Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Dan Phillips Quartet: Converging Tributaries

1

Dan Phillips Quartet: Converging Tributaries

By

View read count
Dan Phillips Quartet: Converging Tributaries
Sorry New York, but Chicago jazz hits harder. And maybe it always has, with players like Gene Ammons, Von Freeman, Fred Anderson and today's stars, Dave Rempis, Frank Rosaly, Hamid Drake, and Fred Lonberg-Holm, to name just a few musicians. Maybe it is the winters, or is it the searing heat of summer that mutates the DNA? Whatever the cause, once altered, the musical whomp is fixed. Even when the musicians have left the Windy City, its influence remains. A prime example is Converging Tributaries by guitarist Dan Phillips' Quartet.

Phillips works as an educator in Bangkok, Thailand, returning to Chicago to record excellent sessions such as this. The same holds for trombonist Jeb Bishop, a North Carolina native whose tenure in Chicago saw him performing in Ken Vandermark's various projects, Peter Brötzmann's Chicago Tentet, and Mike Reed's People, Places & Things. Polish-born Bassist Krzysztof Pabian studied both the classical and jazz realms, played with a symphony orchestra and, as he does here, kept time in Phillip's composed pieces and the group's free improvisations. Lastly, Tim Daisy is, and seems to have always been, part of every improvised happening in Chicago these last twenty years.

Of the four pieces here, two are Phillips' compositions and two are group improvisations. The only difference is in the lengths of the tracks. The freely improvised pieces, "Swirling Headwaters" and "Latent Entropy" clock in at 18:36 and 26:46, respectively, while "Conspicuous Con" is 10:58 and the title track, 9:30. The reason I cite this as the only distinguishing detail is that the four players engage so well, the improvised pieces are easily mistaken for thoroughly composed music. Or is it that the compositions open up so nicely to improvisation?

"Conspicuous Con" opens the disc with the musicians circling each other, juggling melodic notes until they settle into a profound (can we say "Chicago"?) groove. Phillips picks notes over a hypnotic bass line before Bishop exorcises a few trombone demons. A similar submission to swing is found on the title track with Daisy playing with a surprising economy, and Pabian's bowed bass coloring the affair. The two improvised pieces are evidence of four musicians listening and reacting to each other with generosity. The sound is coherent, coordinated and is what we might dub Chicago organic.

Track Listing

Conspicuous Con; Swirling Headwaters; Converging Tributaries; Latent Entropy.

Personnel

Dan Phillips: guitar; Jeb bishop: trombone; Krzysztof Pabian: double bass; Timothy Daisy: drums.

Album information

Title: Dan Phillips Quartet - Converging Tributaries | Year Released: 2017 | Record Label: Lizard Breath Records

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT




Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Tramonto
John Taylor
Ki
Natsuki Tamura / Satoko Fujii
Duality Pt: 02
Dom Franks' Strayhorn
The Sound of Raspberry
Tatsuya Yoshida / Martín Escalante

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.