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Jazz Articles about Sylvie Courvoisier
Sylvie Courvoisier & Wadada Leo Smith, Led Bib. Russ Lossing & Zack Lober

by Maurice Hogue
An episode filled with enticing new releases, highlighted by the musical union of pianist Sylvie Courvoisier and trumpet master Wadada Leo Smth. Look for Angel Falls on end-of-year best-of lists. England's rowdy Led Bib is back as a quartet, while pianist Russ Lossing continues his string of excellent trio releases, this time in the company of bassist Mark Helias and drummer Eric McPherson. There's a taste of pure avant-garde from Havana, Cuba in Against The Jazz Police by bass clarinetist ...
Continue ReadingSylvie Courvoisier, Mary Halvorson: Bone Bells

by Vincenzo Roggero
Tra i massimi interpreti dei rispettivi strumenti, Sylvie Courvoisier e Mary Halvorson sono le punte di diamante di due generazioni che si incontrano sul terreno comune dell'improvvisazione, del minimalismo sonoro, del prevalere delle idee sulle esibizionismo celebrativo. A partire dalla confezione dell'album, privo di note di copertina, ma arricchito da una grafica (opera di Miles Okazaki) a metà strada tra graffiti art e neoespressionismo alla Jean-Michel Basquiat, con la pudica concessione di una foto a colori delle ...
Continue ReadingSylvie Courvoisier Mary Halvorson: Bone Bells

by Mike Jurkovic
Guitarist and sound-chaser Mary Halvorsonnever fails to hypnotize. Add the equally hypnotic pianist Sylvie Courvoisier and beauties like Bone Bells materialize to shift your news-exhausted consciousness to greater possibilities. Bone Bells does that. Bone Bells does it often. Once again each woman is determined to investigate every tangent of the sonic atmosphere. Willfully and excitedly breaks down the margins of contemporary chamber and avant-garde, Courvoisier (who gets along rather well with many musical mavericks, notably Wadada Leo Smith ...
Continue ReadingSylvie Courvoisier and Mary Halvorson: Bone Bells

by John Ephland
Tonally, these two artists offer what feels and sounds like an ideal fit. Pianist Sylvie Courvoisier and guitarist Mary Halvorson are in no hurry with , their third collaboration as a duo, the title coming from a passage in the novel Trust, by Herman Diaz. There is gentleness mixed with a kind of dreaminess, interspersed with what feel like spasms of either delight or some sudden fury of exposition that must find an outlet. And like all duo ...
Continue ReadingMary Halvorson & Sylvie Courvoisier: Bone Bells And The Art Of Surprise

by Lawrence Peryer
Today, the Spotlight shines On two artists who've taken the piano-guitar duo to bold new places. Sylvie Courvoisier and Mary Halvorson . These two players come from different worlds: Sylvie from European classical traditions and Mary from experimental jazz guitar circles. But when they join forces, something magical happens. Their music shifts from delicate to eruptive, structured to spontaneous, with a shared musical language they've built over nearly a decade. The record Bone Bells (Pyroclastic, 2025) ...
Continue ReadingSylvie Courvoisier and Mary Halvorson: Bone Bells

by Jack Kenny
Sylvie Courvoisier and Mary Halvorson! The combination of two such unconventional musicians is both rewarding, challenging and unnerving. The two women are radical disruptors. Their visions and their ambitions are vast. Their range of influences is dizzying. Their creativity seems limitless; their refusal to be conventional is absolute. Even the mechanics of their instruments are subject to their inventiveness. The extent of their comprehensive insurrection is not really acknowledged. Does their gender obscure it? In many ways, their ...
Continue ReadingSylvie Courvoisier and Mary Halvorson: Bone Bells

by Troy Dostert
Given that Sylvie Courvoisier and Mary Halvorson are two of the most distinctive instrumentalists in the world of jazz and improvised music, it is a particular treat to hear them together in a duo configuration, where the intimacy of the setting allows for a fuller appreciation of their virtuosity and empathetic sensibilities than is sometimes possible on their more ambitious group projects. Courvoisier's pianistic prowess can be astonishing, but on recordings like 2023's Chimaera (Intakt Records) it was her arranging ...
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