The Skein : Andrea Parkins & Jessica Constable "Cities and Eyes"

The Skein :

Andrea Parkins, electric accordion, effect, samples & live processing, synthesizers, piano, voice
Jessica Constable, voice and electronics

These duets by The Skein – vocalist Jessica Constable and electro-multiinstrumentalist Andrea Parkins – possess a unified sense of form and feeling. Though fully improvised, it is easy to think of these pieces as composed songs: they are at times quite melodic, exemplifying coherent extemporaneous form. And no matter how unpredictable the sonic content, implicit in all of these pieces is the presence of the human cry: the blues.

Jessica Constable sings into two microphones – one “dry,” and the other treated by electronics that harmonize, reverberate, or mangle her voice. She employs this technique with exceptional adroitness and control as her voice subtly shifts timbre mid- note. Constable’s singing is free and flexible in the manner of classic blues singers, certain pop artists, and singers from Eastern European traditions. There is an implication of ululation, and an often-palpable sense of lamentation that cannot be diluted, tamed or obscured by electronic coloration.

Andrea Parkins brings her full sonic palette to this project: laptop, synthesizers, piano and electronically-processed accordion. Often supporting then subverting Constable’s melodic/modal vocalizations, Parkins keeps things in a constant state of flux. She expresses a tricky balance between the stoic and the confrontational that is like life, illustrated: full of promise, options, occasional disturbance — unpredictable and sometimes without solace.

A salient aspect of these improvisations is that many of them are amazingly concise. With several at less than two minutes in length, these pieces are exceptionally focused. On Nothing/Otherwise, a dreamlike elegy emerges almost fully formed. Soon, Parkins’ distorted accordion and nattering laptop infect the moment with sonic bacteria, subsuming an initial sense of warmth in a swirl of question marks. And Constable’s voice with its breathy lower register and distinctive vibrato adds compelling immediacy to every second.

Often, as on Zobeide, there is a predominating sense of minor modality, even if no clear tonality is offered. This piece highlights Constable’s vocal flexibility, as her voice, in a blink, goes from clear to grainy, from guttural to soaringly angelic. It also reveals Parkins’ timberal range as she laces her accordion with creepy distortion and Whammy pedal harmonics. Her laptop provides a surprising coda; a bluesy string twang vamps briefly, and is suddenly replaced by steam-like hiss and fizz. Mini offers an opening salvo of Lydian grace, only to have Constable’s mock falsetto drift back to the minor, to the blues. Resolution is denied.

Ides for Two delves into musique concrete as it advances from unfamiliar timbres to those we recognize: when tonality emerges but offers no succor, we are sure we’ve heard that disturbing circus music before. Elegy, a twisted torch song, exemplifies a kind of reined-in expressionism perceived throughout the album. A groove is offered and withdrawn. The song is a blues, carefully ruined. On Harrow, Constable nearly channels Laura Nyro mid-ballad before Parkins’ scalpel-like sounds rip at the skin of the tonality.

There are words on this record, though few. Backroom/No introduction offers taut whispers. Are they filled with jittery joy or barely-contained grief? Their ambiguity lends power to the music Ornette Coleman wrote “When Will The Blues Leave?” The blues seep deeply into the unnerving, alluring soil of The Skein’s Cities and Eyes. The sonic chemistry of Jessica Constable and Andrea Parkins gives them undeniable voice in a whole new dark light.– Nels Cline

Un choc, assurément, que ce duo impossible à décompter tant il fourmille de créatures musicales. Disons pour situer les choses qu’on pense un peu à Wyatt et à Bjork, parce que ce sont des voix et des musiques fortes et que ce disque-ci garde quelque chose du format chanson sans la moindre concession, un peu comme si Brassens avait fait un disque avec Pierre Schaeffer et Leo Ferré. Les deux femmes nous emmènent dans des émotions que la musique improvisée donne rarement, plutôt associées à des formes plus simples, du rock à la chanson. Elles me comblent parce que leurs coqs à l’âne semblent des liaisons naturelles, elle découvrent sans se forcer de nouveaux passages, qui se referment derrière elles comme au passage des magiciennes.

- Noël Tachet, ImproJazz

2 titres à télécharger (son qualité CD) :

- Harrow

- Ides for two

Disponible chez HENCEFORTH Records

932 - Ellery Eskelin, Andrea Parkins, Jim Black "One Great Night ... Live" !

YeSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS !

Directly bought at Ellery, on his site, I received it on Saturday.
And there, attention: recording in public, as it is, magnificent.
I had not perceived to there all these interlacings, these curves, these melodic, harmonious crossings, this presence.
The musicians dare to take time, settle down quietly, as sometimes friends could enter discussion, present arguments, let them a little mature, then propose it the others, without forgetting what has just been said.

Even if sometimes some sound ascents can let augur time(weather) forts (and that's fine), more marked words, ideas which ask of the power to be born, he(it) gets free of the set(group) a shape of plenitude, a climate contrasted and qualified as an immense color palette.
Not all the colors, but certainly among the most beautiful.

The set of these 3 musicians, made by improvisation and by complicity, makes us live one thousand births!

Warmly recommended

5 cent - Ellery Eskelin - Jessica Constable - Andréa Parkins - Jim Black - Philippe Gelda "Quiet Music"

Ellery Eskelin - tenor saxophone
Jessica Constable - voice
Andrea Parkins - accordion, piano and sampler
Jim Black - drums and percussion

With special guest Philippe Gelda - piano, organ and voice (on selected tracks)

disc one
1. coordinated universal time 11:22
2. I should have known 6:32
3. 48 A & B 6:18
4. read my mind 8:01
5. instant counterpoint 10:38
6. how do I know 6:32
7. quiet music 9:12

disc two
1. split the difference 4:43
2. cuarenta y neueve 5:20
3. the curve 12:32
4. let's change the subject 3:56
5. like I say 5:32
6. La Berceuse d'Angela 6:22
7. tomorrow is a new day 22:35

Coordinated Universal Time




The Curve




Instant Counterpoint



Vous pouvez acheter directement les alboumes d'Ellery Eskelin sur son site, c'est ce que je fais...

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475 - Ellery Eskelin Andrea Parkins Jim Black : 12 (+1) Imaginary Views

Why the word "imaginary" you ask? Because these pieces barely exist, at least on paper. They exist more so in our minds and imaginations at the time we perform them. But of course as documented on this recording they exist in a very real way. As with all improvisation there is an element of indeterminacy that when negotiated in the spur of the moment ultimately results in definitive musical statements. And these pieces rely on improvisation more so than any we've played thus far. Each one is an idea, a concept containing some specific element that characterizes an otherwise open improvisation.

These twelve short pieces were conceived of and written as a suite and were developed in performance during our 2001 spring tour of Europe. Since the ideas and concepts were predetermined I think the use of the word "pieces" does apply. We're operating about as close to the border of pure improvisation as possible while still performing what could rightly be thought of as compositions. But just to throw everyone off balance a little bit I'll continue to refer to them as imaginary. In retrospect I can see that there is a certain trajectory that can be traced over the course of our our previous recordings that led up to this point. Our first recording, "Jazz Trash", probably had more to do with texture than groove while "One Great Day..." showed me that having musicians that could switch between itchy and scratchy texture improv to rock band in the blink of an eye was a great asset. On "Kulak 29 & 30" we kind of embraced our our "inner" rock band with a bit more gusto and on "Five Other Pieces (+2)" we introduced some cover tunes into the book. Then on "The Secret Museum" I began writing music that was a bit more open, partially inspired by a couple of tunes written by guitarist Eugene Chadbourne that we recorded on that project. After hearing our renditions of his music Eugene paid us a very nice compliment saying, "I like the way the three of you have such different personalities in your playing, but it holds together. You are the Beatles of avant jazz!" Looking back, I might have thought that this instrumentation was too limited to take us this far. In fact, one New York radio DJ (who seemed almost surprised that he even liked our first record) was sure that there would be nowhere to go after "Jazz Trash". But even to my own surprise there is still more to do. In many ways this music is a recapitulation of all we've done so far, but probably the most fundamental difference is the change in overall organization and presentation of the music. This suite of pieces can be seen as twelve imaginary miniatures, magnifying smaller more detailed improvisational ideas as they appear and disappear, shifting and mutating in and out of the musical foreground. The musical information on the page may be minimal yet the music that results is very different than had there been no "pieces" involved. From the beginning I always had the idea that this was a band of improvisers for whom I happen to write music in order to structure the sound and make sure that certain things occur in the music that I wanted to hear. This requires that we improvise more as composers than soloists.

Needless to say, putting these same pieces in front of any other musicians would result in something very different. So how does a dry, academic and overly analytical explanation of music such as this one suffice when one tries to reconcile this listening experience to the real world? Well, that's up to each and every listener. I don't espouse affixing specific meanings and connotations to music. The music is simply a catalyst for you to explore feelings and emotions that perhaps you've not thought about or felt before, wherever you are, whatever you do. Sometimes I worry that jazz and improvisational music seems destined to exist within a small and insular world.

I deeply appreciate every person who comes to this music but sometimes the situation frustrates me. I like to think that this music can communicate to anyone who wants to open up to it. No prerequisites, no secret knowledge for "getting it". Just an openness and a desire to experience something different. All the music that I like best in the world has a certain communicative power to it, from the introspective electricity of the Bill Evans trio to the intensity of a late John Coltrane recording. It could be the skronk of a kick-ass punk band, the emotional directness of a simple pop tune or the grandiosity a symphony, it's not really about style. So in the end this music may not be for everybody but it certainly is for anybody. Oh, and as for Thelonious Monk's rarely played composition "Oska T", which closes the program; given it's "minimal" quality on paper it simply seemed about as natural to us to play as anything we've ever done. And so we did and yet it finishes the recording with a slightly different "view"...

Ellery Eskelin November 2001 New York City Ellery Eskelin with Andrea Parkins and Jim Black 12 (+1) Imaginary Views

Ellery Eskelin - tenor saxophone Andrea Parkins - accordion, piano, sampler Jim Black - drums and percussion

1 opener 4:22 2 four chords 3:27 3 low(ly) 4:49 4 plastiche 4:06 5 grafik 6:11 6 hûm 2:02 7 modular 7:38 8 naked eye 7:05 9 combulatory 5:24 10 kicks 3:17 11 middle C 3:42 12 magnets 3:16 13 oska t 5:29 Total Time 60:48

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468 - Arcanum Moderne, par le trio d'Ellery Eskelin

Je pense que je devrais particulièrement créer une rubrique "Trio".
Très particulièrement "Trio". Même quand ces "trios" sont parfois plus de ...3. Comme pour le "Ten" d'Ellery Eskelin, où le trio croise d'autres musiciens / artistes.
Cela ne change rien, c'est à la base un trio.
Rien que le message précédent (oui, juste là, le n° 467) est centré sur un trio.

Pourquoi des "trios" ? Ben justement, c'est toujours magique, un trio.
Essentiel.

Les mots se forgent avec une poignée de lettres.
Pareil pour les musiques.
Avec une poignée de notes & des "trios".

Celui d'Ellery Eskelin est un trio majeur.
Formidablement créatif.
Comment l'impro se construit.
S'improvise.
Comment construire l'impro.
Quelques éléments de réponse dans cet alboume où non seulement il y a ce son terriblement beau du sax d'Ellery Eskelin, mais (ET) aussi toute la lumineuse présence d'Andrea Parkins et de Jim Black.
Il est question ici de musique de rêve, quand le marcheur avance sans savoir qu'il avance.
Oublier le pas, n'être que le chemin.

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451 - Ellery ESKELIN Ten

1. If Not Now 2. Tell me When 3. Anyone's Guess 4. Say it Again 5. Ask to Be 6. More Than That 7. Anywhere, Not Here 8. If So 9. Ask Me Why 10. No Illusions 11. I Couldn't Say 12. Take Me

Ellery Eskelin saxophone ténor;
Andrea Parkins piano - accordéon - sampler;
Jim Black batterie - percussions;
Marc Ribot guitare;
Melvin Gibbs basse électrique;
Jessica Constable chant

Some words about "Ten" here
and here
and here.

Pour les 10 ans de ce trio, Ellery Eskelin propose un alboume avec invités de marque : Jessica Constable (qui maintenant fait partie intégrante du quartet), Marc Ribot & Melvin Gibbs.
Les passants connaissent déjà Jessica Constable (Soul Reactive, unique tentative française de jazz électronique, de trip hop, de groove, de ....).

Ce trio + trio d'invités est une étape essentielle vers les musiques improvisées sans limites. La magie de ce "Ten" tient autant à la diversité des propositions musicales (trio, duo) qu'à la liberté de l'improvisation généreuse, intimiste, électrique et étrange. Depuis que le trio existe - 1994 - , ce "Ten" nous propose des résumés futurs, de la matière à venir, de nouvelles voies.

Tous les alboumes sont disponibles sur le site d'Ellery, directement, sans détours.
N'hésitez pas.

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