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Mary Halvorson: Cloudward review | John Fordham's jazz album of the month
(Nonesuch)The Brooklyn jazz guitarist’s seamless, beautifully interwoven tracks are full of welcome surprises
Now comes Cloudward, a superb eight-piece set (reflecting in its title and moods the composer’s sense of liberation at the then-receding pandemic) for her sextet, joining guitar and Patricia Brennan’s vibraphone with trumpet, trombone, bass and drums, and the legendary Laurie Anderson on effects-violin for one track. The slowly mounting brass-and-vibes fanfare of The Gate conceals the groove of the building bassline and softly hustling drums that eventually emerge, while trumpeter Adam O’Farrill – secure and clean-toned all over the horn’s range – shares beautifully interwoven brass harmonies with trombonist Jacob Garchik on Collapsing Mouth and Unscrolling. And the melodically freewheeling American tenorist Rich Halley, an unjustly close-kept secret beyond his native Oregon, delivers a scalding postbop-to-free reminder of his long-honed eloquence in a formidable quartet including masterly post-Cecil Taylor pianist Matthew Shipp on Fire Within (Pine Eagle Records).
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