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Konitz/Mehldau/Haden/Motian: Live at Birdland
by Dan McClenaghan
Konitz/Mehldau/Haden/MotianLive at BirdlandECM Records2011 The tunes are familiar, Great American Songbook and jazz standards all. So for those unfamiliar with the names involved in this quartet outing, the old complaint of “same old same old" could surface. But with alto saxophonist Lee Konitz at the top of the listing, “same old same old" gets rolled out the door. Konitz, with over 60 years of professional experience--from the 1949 Birth ...
Continue ReadingPaul Motian: New York, NY, May 20 2011
by Warren Allen
Paul Motian Quartet “Tribute to the MJQ"Village VanguardNew York, NYMay 20, 2011 The boundary between past and present in jazz has, over the years, become a source of overwrought debate. The rise of “Tribute" shows at New York City's big name clubs gives ammunition to those who say that jazz today looks too much to its past at the expense of its future. But good musicians make good music, regardless of how it's advertised, ...
Continue ReadingKonitz/Mehldau/Haden/Motian: Live at Birdland
by John Kelman
Grist for what seems like an endless flow of recordings, The Great American Songbook has, ultimately, become as much a crutch as it is an inspiration. There's no denying the staying power of music that's near-Jungian in its collective familiarity, but if an artist is simply running down the tunes, à la Real Book--head, solo, head--the music too easily becomes nothing more than a tired retread, a kind of whitewashing that, rather than moving jazz forward, stops it in its ...
Continue ReadingPaul Motian Trio 2000 + Two: Live at the Village Vanguard, Volume lll
by Charles Walker
Paul Motian Trio 2000 + TwoLive at the Village Vanguard, Volume IIIWinter & Winter2011 It almost seems like a challenge to the critical establishment: return to the scene of your greatest early-career triumph, 40 years later, surrounded by active musicians instead of legends, and see what happens. Drummer Paul Motian, a fundamental gear in the Bill Evans Trio's landmark Sunday at the Vanguard (Riverside, 1961), has spent many of the intervening ...
Continue ReadingPaul Motian: On Broadway - Vol. 5
by AAJ Italy Staff
Nell'anno che sta per arrivare dobbiamo segnare sul calendario, esattamente al 25 di marzo, la festa per l'ottantesimo compleanno di Paul Motian, un batterista che continua imperterrito a percorrere la sua strada fatta di momenti intimi e delicati che però non sono mai fragili ed impalpabili. Anzi sono decisamente solidi e deliziosamente flessibili al tempo stesso. Perfettamente in grado di esaltare nuovi elementi vitali in vecchi brani resi celebri dalle commedie di Broadway e diventati successivamente standard jazzistici più o ...
Continue ReadingPaul Motian / Jason Moran / Chris Potter: Lost in a Dream
by Ian Patterson
Pianos have rarely been featured in drummer Paul Motian's ensembles, though his years with Bill Evans and Keith Jarrett have surely left an impression on his approach to balladry. Lost in a Dream is a collection of Motian ballads recorded at the Village Vanguard in early 2009, with Motian in the intriguing company of pianist Jason Moran and saxophonist Chris Potter. The empathy here is pronounced. Never restricted by the role of mere time-keeper, Motian's touch and free, impressionistic playing ...
Continue ReadingPaul Motian / Chris Potter / Jason Moran: Lost In A Dream
by Martin Gladu
Flitting like drunken fireflies, luminescent tones flutter out of a saxophone, tracing capricious, spasmodic lines. In the background, washes of cymbals and softly-brushed snare sweeps weave discretely fine-spun rhythms around a shy piano that is busy rocking drowsy chords to sleep. Fragmented, almost to the point of abstraction, the music nevertheless expands, ebb and flowing placidly like sea waves licking at a sandy beach, pulse-less yet its life beating strong.If a modernist spin on the old cubist aesthetic ...
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