New Issues

Pastor, vln, vla, vcl, g, mand.
Sept 2006, Genova Italy.
at moments, and the album closes well with “Danca do Solidao”
sung in Brazilian over mandolin, guitar and percussion, with a vio-
lin solo passage. Stefano Pastor is certainly multi-talented, but (2)
is better taken in small doses, as after a few tracks the sound of the
violin solo, or of his gentle voice singing can be enough. (2) makes
me wish to hear Pastor with a fine quartet supporting him. Perhaps
next time out. 
Phillip McNally

RESPECT SEXTET
SERIUS RESPECT: THE W
hile my Stockhausen LPs sit right next to my Sun Ra col-
lection on my record shelf, I’d never considered putting
the two artists in the same sentence before this. (Oddly Sun Ra
MUSIC OF SUN RA & migrated to the end of the S’s rather than the start of the R’s.)
STOCKHAUSEN Somehow, the Respect Sextet came up with this odd matchup. Sure,
MODE / AVANT 6 the two composers have aesthetics which are based on personal
cosmologies and structural languages. Both claimed to have extra-
Jet Flight / Leo / Shadow terrestrial origins. Astrological titles and themes are omnipresent in
World / Dienstagslied /
their works. And both developed a circle of acolytes who immersed
Angels and Demons at Play
themselves in the study and performance of their music. But the
/ Lights on a Satellite / Pices
/ El Is the Sound of Joy / Set music itself would seem to have little in common. Yet somehow,
Sail for the Sun / Velvet / these guys pull it off! The set juxtaposes the Free Jazz voicings,
*Capricorn – Saturn. 70:37 collective improvisations, and wild stomps of the Ra tunes with
textural layering and timbral explorations of Stockhausen’s scores.
Eli Asher, tpt, slide tpt, melodica, The group makes the most of the three horn front line, massing
perc; James Hirschfeld, tbn; perc; reeds, trumpet, and trombone and then opening them up to arc
Josh Rutner, ts, b cl, melodica, across each other. Wierenga’s keyboard playing, whether on piano
tbn, perc; Red Wierenga, p, kybds, or electric keyboards, colors the arrangements to buoy the pieces
perc; Malcolm Kirby, b; *Matt
along. Kirby’s bass fills out the sound with percussive strums and
Clohesy, b; Ted Poor, d, perc.
dark arco and Poor’s lithe, light-handed drums and percussion
Apr 1, 2007, NY, NY; *Dec 8, 2006,
Syracuse, NY. move back and forth between loose swing and orchestral shad-
ings. Nothing is played too straight; no one would consider this
a repertory exercise. The Ra tunes are often deconstructed into
the barest of thematic threads and then built up from there. And
the Stockhausen pieces are mostly from graphic scores where
instrumentation isn’t specified so there is plenty of liberty available.
On the last piece the group mashes the two composers together
to come up with an amalgamation that nicely ties together the
preceding hour of music. By internalizing the music of Ra and
Stockhausen, they’ve come up with something that hits at the core
of both while still stamping the music with their own mark.
Michael Rosenstein
Greg Stafford by Mark Ladenson

jan - feb - mar 2010 | cadence | 129