Hailing from Montreal, Beth McKenna is building up a reputation in the city as one of its most protean composers, bandleaders and saxophonists. Her thing might ostensibly be called contemporary jazz, though “contemporary” jazz often gets lumped in with “smooth” jazz. That’s not the case with McKenna, not even close.
Citing influences like Pat Metheny, Snarky Puppy and Brian Blade Fellowship, McKenna has honed her own extended form style of composition that does sound contemporary but blends together too many genres to call it simply “jazz.” At the same time, McKenna does leave plenty of space in her charts for individual expression, so the spirit of jazz is nonetheless strong in her songs.
In the video debuting above, McKenna opens up about her upcoming release Beyond Here, revealing the context in which the album was conceived and recorded, and how her quintet brought her songs to life. While she speaks of the music not being “fit into a defined form” the snippets of music from the new album bores out her words. Her album isn’t so much a genre but a mixture of feels. Good feels, I would add.
McKenna fronts a tight combo – which is just what her songs demands – of the multi-woodwinds player and leader backed by François Jalbert on electric guitar, Guillaume Martineau on keyboards/piano, Olivier Babaz manning bass both electric and upright and Peter Colantonio on drums. Vocalist Sarah Rossy is on hand for several numbers to wordlessly amplify the melodic development à la Pat Metheny Group.
Beyond Here goes on sale October 22, 2021. Preorder/Order it from Bandcamp.
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