Whispers, Grins, Bloodloss & Handshakes; Pandemonium; Phenomena of Interference

Pianos, horns, strings, drums, wind their way around the human voice on three recently released records where words are not sung, but spoken. A vessel for the most direct form of communication in this country, the English language is delivered in so many ways.

David Greenberger
Whispers, Grins, Bloodloss & Handshakes
Meester-Pel Pel
2006

Delightfully comic in its innocence, David Greenberger and 3 Leg Torso's Whispers, Grins, Bloodloss & Handshakes resonates with the clever charm of a population's elder statesmen as they fearlessly divulge. Based on conversations with nursing home residents, the Duplex Planet founder recites his subjects' plainly stated observances of life's pleasures and surprises with a humorous no-nonsense approach. The adventurous quartet emphasizes the energy of each story as mischievous tales of childhood become giddy with looping violins and bubbling accordion and melancholy melodies join "Buddy, an ode to a Boston terrier.

Barry Wallenstein
Pandemonium
Cadence Jazz
2005

Pandemonium deals with the hills and chasms of life as well, but it throbs with a heavy emotional component. A heartbreaking dialogue between son and mother is wrapped in a cloak of eerie sound effects that forces reality away. Backed by a full jazz quintet (minus drums), Barry Wallenstein's comfortable voice slips in easily among the notes of John Hicks' atmospheric piano and Serge Pesce's guitare accommodée, which, whether bowed or prepared, emits a tremendously varied lexicon of sound. Bassist Curtis Lundy softens the group's vivacious dynamic, which often meanders toward the abyss, antagonized by Pesce's electronic schisms, while Daniel Carter and Vincent Chancey round out the sound with their horns.

Steve Dalachinsky/Matthew Shipp
Phenomena of Interference
Hopscotch
2006

The spatially considerate Phenomena of Interference combines the two frequencies of Matthew Shipp's evolved piano idiom and Steve Dalachinsky's vernacular poetics. Recorded last year at Tonic, he gives breathe to "charnel angels and "the forgotten egret who "dodged the winds blue hands with a thick New York accent. He tells wistful tales with metaphysical metaphors and bluntly states his oblique observances while Shipp continues the thought, eradicating the sound of the human voice with a thrust of a hammer upon a string or a dreamy cascade down the keyboard.

Tracks and Personnel

Whispers, Grins, Bloodloss & Handshakes

Tracks: Play On; Fling Flung Bing; Whiskey Painter; Electronic Music; Miss Dog Miss Me; Ask Einstein; Kangaroo; Break; Buddy; Mudurian's List; All Right In The Bleachers; The Wedding; Only Natural Worries; The Last Words Of Arthur Wallace.

Personnel: David Greenberger: monologues; Béla Balogh: violin, trumpet; Gary Irvine: drum set, percussion, glockenspiel; T. MacAoidh: drum set, vibraphone, xylophone, percussion; Michael Papillo: double bass; Courtney Von Drehle: accordion

Pandemonium

Tracks: Blues Again; Lorelei; A Little Bunch of Could Haves; Ballad; Drinking; At Thoor Ballylee; Pandemonium; The Job 2008; Days of the Week; Backstage; To Be Spoken with Brass; "Lifey/Deathy": Sewer and Tree; Commitment to a Fog; Insinuation; Crime; Bigs & Littles; Prayer; How the Day Begins; Footprints; A Little Bunch of Could Haves [alt. track] -. The Job 2008 [alt. track].

Personnel: Barry Wallenstein: voice; John Hicks: piano; Curtis Lundy: bass; Vincent Chancey: French horn; Daniel Carter: sax & trumpet; Serge Pesce: guitare accommodée.

Steve Dalachinsky/Matthew Shipp

Tracks: Myth; OK; Retiring the World; Embracement; The Light; Phenomena of Interference; Blue #3; Trust Fund Babies (Excerpt #1); Door Poems 1-6; Naima; Julie; Blackjack; Galileo (for Sonny Rollins)/Soaring thru Tin; Matter; Shadows (Excerpt from "Rum of the Bereft"; We All Have To; Subway System; Three Orchids for Niblock; Ruakh Hakodesh; All The Things You Are (Encapsulated); Trust Fund Babies (Excerpt #2); Partita #3.

Personnel: Steve Dalachinsky: poetry; Matthew Shipp: piano.