna l’uscita del disco, un lavoro che sposa decisamente le sonorità del free jazz e del groove, senza disdegnare l’intimità della ricerca, quasi monocorde, ispirata ad uno dei suoi più grandi e riconosciuti maestri, John Coltrane. Se si cominciasse l’ascolto da “The Blues Still Blossoms” questa eredità sarebbe ancora più evidente, con quel sax così solo e così pieno di senso che sembra lenire la banalità e prendersi cura della nostra anima. Spira invece tutt’altra aria nel primo brevissimo, ma programmatico brano, “Foreground“ con il sax che ancheggia e spara bordate vigorose ed energetiche. Se rimane tutto godibilmente groove in “Someday We’ll All be Free”, secondo brano del disco, preparatevi ad ingaggiare una battaglia nel quarto possente ed impietoso pezzo “Middle Ground”, con quella incredibile sventagliata di note da un sax che in 47 secondi inonda di energia pura mente e cuore. Non è da meno il brano che dà il titolo all’album, “Eye of I”, anche se giocato su toni più riflessivi e su una più complessa dialettica armonica e disarmonica, dovuta alle possenti percussioni di Max Jaffe. Nel disco i vuoti e i pieni si alternano ed ecco arrivare la rarefatta simmetria di “Within You Are Answers” e “Womb Water” (scritta in collaborazione con Cecil Taylor), la seconda più problematica con quel basso continuo del violoncello di Chris Hofman che la rende ancora più inquieta. L’attacco dolcemente elettronico della brevissima “Background” ci riporta in ambiente “free”. Questi pezzi brevissimi, come frammenti, sorta di meteoriti sonore, impreziosiscono e non poco la struttura dell’album. Di Free Jazz vive anche “Send Seraphic Being”, mentre “Even the Sparrow” simile a una colonna sonora circense, briosa e apparentemente disarticolata, offre una varietà mutevole di atmosfere, sempre sostenute dal sax di James Brandon Lewis. Infine ecco l’iniziale atmosfera notturna di “Fear Not” che si trasforma cammin facendo in una lunghissima cavalcata che raccoglie in sé sonorità persino un po’ pop-rock, in una costante tensione musicale di grandissimo livello, dove l’infinito assolo del sax di James si dispiega fino nell’eternità. Secondo The New York Times, Brandon Lewis è “un sassofonista che incarna e trascende la tradizione”, parole assolutamente condivisibili. Ottimo lavoro James!

[donospl]

Giovanni Guidi „A New Day”

ECM, 2024 Włoski pianista Giovanni Guidi po raz kolejny prezentuje się w towarzysztwie swojego wypróbowanego tria z udziałem Thomasa Morgana i Joao Lobo. Do zespołu dołączył tym razem saksofonista James Brandon Lewis. Na nagranym w połowie 2023 roku albumie znalazło się siedem utworów. Cztery z nich z nich to oryginalne kompozycje lidera. “Only Sometimes” jest kolektywną improwizacją. Z kolei…

[toffeethief]

[soundgrammar]

Listen to: Sparrow by James Brandon Lewis / Red Lily Quintet

[sonicziggy]

"L'Orso" by The Messthetics, James Brandon Lewis https://ift.tt/tv9Lu3r

[kyledidthis]

The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis Photography: David Willingham Client: Impulse! Records

[lyssahumana]

James Brandon Lewis’ Red lily quintet Fallen flowers Live

[dustedmagazine]

James Brandon Lewis/Red Lily Quartet — For Mahalia, with Love (Tao Forms)

Photo by Henri Selmer

For Mahalia, With Love by James Brandon Lewis / Red Lily Quintet

James Brandon Lewis reconvenes the Red Lily Quintet—with Kurt Knuffke on cornet, Chris Hoffman on cello, William Parker on bass, and Chad Taylor on drums—for a set inspired by songs associated with Mahalia Jackson, the towering figure in gospel music in the previous century. The group develops the brief melodies of these traditional devotional tunes into vehicles for improvisation and exploration, creating a joyful noise that celebrates Jackson and also recalls the exploration of themes associated with the Black church by Charles Mingus, Albert Ayler and Roland Kirk.

In some cases, such as “Swing Low” and “Wade in the Water,” the source material is readily apparent while in others it is less so. The set begins appropriately and gently with Lewis’s adaptation of one of Jackson’s signature songs, “His Eye Is on the Sparrow,” which provided the name for a radio show that she hosted in the 1950s and with which she wowed the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival. Lewis’s phrasing well captures Jackson’s meditation on a tune that, like the rest of those here, is beautiful in its simplicity rather than showy.

The quintet was rock-solid on its first outing, Jesup Wagon (2021), and is even more together this time around. Parker is, predictably, outstanding here, delving deep into the music whether soloing, as on “Go Down Moses” and the first minute of “Elijah Rock,” or providing bedrock support throughout. Hoffman’s cello often blends with Parker’s bass, somewhat like the dynamic between the two bassists in some of Coltrane’s bands. Knuffke once more serves as the perfect foil for Lewis as they alternately trade leads and blend their voices. His solo on “Deep River” well exemplifies his approach, building on the foundation established by Lewis before him, he ranges from flutters to searching cries consistent with the funereal theme of the song. Taylor, along with Parker, holds everything together, being equally effective in delivering frantic rolls, as on “Were You There,” and hand percussion, as on “Calvary,” and there are numerous satisfying moments when he and Parker lock in, such as the last couple minutes of “Elijah Rock”

Lewis’s ever-deepening mastery of the tenor is naturally on full display here. His playing, like this recording, delves into the history of jazz without ever sounding formulaic with a tone that is simultaneously ancient and cutting-edge. Here, his horn transforms into the voice of the great gospel singer, channeling as well the voices that she was influenced by and that influenced her.

Those who purchase the CD or vinyl versions can hear Lewis’s playing in a different context on a live recording of his composition for sax and strings with the Lutoslawski Quartet. Titled These Are Soulful Days, the piece interweaves themes from the spirituals and thus serves as a companion to the Red Lily Quartet recording. This fresh context for Lewis’s vision unfolds through the tranquil and plaintive “Prologue – Humility” and four movements to “Epilogue – Resilience.” The movements interweave more and less recognizable phrases from the gospel songs, particularly the dramatic eruption of “Wade in the Water” in Movement III, while “Epilogue” gets fairly noisy and atonal. An encore concludes the set in the form of a lyrical solo sax performance of “Take Me to the Water.”

For Mahalia, with Love, like Jesup Wagon and Lewis’s “Molecular” releases, is fairly high-concept, but the music is spunky and easy to enjoy, with plenty of groove and intensity. The bare nature of the source melodies is well-suited to jazz exploration (as successive generations of musicians have discovered). Lewis is still too young to be considered a jazz elder statesman (and national treasure), but he is steadily building a body of work and a perspective commensurate with that status.

Jim Marks

[burlveneer-music]

The Messthetics, James Brandon Lewis - Emergence - their forthcoming album promises to be a real skronkfest :)