Teri Parker: Shaping the Invisible

Here is how to take an artistic vision to the next level: Find a room with a lock on the door. Step inside. Engage the lock. Examine the work of those who came before you. Then begin the process of your own creativity.

This worked for pianist/composer Parker—so says her sophomore recording, Shaping The Invisible.

Parker is a Toronto-based musician. Her debut album, 2017's self-produced In The Past (review here) is a highly engaging and beautifully melodic set. Shaping The Invisible takes things, compositionally, to the next level. Her tunes are frequently off-kilter, odd. It is not clear who she listened to in her creation room, but with "Becoming"—named for Michelle Obama's memoir—the incomparable pianist Andrew Hill's approach seems to bubble up. Like Hill's writing, "Becoming" is compelling in its own unconventional way, the "unconventionality" of it making it all the more riveting, opening in a dreamy mode before shifting into an insistent straight eighths groove.

Parker uses, by turns, a quintet-and-a-rhythm-section or a quartet-and-a-rhythm-section, with saxophonist Luis Deniz sitting in on all the tunes, and trumpeter Andrew McAnsh contributing to three tunes, with bassist Mark Godfrey and drummer Ernesto Cervini rounding out the group.

"Hmph" was written with saxophonist Dewey Redman in mind. It brims with a scattershot joy, reminiscent of Keith Jarrett's American Quartet.

Seven of the nine tunes presented here are Parker originals. She brings in the writing of another Parker, Charlie Parker, with "Segment." The band plays the tune as if they really love it, giving the familiar melody a bright buoyancy, while "Retrograde," written by British producer/singer James Blake, explores some blue moods, with Deniz's sax sounding eloquently anguished.

"Paw Prints" says that Parker may not have gone with total solitude in her creation room. There may have been a dog (dogs?) in there with her when she was writing this light-hearted, light-stepping romp. The disc closes with the Thelonious Monk-inspired "Strolling"—full of its zigs and zags and an unusual angularity, with an introspective piano segment in the beginning that shifts into a bouncing bop mode with Deniz' impassioned sax out front. This might be the highlight, though there is a lot to choose from for that tag.