Arild Andersen Quartet: Affirmation

Arild Andersen began his association with ECM Records in 1975, with the release of his album Clouds In My Head. He has released over 20 more recordings in a leadership role for the label, and has participated in even more albums—for ECM and other labels—in a sideman role, joining artists as diverse as pianists Bobo Stenson, Ketil Bjornstad and Yelena Eckemoff, saxophonists Jan Garbarek and Tommy Smith. trombonist Roswell Rudd and singer Sheila Jordan. He has proved himself a prolific and versatile artist over a 45- year career, with a style which is hard to tag—not mainstream, not avant-garde, but rather an approachable, off-center full embrace of beauty in a personal, off-the-beaten-path way. Call it Nordic Cool, which is not afraid to heat things to a steady high flame at times.

The bassist's 2022 offering Affirmation, veered away from its original plan of playing some of Andersen's distinctive compositions. In the course of trying out those tunes, he and his quartet-mates somehow shifted into a full improvisation mode. They created a compelling 37-minute suite—" Affirmation Part 1" and Affirmation Part 2" that wraps up with a non-suite piece, "Short Story—listening to each other, reacting, and conversing, all with no pre-planning, while articulating a collective vision of what a saxophone-and-a-rhythm-section quartet can do.

Spacious, at times serene, at other times exuding a menacing ferocity, the openness of the music allows the savoring of the individual virtuosities—the leader's powerful bass lines and the oftimes eerie arco work along with added pedal-generated electronic embellishments, pianist Helge Lien's deft glissandos and inward searchings, drummer Håkon Mjaset Johansen's flurries juxtaposed with his whisperings, and saxophonist Marius Neset's prayers rising into rants which taper down to ruminations.

Aspiration sounds leaderless; equality of input reigns. And it sounds cool—or even cold—and beautiful, like a calving glacier, its cover art looking like a good fit as an illustration for Kim Stanley Robinson's 1998 novel Antarctica (Bantam Books), the music serving as a soundtrack to a four-man sled journey to the South Pole.