Bill Frisell-History, Mystery

I have tried for some time now to compose a brief piece on this album. The more I listen to it, the deeper I fall under it's spell, rendering me useless in any attempt to write about it. It's not perfect, but it's such a wonderful ride that you're disappointed every time it comes to an end. Every so often, you read a book that you want to immediately start again once the last paragraph has been read. It brings to mind a story Kurt Vonnegut told of visiting his uncle when he was a young boy. It was summer and they sat under a tree in his uncle's yard and sipped lemonade. After some time passed, his uncle looked at him and said, "if this isn't nice, I don't know what is."

Vijay Iyer-Historicity

Some brief notes on this record I can't take off the stereo:

Label: Act Music + Vision

Recorded November 3, 2008 and March 31, 2009

Historicity-Solo piano, bass and drums enter quickly, stuttering pace, building to a coherent groove, seemingly dropping into a pronounced statement. Drums constant ride within beat. Bass constant flow. Jagged, Monk-like phrasings by Iyer.

Somewhere-Leonard Bernstein/Stephen Sondheim-Beautiful. Hesitant slant into melody. Behind the beat. Anticipation. Chord cluster descension-powerful drop from head of melody into improvised portion.

Galang-Maya Arulpragasam (M.I.A.)-powerful, steady, driving beat with Vijay crashing on top

Helix-Vijay Iyer-Soft. Touching right hand over soft chords, bass, brushes. Eventually rapidly falling into descending lines. Repetitive lines descending with dropping bass lines and sticks replacing the brushes. Abrupt ending.

Smoke Stack-Andrew Hill-Magically rendered tribute to a master. Piano solo joined by skipping rhythm section to match the slanted statement of the head. Iyer’s improvisation is inspired, reckless, manic and pure. Falls into a sweeping shuffle. Magnificent. Absolutely magnificent. Softly fades off with drummer Marcus Gilmore’s fills and bass line coasting alone until Vijay re-enters to comp the head.

Big Brother-Steve Wonder

Dogon A.D.-Julius Hemphill

Mystic Brew-Ronnie Foster

Trident: 2010-Vijay Iyer (Trident: 2001 was on his album Panoptic Modes)

Segment for Sentiment #2-Vijay Iyer (originally performed on Memorophilia)