Matthieu Bordenave: The Blue Land

Getting across the great open land beneath big sky country is full of epic moments. The Blue Land, French saxophonist Matthieu Bordenave's second for ECM, is that migrant's diary.

As he so skillfully rendered on his 2020 ECM debut La Traversée, Bordenave again enters the studio conjoined with the assertive mood swings of bassist Patrice Moretand the rapidly moving divertimentos of pianist Florian Weber. Only this time he adds to that valorous energy the meatier, Art Blakey-like sentiments of drummer James Maddren—and The Blue Land's tale begins.

First, "La Porte Entrouverte." A searching chapter as the quartet enters the story individually, slowly, one by one. Not so much as to tease or to give false direction but to turn into a visceral, near heroic moment. Which could very well be The Blue Land's namesake track. Rising from Weber's undisguised thunder, the quartet evolves across time and space, mode and motif, as Moret's slippery blue tones holds sway.

Spacious, moody, meditative, and immediate, the saxophonist and his compositions spin delicate, cognitive webs, leaving Moret, Weber and Maddren to create at will a way around a moving center. Thus another heroic moment in the saga is the collective's indigo meditation upon John Coltrane 's victorious "Compassion." First heard on Coltrane's elevated Meditations (Impulse!, 1966), Bordenave, Moret, Weber and Maddren take what amounts to be an even more emotive, penetrating stance.

It is a great moment when we can eavesdrop on one of ECM's unchallenged triumphs. And that, in a nutshell, is what The Blue Land is: a coalition of rampant, runaway energies coalescing into the moody atmospherics of "Cyrus," and "Refraction." Empowered by Maddren's beat hand jive, "Distance" builds into "Three Four" which may very well define Bordenave's inquiring, quixotic approach to chamber jazz. Focused loosely, "Timbre" is allowed to fall in and on itself all in the name of a classical modernist's interpretation of bop, both then (Coltrane again though aided and abetted by Charles Lloyd) and since. "Three Peaks" is the stoic conclusion. None the worse for the wear and tear. Alert and alive. Here.