Yuma Uesaka & Marilyn Crispell
Among the many lauded recordings Marilyn Crispell has made as a leader and collaborator over the years are albums with iconic reed players from Anthony Braxton and Joseph Jarman to Tim Berne and Joe Lovano. Now she has teamed with Yuma Uesaka, a rising talent among multi-reed performers. Their searching new duo album Streams – featuring a mix of free improvisations and Uesaka’s poetic compositions – will be released collaboratively via Not Two Records and Polyfold Music on October 15, 2021, digitally and on CD. Crispell has produced a series of beloved albums for ECM in recent decades, including Nothing Ever Was, Anyway, a classic that DownBeat called “one of the loveliest records of piano music ever released on ECM… stunningly played.” The New York City-based Uesaka – who plays tenor saxophone and B-flat and contra-alto clarinets on Streams – made his mark in 2015 with a debut solo EP, Spear and Shield, which was singled out by Bird Is the Worm for its blend of “power” and “lyricism.” Next, Uesaka’s album with new trio Ocelot earned praise on both sides of the Atlantic, from WBGO to The Wire, along with being featured as one of spring 2021’s Best Jazz Albums by Bandcamp. For her part, Crispell says: “Yuma is special, I think, and we connected musically, intellectually and spiritually. Playing duo creates the possibility for an intimate and very exposed kind of communication. There is no one and nothing to hide behind, so it’s both challenging and exciting.”
Simultaneously meditative and emotive, Streams was conceived by Uesaka in the spirit of Crispell’s previous duo ventures with Braxton (Duets, Vancouver 1989) and Jarman (Connecting Spirits). After the atmospheric, freely improvised scene-setter “Meditations,” Uesaka’s composition “Iterations I” is marked by a Braxton-inspired atonal melodic synchrony that builds in sonic intensity before its spectral finish. The nearly 20-minute sequence of “Streams,” “Capillarity” and “Torrent” constitutes a centerpiece suite of free improvisation, brimming with spontaneous counterpoint, collective textures and musical callbacks. The album concludes with the ravishing “Ma / Space,” Uesaka’s compositional nod to his Japanese heritage and the ancient court music of Gagaku, with this track featuring a third player as seamlessly overdubbed guest: Chatori Shimizu on ethereal Shō (the Japanese mouth organ).
About partnering with Crispell, Uesaka says: “Marilyn has such a wide range of skills and experiences as a pianist. Most notably, having worked with Anthony Braxton for more than a decade, she’s never phased by out-of-the-box musical notations and quickly creates music out of loosely formed instructions. She can play with explosive energy, while at the same time integrating everything that’s going on around her. Marilyn also has an incredible sense of melodicism, which really shines when playing in the subtlest musical contexts. It was very clear when playing with her that Marilyn is first and foremost listening – not only to what I’m doing but also to where the music wants to go. It’s listening both in terms of the most micro-level musical elements, like rhythms, melodies and timbres, but also in a macro-level sense, in terms of form, themes and overall emotional weight. I’ve known this about Marilyn’s playing through hearing her in various contexts, but it was something else to be in the same space creating music with her. Playing with Marilyn pushed me to a heightened state of awareness and confidence.”
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