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About Francois Houle
Quinsin Nachoff: Patterns from Nature
by Glenn Astarita
Quinsin Nachoff, a Canadian-born saxophonist and composer now based in New York, has long pursued deep connections between music, science, and visual form. Patterns from Nature grew from an extended collaboration with physicist Dr. Stephen Morris of the University of Toronto, drawing on concepts of emergent order in natural systems. The project spread itself across several formats--a recorded suite, a film with contributions from four filmmakers, and live multimedia performances--and assembles an exceptional cast: pianist Matt Mitchell, clarinetist François Houle, ...
Continue ReadingEmad Armoush's Rayhan: Distilled Extractions
by Mark Corroto
Jazz and creative music have always resisted assimilation. By that, I mean jazz draws upon--or perhaps more accurately, appropriates--sounds, traditions and styles to create something entirely new. This has been true since New Orleans musicians blended Caribbean, French, African and Sicilian influences while performing on traditional marching band instruments. Over the century-plus since its inception, improvising musicians have expanded the genre far beyond the boundaries envisioned by their Louisiana originators. Think of artists like John Coltrane, Yusef Lateef, Ahmed Abdul-Malik, ...
Continue ReadingFrançois Houle: Insider Listening that Makes You Clever
by Kerilie McDowall
Canadians and local Vancouverites have been in awe at BC, Canada's prestigious regular rising star clarinetist François Houle's international ranking status. Houle creates brilliantly fascinating compositions and such clever, innovative work. He has released seven albums as a leader from 2022-2023 and has four more plus on the way. Incredibly he will have released 11 albums as a leader within two years soon, with four additional albums as a sideplayer. Yes, a total of 15 albums or more.
Continue ReadingFrancois Houle, Sei Miguel & other new Clean Feed Releases
by Maurice Hogue
There's plenty of great new music to get excited about in this edition of OMJ. Clean Feed Records, that wonderful label in Portugal, just dropped a whole bunch of new albums and I'm happy to dig into these--the Italian band {m: Roots Magic}} that digs into blues and avant-garde, the unique trumpeter Sei Miguel , Canadian clarinetist Francois Houle & his Genera sextet with a tribute to their late friend and one of the most important people in Canadian and ...
Continue ReadingFrançois Houle, Marco von Orelli: Make That Flight
by Alberto Bazzurro
Sessantun anni, canadese del Québec l'uno, cinquantadue anni, svizzero di Basilea l'altro, François Houle e Marco von Orelli sono musicisti appartenenti a un'area di sperimentazione jazzistica sicuramente influenzata da una visione che definiremmo “europea" della contemporaneità in fatto di suono, ormai noti agli ascoltatori più attenti da un bel po' di tempo. Questo loro tête-à-tête ne riconferma, e anzi ne rafforza, l'immagine estremamente positiva che avevamo maturato nei loro riguardi lungo il succitato lasso di tempo. Vi ...
Continue ReadingGordon Grdina: Night's Quietest Hour
by Mark Corroto
Gordon Grdina might be proof of the saying “you can't keep a good man down." With Night's Quietest Hour he turns his attention once again to traditional Iraqi and Arabic folk music. This release by his small big band Haram follows Her Eyes illuminate (Songlines, 2012) and includes a guest appearance by Marc Ribot. Much like Ribot's forays into Cuban music with his Los Cubanos Postizos and Frantz Casseus' Haitian compositions, Grdina aspires for musical authenticity without being patronizing. And, ...
Continue ReadingMatt Choboter's Hypnopompia: Sleep Inertia
by Doug Collette
In keeping with its title, these eight tracks of just over fifty-minutes comprise a waking/sleeping dreamscape where conscious thoughts crystallize. then turn amorphous in an engrossing cyclical pattern. The fourteen or so minutes of the two-part “Converging Diverging" elucidate the most literal instrumental explication of the concept: replete with far too much ornate detail to fit the description of free jazz, the musicianship nevertheless radiates an abiding spontaneity with all instrumental commentary and elaboration/embellishment from around the quintet.Canadian ...
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