Matt Mitchell: Zealous Angles

Among 2024's contenders for the most tireless and ambitious pianists in creative music, one has to put Matt Mitchell near the top of the list. When he is not working as a sideman alongside other pathbreaking musicians like Miles Okazaki, Ches Smith, Darius Jones or Kim Cass, he is busy crafting his own idiosyncratic compositions and assembling the uniquely capable ensembles required to bring them into being. Earlier standout efforts included 2017's A Pouting Grimace (Pi Recordings) and 2019's Phalanx Ambassadors (Pi Recordings), both of which were sprawling, multitextured releases that were consistently imaginative and challenging. And then there was Snark Horse (Pi Recordings, 2021), an even more astonishing collection of music that, despite its six-CD heft, somehow felt as though it was only scratching the surface of Mitchell's capacious vision.

Amidst this creative cornucopia, it can be something of a relief to hear the pianist in a "conventional" trio setting, with just bass and drums for support. This is not to say that there is anything facile or straightforward about the delectable music on Zealous Angles, Mitchell's release with bassist Chris Tordini and drummer Dan Weiss. But the pared-down format does allow us to concentrate even more fully on Mitchell's freakish skills as a pianist and his superlative rapport with his colleagues, qualities that are sometimes less immediately apparent on his more wide-ranging sonic experiments.

Tordini and Weiss have worked with Mitchell extensively, most notably on the pianist's Vista Accumulation (Pi Recordings, 2015), a terrific album that also included Chris Speed on clarinet and tenor sax. Unlike that release, however, which featured long, winding pieces that necessitated a two-disc format, the music on Zealous Angles is taut and focused, with a lapidary precision that puts the emphasis squarely on the intricate collaboration of the musicians. Most of the recording's seventeen tracks are in the three to four-minute range, allowing the listener to appreciate fully each concentrated burst of ingenuity and energy before turning to the next moment of compressed exhilaration.

The music revels in the tensile push-pull of the trio as they make their way through the thicket of Mitchell's wily compositions. Weiss and Tordini possess unsurpassed rhythmic instincts, but those instincts are often employed chiefly in elasticizing the pulse rather than staying locked onto a singular rhythmic framework. The crafty opener, "Sponger," is a case in point, with all three players somehow staying in sync despite the rhythm's intrinsic elusiveness, only fleetingly converging on something approximating a perceptible shared beat, as fluid polyrhythms otherwise predominate. "Jostler" operates similarly, with Mitchell's oblique fragments scampering alongside the piquant lines of his partners. Mitchell likes to explore repeated figures, teasing out their implications by continuously re-working them, as on "Rapacious," with the music taking on a transfixing aspect as Mitchell exhausts the possibilities contained in each phrase before moving onto the next. The most wickedly addictive track is the album's longest: "Zeal," coming in at around ten minutes, has a brash energy fueled by Weiss and Tordini that gives Mitchell an opportunity to explore the full range of the keyboard, from compact ostinato phrases to impressionistic cascades.

To be sure, this is challenging music. Listeners who require accessible melodic themes will be disappointed. Yet we do occasionally get a glimpse of the unusual lyricism that can rear its head in Mitchell's compositions. "Gauzy" is a subtly gorgeous meditation, with a compelling use of space that is a reminder that for all his usual garrulity, Mitchell is just as capable of taking his music in a contemplative direction. But the prevailing temperament of Zealous Angles is indeed its zealous angularity, with Mitchell's off-centered pianistic sensibility on full display. It is a superb addition to his discography, and a likely entry on many a "best of" list for 2024.