Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Kali Z. Fasteau: Vivid

162

Kali Z. Fasteau: Vivid

By

View read count
Kali Z. Fasteau: Vivid
The double entendre in the title of Vivid applies to color as well as emotion. Multi-instrumentalist Fasteau, who's traveled the world living and performing, offers an intriguing combination of soprano saxophone and voice, among other things. Her fusion of high-energy blowing with high-flying song fits surprisingly well into this mix of performers and instruments. When Fasteau sings, her soprano voice sounds eerily like a soprano saxophone—you might not catch it if you weren't paying attention.

Recorded live during three performances during 1998 and 1999, Fasteau's group pursues energetic free improvisation around abstract themes relating to hues. The tone of each piece reflects the group's interpretation of a particular color. If you're willing to play the game, it can be quite fun to make the connections and see how vision can connect with sound. Regardless, this all-star group has much to offer from a purely musical standpoint. The combination of three horns yields a thickly textured sonic field which twists and thrusts about. Fasteau, McPhee, and Mateen frequently engage in synergistic expressionism, though they tend to shy away from call-and-response play. At times the group deviates from Western harmony into more mystical Eastern flavors.

Hamid Drake and Ron McBee drive the rhythms on Vivid, with occasional help from Fasteau. These tunes tend to have a tribal feel, so the use of percussion to round out the drum kit lends additional depth. Unfortunately this recording is quite limited in terms of sound quality, so the percussion is often lost. And with rare exceptions, bassist William Parker is essentially inaudible—a tragic loss, given his affinity for complex rhythms and his unusual treble extension. I suppose one must pay a sonic price to experience live music created in the moment—but Vivid is so poorly recorded that the listening experience is compromised. It's a shame, given the prodigious talent in this group and the confident approach they use with the music.

Personnel

Kali Z. Fasteau
multi-instrumentalist

Album information

Title: Vivid | Year Released: 2001 | Record Label: Flying Note 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.