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Raphael Malfliet Large Ensemble: LE10 18-05
by Karl Ackermann
On his debut album, Noumenon (Ruweh Records, 2016), Belgian-born bassist Raphael Malfliet incorporated his influences of modern classical, avant-garde, and improvised music, without deference to any particular genre. In that trio setting, Malfliet mixed textures and loose, fluctuating melodies that played as a surprisingly full sound and served to emphasize the opposing uses of silence. The composer/bassist expands to a large ensemble on LE10 18-05, sometimes employing the instruments' natural voices, but often imposing extended techniques in abstract settings.
read moreRaphael Malfliet: LE10 18-05
by Jakob Baekgaard
Belgian-born electric bassist and composer Raphael Malfliet continues to explore the complex worlds of sound that he introduced on his acclaimed debut, Noumenon (Ruweh Records, 2016). However, his second album LE10 18-05 shifts focus from the tight constellation of the trio to the extended possibilities of a large acoustic ensemble. On Noumenon, Malfliet already understood how to create elaborate abstract layers of sound with a technique that seemed to make the referential sound of the instruments disappear, but ...
read moreTodd Neufeld: Mu'U
by Mark Sullivan
Guitarist Todd Neufeld makes his debut as a leader, after recording with drummer Tyshawn Sorey on his Koan (482 Music, 2009) and Oblique-l (Pi Recordings, 2011) albums and working with the late Japanese pianist Masabumi Kikuchi, saxophonists Lee Konitz and Tony Malaby, and others. After the brief introduction “Dynamics" with bassist Thomas Morgan and drummers Billy Mintz and Tyshawn Sorey, vocalist Rema Hasumi joins in on “Echo's Bones," giving the piece a welcome focal point. She is the ...
read moreRema Hasumi: Billows Of Blue
by Dan McClenaghan
Pianist Rema Hasumi, Japanese-born and now New York City-based, calls her compositions sound stories. Those “stories" sound like tales drifting out of a dream land: untethered to time and place, free-flowing and graceful, strikingly pretty, sometimes spooky, and starkly rendered, with the input of her empathic trio that includes bassist Masa Kamaguchi and drummer Randy Peterson, on her second album release, Billows of Blue. Hasumi's trio approach brings to mind the late Masabumi Kikuchi--whom she cites as an ...
read moreRaphael Malfliet: Noumenon
by Karl Ackermann
Belgian-born bassist Raphael Malfliet graduated from the Conservatory in Antwerp in 2014, moving to New York shortly afterward. Though the music on his debut trio album Noumenon is outside of well-defined genres, his influences of modern classical and improvisation are evident from the start. One is as likely to hear traces of Elliott Sharp as they would be to hear the micropolyphony of Gyorgi Legeti.The trio consists of Malfliet, guitarist Todd Neufeld and drummer Carlo Costa. Neufeld has ...
read moreRaphael Malfliet: Noumenon
by Jakob Baekgaard
How does it sound when a bass is not a bass, a guitar not a guitar and a drum is a not a drum? The answer to this riddle is the album Noumenon by the Belgian-born bassist Raphael Malfliet. His album is yet another worthy addition to the hip Brooklyn label, Ruweh, but it is also the most difficult and experimental of the three releases on the label so far. Malfliet is interested in ...
read moreSergio Krakowski: Pássaros: The Foundation of the Island
by Jakob Baekgaard
Pássaros: The Foundation of the Island is the second release on the noteworthy Brooklyn label, Ruweh Records. It is a special release in many ways. First and foremost, the leader of the date, Sergio Krakowski, is playing an instrument that is very rare in jazz: the pandeiro. The pandeiro is a hand frame drum that is particularly popular in Brazil. It is no coincidence that the instrument has been named the Brazilian tambourine. However, there is a ...
read moreRema Hasumi: Utazata
by Jakob Baekgaard
There once was a painter. He wanted to paint everything in the world, so he took the largest canvas he could ever find and started painting in his studio. In the beginning, people came by and watched interestedly as the landscapes spread around on the white canvas and detailed characters began to emerge in a world of green plants and wild animals. The years went by, and the painter would still be painting, adding layer upon layer, color upon color. ...
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