Carla Bley, Sheppard, Swallow : Life Goes On - LP 180g Vinyl

Bley’s writing captures strong moods with sturdy structures, sparse lines and clear voicings, and when she improvises, she eschews virtuosity, cuts out excess and gets to core essentials. Much turns on the placing of a single note, while simple lines deliver complex emotions with a sardonic twist.
Mike Hobart, Financial Times, October 2019.
 
The third volume of a sequence of albums begun with Trios in 2013 and continued with Andando El Tiempo (2016), Life Goes On – once more recorded in Lugano and produced by Manfred Eicher - features striking new music from American pianist/composer Carla Bley, whose trio with saxophonist Andy Sheppard and bassist Swallow has a long history. (Their first recording in trio format was Songs with Legs, recorded for the ECM-distributed WATT label in 1994.) Bley has composed for ensembles of every size but, over time, the trio has established itself as an ideal unit for expressing the essence of her work. Throughout Life Goes On, Carla’s terse, distinctive piano, shaping phrases irreducible as Monk or Satie, is beautifully framed by Swallow’s eloquent, elegant bass guitar and Sheppard’s yearning saxes. This trio has a unique collective sound, reflecting – as The Telegraph recently noted – “musical mastery of a rare order”.
 “We’ve learned to breathe together when we play,” Carla told the Charleston City Paper recently. “I hear our voices in my mind’s ear as I compose for us. I especially relish the conversational flow the trio format allows. We’re essentially a chamber music ensemble, and this allows me to write music for us free of bombast and exaggeration. Music stripped down to its basic elements. This format also demands that, as players, we improvise in the character of each particular song, which is both a challenge and, on a good night, a great satisfaction. “
The new compositions featured here, all penned by Bley, take the form of three suites, each of which was widely previewed and fine-tuned by the group at concert and festival appearances in the US and Europe prior to the May 2019 recording session at Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI in Lugano. “This is music we’ve been preparing for the last three years,” Carla Bley told DownBeat, when the trio played the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, as part of ECM’s 50th anniversary celebrations. “The reason we’re touring is to be able to practice it every night and get it right, because it’s finally going to get put down. It’ll always be the same once it’s recorded.” If this seems unlikely, given the improvisational capacity of the participants, the recording does have a definitive air about it.
The stoical sound of the 12-bar blues - resolute and ready for anything - opens Life Goes On. The album’s title piece was written as Carla Bley was recuperating from illness, alluded to in characteristically droll liner notes – in verse this time. “The whole suite has a more optimistic feel than the melancholic, wistful Andando El Tiempo,” suggested Jazz Views writer Jack Kenny, reviewing the group in London. “The middle parts, ‘On’ and ‚ And On‘, are written with wit and humour. The last part, ‘And Then One Day’, moves from tango into a more settled rhythm. This is a great addition to the Bley library, bright and optimistic.” Sheppard offers robust tenor in the first three movements, switching to lightly floating soprano for the fourth and sharing lead instrumental duties with Swallow, who has shaped a personal, highly lyrical approach to the electric bass.
 “Beautiful Telephones”, perhaps the first jazz composition inspired by a quote from the White House’s current occupant, has been described by JazzTimes as “Bley at her sardonic best…Introduced as a duo with Swallow, the solemn and cinematic theme wended through several elegiac moods punctured by a series of quotes, including ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ and ‚’Yankee Doodle.’” Carla has summed it up as “a piece where things get excited and then impatient and then excited again and then change. Nothing stays the same because, with the attention span of the President, we have to quickly change the music, too.”
The third suite, “Copycat”, explores the notion of call-and-response in fresh ways as the improvisers continue each other’s thoughts, putting a slightly surreal spin on the imitation games that are part of jazz interaction, as phrases are passed around among the players for commentary and elaboration.
Further recordings with Carla Bley are in preparation.
 
Press Reactions to Carla Bley/Andy Sheppard/Steve Swallow on ECM
Trios

“Surely the trio’s empathy and depth of expression has never been better captured. With Bley’s beautifully clear-minded compositions and undimmed pianism, Swallow’s effortless shifts from accompanist to melodist, and Sheppard’s saxophone as communicative as a human voice, this is flawless music.”
Steve Harris, Hi-Fi News

“Giving herself fully to the direction of producer Manfred Eicher for – somewhat unbelievably – her ECM debut as a leader, Bley repurposes some works for trio, while others are heard in unusual context. Regardless of the approach, the result allows light to illuminate unfamiliar curves and crevices in these well-worn pieces.”
James Hale, Downbeat
 
Andando el Tiempo
“Her coolly ravishing album, ‘Andando el Tiempo’ (‘In the Course of Time’) […] features a handful of inventions for her long-time trio with Mr. Swallow and the saxophonist Andy Sheppard. Chamberlike and willowy, suffused with melancholy, it reflects her sly noncompliance with jazz and classical conventions, which has been a prevalent theme of her half-century career.”
Nate Chinen, The New York Times

“As ever, Bley’s sense of melodic line and thematic structure drives the music, whether through the Spanish-tinged narrative of the title suite or the witty allusions of the Mendelssohnesque wedding tune. And she more than fulfills her improvisational duties, emphasizing her often-underused gifts as a pianist. Indeed, her playing is so strong that there are times when the music feels not so much charted as collectively improvised.
J.D. Considine, DownBeat (Five stars)

“Carla Bley publie son deuxième disque chez ECM. Le precedent, avec la meme équipe, revisitait les classiques de la pianiste et chef d’orchestre. Ici il s’agit d’originaux, avec notamment une de ces suites en trois mouvements que Carla Bley affectionne, ‘Andando el Tiempo’, qui donne son titre à l’album. Sur ce tryptique, Andy Shepaprd apparaît dans le plénitude de son art. Son lyrisme passe tantôt par la suggestion, tantôt par de brusques poussées expressionnistes. […] Si son éclatante maîtrise ressort dès la première ècoute, on n’est pas moins frappe par tous ces petits cailloux miraculeux que le grand Steve Swallow dépose au bord de sa route.”
Jean-François Mondot, Jazz Magazine