tnycjr201305

GLOBE UNITY: ITALY
Sin Fronteras Actis Dato Quartet (Leo)
If Not (omaggio a Mario Schiano)
Progetto Guzman (Terre Sommerse)
Untitled #28 Fabrizio Sferra Quartet (Jando Music)
by Tom Greenland
Jazz, first introduced to Milanese audiences in the
early 20th century, was later adopted and adapted
by local musicians, with strong scenes emerging in
Milan, Rome, Sicily, Perugia (home of the Umbria
Jazz Festival) and elsewhere.
Integral to Italian new jazz for 40 years, multireedist
Carlo Actis Dato maintains his ebullient
humor on Sin Fronteras, a quartet release with
soprano/alto saxist Beppe Di Filippo, bassist Matteo
Ravizza and drummer Daniele Bertone. The alloriginal
date sustains a Carnevale-esque atmosphere
through danceable beats, catchy unison melodies
and raucous soloing, spurred by group chanting,
whistling and scatting. Favoring baritone sax (with
occasional tenor and bass clarinet), Dato’s style
blends inside and outside playing, delivered in a
slightly husky tone, complemented by Di Filippo’s
higher-pitched melismatic lines. Bertone combines
standard drumkit and hand percussion on Middle
Eastern and South American rhythms, which meld
with Dato’s Middle Eastern melodies and Phrygian
harmonies in a distinctively Mediterranean style.
If Not, an homage organized by author Paola
Carradori to the late Mario Schiano, a father figure
of Italian free jazz, combines the trios of trumpeter
Angelo Olivieri (with bassist Silvia Bolognesi and
drummer Marco Ariano) and tenor/soprano
saxophonist Alípio C. Neto (with bassist Roberto
Raciti and drummer Ermanno Baron), with guest
appearances by soprano saxist Eugenio Colombo,
trombonist Giancarlo Schiaffini and others. The
repertoire includes Schiano’s “If Not Ecstatic We
Refund” (both studio and live versions), “Sud” and
“Song” (which ends with a recording of Schiano
singing in a slurry, Louis Armstrong style), plus
standard covers and free improvisations. Olivieri
and Neto prove dynamic leaders and the free
improvisations show remarkable transparency, no
easy task with multiple bassists and drummers.
Drummer Fabrizio Sferra leads his quartet of
reedman Dan Kinzelman, pianist Giovanni Guidi
and bassist Joe Rehmer on Untitled #28, a collection
of hummable tunes over floating rhythms, which
are easily accessible yet open-minded. Like the late
Paul Motian, Sferra leads by following, preferring
the role of facilitator and colorist to that of
timekeeper, giving this project a truly collaborative
feel. Most of his songs are grounded in tonal
harmony, with an almost hymn-like quality, though
the key centers tend to shift in unpredictable ways.
Sferra’s unobtrusive, virtually subliminal playing
accomplishes more through innuendo than overt
emphasis while Kinzelman’s tenor sax (with several
clarinet cameos) and Guidi’s tinkling arpeggios add
to the Sunday afternoon ambiance of the set.
For more information, visit leorecords.com,
terresommerse.it and jandomusic.com
16 May 2013 | THE NEW YORK CITY JAZZ RECORD
Bridges
Andrea Centazzo/Akira Sakata/Kiyoto Fujiwara (Ictus)
Halcyon Days, The Complete Recording Vol. 2
Andrea Centazzo/LaDonna Smith/Davey Williams (Ictus)
In A Rainy Day
Andrea Centazzo/Roberto Ottaviano (Ictus)
The Battle Andrea Centazzo Invasion Orchestra (Ictus)
by Robert Iannapollo
Italian born/American resident, percussionist Andrea
Centazzo has a massive discography at over 100
recordings, with his Ictus record label, founded in
1976, releasing many of them. He’s recorded albums
with the finest of European and American improvisers;
a short list would include Steve Lacy, John Carter,
ROVA Saxophone Quartet, Derek Bailey, Evan Parker,
Lol Coxhill…the list is extensive. Although a master
free improviser, he’s also a composer, having done
orchestral and chamber compositions. And he’s not
averse to playing mainstream and fusion when the
muse moves him. These four albums are among the
most recent editions released on Ictus and show
Centazzo still forging ahead at a creative pitch after 40
years.
Centazzo’s peripatetic nature has seen him
establishing musical relationships all over the globe.
Bridges finds Centazzo collaborating with two of
Japan’s most august improvisers, saxophonist Akira
Sakata and bassist Kiyoto Fujiwara, in a 2012 concert
from Milan. Sakata was one of the earliest Japanese
saxophonists to embrace free jazz, part of pianist
Yosuke Yamashita’s trio for much of the ‘70s. And he
has kept his music fresh by collaborating with
contemporary players like Jim O’Rourke and D.J.
Krush. On Bridges his alto voice is the most dominant,
coming from the Charlie Parker-through-Jimmy Lyons
lineage, and Centazzo and Fujiwara keep a busy
accompaniment to Sakata’s flights, spurring him on to
some truly frenetic sequences. Although everything
here is improvised, “Bridge #5“ toys with “Stella By
Starlight” but taken to some pretty far-flung places.
While the performance is quite good, the sound of the
disc is a bit too ‘live’ and at 32 minutes, a little bit
chintzy with playing time.
Centazzo’s journeys have even taken him to such
unexpected places as Tuscaloosa, AL, meeting up with
the improvising duo of violinist/violist LaDonna
Smith and guitarist Davey Williams. They first
collaborated in 1979 and their meetings have resulted
in several albums. Halcyon Days stems from recordings
that date back to a concert in Venice in April 1979.
Generally, the instrumentation skews this music
toward the treble range; Centazzo’s mini-moog is his
only electronic element and that reinforces it. This
sounds like music of discovery and there’s an almost
giddy quality that is attractive. Centazzo patters away
while Smith scrabbles and scrapes and Williams
wrenches all sorts of sound from his guitar and banjo.
The music runs the sonic spectrum from delicate
textures to all-out barrage. There’s an obvious
connection among these three and the music flows
with natural ease.
In A Rainy Day finds Centazzo in a duo with
countryman soprano saxophonist Roberto Ottaviano.
The latter leans towards music with a more melodic
character and Centazzo adjusts his playing accordingly,
his percussion much more textural and reliant on an
electronics and keyboard setup. At times the music
tends towards the ambient (“In A Balinese Garden”,
where the kat mallet sounds like a gamelan instrument)
but Ottaviano can ratchet up the energy level and he
proves a good match for Centazzo’s free jazz chops. “A
Kind Of Duke’s Blue” opens up with a percussive reed
squall, which, despite the freneticism, clearly draws on
“Take the ‘A’ Train”, going through several changes
before concluding with a repeated sample of the song’s
famous piano intro. This is a studio recording from
2012 with a lot of overdubbing and while some of the
electronic work is a little clunky, in general, this is a
satisfying set of duets that shows both musicians’
range.
The Battle is the most elaborate of these releases,
consisting of a 2012 performance at The Stone by
Centazzo’s 13-member strong Invasion Orchestra.
Consisting of Italian and American musicians, it is a
well-stacked ensemble including Dato, Ottaviano,
trumpeters Dave Ballou and Guido Mazzon, pianist
Umberto Petrin and co-drummer Gino Robair. The
compositions are multi-faceted, make good use of the
instrumentation and are long and involved (the
shortest is eight minutes). They tend to go into
unexpected areas; for example, the title track has a
brass chorale inserted at the midway point that leads
into simultaneous solos from the reed section. Most
players are featured but trombonist Giancarlo
Schiaffini’s plunger extravaganza at the beginning of
“The Victory” stands out.
For more information, visit ictusrecords.com. Centazzo is at
JACK May 3rd and The Firehouse Space May 5th. See
Calendar.
May 7th
Rosemary George and Group
May 14th
Antoinette Montague and Group
May 21st
Mike Longo’s 17 piece NY
State of the Art Jazz Ensemble
with Ira Hawkins
New York Baha’i Center
53 E. 11th Street
(between University Place and Broadway)
Shows: 8:00 & 9:30 PM
Gen Adm: $15 Students $10
212-222-5159
bahainyc.org/nyc-bahai-center/jazz-night