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Xavier Lecouturier: I Remember Why Now
by Paul Rauch
Wisdom is in part gathered by the realization that one can only be honest with oneself. There are no lies, only distractions and suppositions that put vision and truth at bay. The wisdom and truth that produces great music is not only arrived at by immersion into the art itself, but the immersion and subsequent understanding of other experiences from which inspiration is drawn. Drummer / composer Xavier Lecouturier in his second solo album, explores the realization that there has ...
Continue ReadingMartin Budde: Back Burner
by Paul Rauch
The title of this debut recording from Seattle-based guitarist Martin Budde suggests the music has been percolating in the backwaters of his musical endeavors over the past few years. Indeed, that is the case, as the past five years have found Budde smack dab in the middle of the musical collective, Meridian Odyssey. The music was inspired by, and recorded during, the pandemic shutdown of 2020. This was a time when this collective of young Seattle musicians was sequestered in ...
Continue ReadingMartin Budde: Back Burner
by Andrew Luthringer
In the ever-evolving crucible of progressive jazz guitar, younger players often face a formidable challenge: forging a distinctive approach amidst the echoes of legends. The roles and methodologies that define modern electric jazz have multiplied exponentially in recent decades, but Martin Budde, a guitarist of floating, effortless fluidity and solid foundational control, navigates this landscape with the confident stride of a searcher who's found something he wants to communicate. On Back Burner, his second solo album, he shares the riches ...
Continue ReadingMeridian Odyssey: Second Wave
by Paul Rauch
The human qualities that are attributed to friendship, draw a remarkable parallel to those qualities that bring musicians together and allow them to communicate without fear. There is the willingness to make oneself vulnerable to emotional discretion, to communicate and embrace others without the encumbrances of ego. There is hard work involved, and a unity that is earned through honest interpretation of one's personal humanity. The actual circumstances that bond friendship, or musical integrity, are distinct and variable. In the ...
Continue ReadingMeridian Odyssey: Earthshine
by Jack Bowers
Meridian Odyssey is a sextet comprising young musicians from the improbable jazz territory of Big Lake, Alaska, and Earthshine is their second recording together, with trumpeter Noah Halpern having been added to the quintet since the ensemble's 2021 debut album, Second Wave. On Earthshine, there are nine original compositions by members of the group, two of which ("The Front of the Mirror," “Reflecting") are roughly a minute or so long. “Mirror" was written by and features bassist ...
Continue ReadingMeridian Odyssey: Second Wave
by Dan McClenaghan
Seattle's Origin Records opened 2021 on a hopeful, turning-of-the-page note with Second Wave, by the group Meridian Odyssey. The band comprised five young (twenty-something) Seattle-ites who took advantage of the time on their collective hands, and the low air fares resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, to journey to Alaska, where guitarist Martin Budde's father—a pilot—owns an airplane hangar which served as a recording studio. Where the plane, the hangar's previous occupant, ended up is uncertain. But the saxophone, guitar, bass, ...
Continue ReadingGeneration Next: Four Voices From Seattle
by Paul Rauch
Each generation, an insidious notion arises, and is passed about the musical world that jazz music, the only uniquely American art form is somehow experiencing a slow, but certain death. Inevitably, this notion is set aside, and somehow projected forward in time, as a new generation of artists rise to the occasion, not only facilitating the survival of, but enabling the forward journey of the genre. In Seattle, the vibrant scene has moved forward from Quincy Jones and Ernestine Anderson, ...
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