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Hans Glawischnig: Jahira
ByThe crowning aspect of all of this is that Glawischnig, together with the support of two wonderful musicians seems to found a way to inhabit several musical dimensions at once. There is the known dimension of the waves of sound beamed at the ear and then there is the spectral dimension of sound that delivers an enormous amount of color and tone directly into the human soul. Here melodies, hidden in bass lines and the inner rhythms of melodies, as well as the multiplicity of swelling polyphony tangles with the harp that sounds in the other world of the soul. Listening intently it is possible to hear what Glawischnig hears.
His notes are at once single and multiple, because they echo with many shades of sound and feeling. His lines are sometimes long and ponderous; filled with elemental sadness as in "Ballad No.2," or unbridled energy and aggression, as in "Crow Point." At other times they are short, like ventricular fibrillations, and feel as if they will shatter the fragile silence within the chest. "Once I Hesitate" and the microscopic portrait of a woman, Sam Rivers' "Beatrice" are singularly beautiful examples of this loping dynamic. Glawischnig plays this on an instrument that can be both acoustic and electric, and which carries a phenomenal amount of textures that unfold diaphanously.
And that is not all. Saxophonist Samir Zarif is a master of tonal beauty. His dry voice somehow finds a way to sound like a myriad of hornsprincipally a saxophone, of course, but also like a haunted bassoon and an oboe offering shades and textures of its own to both saxophone and bassoon personas. And Eric Doob is not simply a drummer, he is a magician who animates sticks and skin and the brittle circular bodies of the drums and shimmering cymbals as well. His take on Bud Powell's "Celia" is nothing short of a monumental feat, as he charges through Zarif's final choruses and then makes off on his own into the unchartered recesses of the song.
Jahira is, then, a feast for the ear as well as the heart and soulan event to be celebrated with resounding joy, for Hans Glawischnig has arrived.
Track Listing
Once I Hesitate; Jahira; Ballad No. 2; Crow Point; Calabria; Celia; Alondra; Beatrice; Shock Value.
Personnel
Hans Glawischnig
bassHans Glawischnig: bass; Samir Zarif: tenor and soprano saxophones; Eric Doob: drums.
Album information
Title: Jahira | Year Released: 2012 | Record Label: Sunnyside Records
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Hans Glawischnig
CD/LP/Track Review
Raul D'Gama Rose
Sunnyside Records
United States
Sam Rivers
Samir Zarif
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Bud Powell
Jahira