Ivo Perelman and Matthew Shipp just can’t quit each other.
A long-running musical collaboration that’s produced a discography that’s already longer than the entire catalog of many a prominent jazz musician just got expanded by three and a half hours with the recent release of Efflorescence, Volume 1.
This wasn’t supposed to happen, or so I thought. Their last duet album from a year and a half prior Oneness was posited as “a disc representing a grand summation of this long-running musical communion between the alto saxophonist from Brazil and the pianist from Wilmington, DE” that was stretched out over three discs. It seemed then they were making sure that they left nothing on the table when they went their separate ways. But they didn’t go their separate ways. The two still performed together live (as the above video can attest), and that led to another trip to the studio. Four shiny discs are required to contain Volume 1 and probably four more will be needed for the upcoming Volume 2 from the same sessions.
As they always do, the two masters just let it flow organically, and that means never taking an idea longer than it’s logical conclusion. Thus, the running times for the vast majority of these tracks are radio friendly length but there’s nothing else radio friendly about these tunes.
That doesn’t mean these songs lack beauty, the core beauty of the music is exposed with nothing in between the soul of the two and the ears of listeners. The delicacy of, say, “Track 2” on the first disc gives way to the dramatic bursts of “Track 3” and the barren soul terrain of “Track 4.”
Throughout, Perelman reaches for impossibly high notes less than usual, replacing it with the warmth of early sax maestros Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins but not explicitly imitating their styles. The times he does reach high (“Track 4, Disc 2) stand out all the more, as he emits a humanlike cry in those upper reaches of the sax register, and “Track 9, Disc 4” is largely a romp into dog whistle territory, if you’re still yearning for a taste of that side of him.
In these duet settings, Matthew Shipp puts on a master class in improvisational comping, residing deep inside Ivo Perelman’s head, as evidenced to his ability to anticipate the saxophonist’s next move and accentuate it precisely. He builds a fetching melody from Perelman’s esoteric patterns in real time, even when Perelman is blowing microtones (“Track 2, Disc 2”).
“Track 6, Disc 2” is a flurry of notes, done with lockstep simpatico. “Track 8, Disc 2” does the same, but with climatic buildups and stops. But the overall vibe of this record can be summed up in one word: flow. Every song is poetry set into motion, headed to a destination not known until it’s reached. But there’s always an unshakeable sense that they always know where they’re headed.
Hiatus? What hiatus? The Ivo Perelman / Matthew Shipp creation train keeps on rolling. Efflorescence, Volume 1 is now out from Leo Records. Look for Volume 2 later this fall.
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