Drawn Inward
ASIN: B000026PF4
Editorial Reviews
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Drawn Inward continues Evan Parker's merging of acoustic improvisation with live electronic processing, extending the six-piece Electro-Acoustic Ensemble's previous Toward the Margins. A seventh member, electronic composer Lawrence Casserley, has been added, further altering and combining the others' instruments and processors. The CD begins with a tribute to Johnny Hartman, and if the velvet-voiced jazz balladeer seems a surprising subject, it hints at a meditative lyricism that's often present on this album. It surfaces in different ways, from Parker's warm tenor on "Spouting Bowl" to Barry Guy's deeply resonant bowed bass on "Reanascreena." What may be most remarkable is the consistent balance achieved between the complex and the coherent. Parker's trio with Guy and percussionist Paul Lytton, the acoustic core of the Electro-Acoustic Ensemble, is independently capable of the densest swarms of sound, but in this expanded forum, each player has developed another approach to musical space, paring back the skittering lines and responding to the new environment. For their part, the electronic musicians, including Casserley, Walter Prati, and Marco Vecchi, exercise remarkable creativity and discretion in unleashing their resources, subtly blurring the sources and their manipulations. "Serpent in Sky" matches the multiphonic waves of Parker's untreated soprano with the gradually multiplying string parts of Guy and violinist Philipp Wachsmann. The strings also contribute a luminous, orchestral quality to the haunting "Drawninward," while "Collect Calls," based on a portion of a live performance, teems with chirping, spontaneous life. Beyond the novelty and complexity of its processes, this music is as accessible as it is fresh. --Stuart Broomer
From Jazziz
Take one of the fastest-moving free-jazz trios - Evan Parker (soprano and tenor saxophones), Barry Guy (double bass), and Paul Lytton (percussion, live electronics) - add four musicians who electronically process the trio's sounds - Philipp Wachsmann, Walter Prati, Marco Vecchi, and Lawrence Casserley - and what do you get? By balancing both traditional jazz instrumentation and end-of-the-century electronic sound processing as well as mixing human agents and abstract machines, the septet presents a record for the new millennium. This septet amalgamates acoustic sounds - Parker's trademark tightly woven saxophone swirls, for example - with jarring alien electronic textures to create a chamber-like, abstract introspection. "Phloy in the Frame" has Parker on the khène (a southeast Asian reed instrument), playing a short, pensive solitary theme against Lytton's industrial landscapes (his live electronics processed further by the others). Here and elsewhere on the CD, the acoustic contrasts with the electronic, creating an unsettling mix that's unusual to freely improvised music. Drawn inward, listeners can (try to) delineate the margins between each "acoustic" musician and the transformations made from his raw material. Nonetheless, the human agent often recedes deep into the background.
REVIWER: Bruce Carnevale, JAZZIZ Magazine Copyright © 2000, Milor Entertainment, Inc.
Drawn Inward,Evan Parker Electro-Acoustic Ensemble,Ecm Records,Avant-Garde Jazz,Free Improvisation,Jazz,Jazz Music,Pop
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Drawn Inward
Evan Parker Electro-Acoustic Ensemble Manufacturer: Ecm Records ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD  Avant Garde & Free Jazz
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ASIN: B000026PF4 Release Date: 2000-02-29 |
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Amazon.com
Drawn Inward continues Evan Parker's merging of acoustic improvisation with live electronic processing, extending the six-piece Electro-Acoustic Ensemble's previous Toward the Margins. A seventh member, electronic composer Lawrence Casserley, has been added, further altering and combining the others' instruments and processors. The CD begins with a tribute to Johnny Hartman, and if the velvet-voiced jazz balladeer seems a surprising subject, it hints at a meditative lyricism that's often present on this album. It surfaces in different ways, from Parker's warm tenor on "Spouting Bowl" to Barry Guy's deeply resonant bowed bass on "Reanascreena." What may be most remarkable is the consistent balance achieved between the complex and the coherent. Parker's trio with Guy and percussionist Paul Lytton, the acoustic core of the Electro-Acoustic Ensemble, is independently capable of the densest swarms of sound, but in this expanded forum, each player has developed another approach to musical space, paring back the skittering lines and responding to the new environment. For their part, the electronic musicians, including Casserley, Walter Prati, and Marco Vecchi, exercise remarkable creativity and discretion in unleashing their resources, subtly blurring the sources and their manipulations. "Serpent in Sky" matches the multiphonic waves of Parker's untreated soprano with the gradually multiplying string parts of Guy and violinist Philipp Wachsmann. The strings also contribute a luminous, orchestral quality to the haunting "Drawninward," while "Collect Calls," based on a portion of a live performance, teems with chirping, spontaneous life. Beyond the novelty and complexity of its processes, this music is as accessible as it is fresh. --Stuart BroomerJazz Music: