ALEXANDER HAWKINS – ELAINE MITCHENER QUARTET
UPROOT

 

Neil Charles: Double Bass
Stephen Davis: Drums, Percussion
Alexander Hawkins: Piano
Elaine Mitchener: Voice


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1. Why Is Love Such a Funny Thing? 2:16
2. The Miracle · You 7:04
3. UpRoot 8:57
4. If You Say So 4:43
5. Blasé 2:48
6. OM-SE · Environment Music 13:23
7. Joy 3:57
8. Directives · Walk Nicely · I’ll Meet You There 6:10

All compositions by Alexander Hawkins, except ‘Why Is Love Such a Funny Thing?’ (Patty Waters);
‘The Miracle’ (Jeanne Lee); ‘Blasé’ (Archie Shepp); ‘Directives’ (Elaine Mitchener); and ‘If You Say So’
(Charles/Davis/Hawkins/Mitchener). Hawkins published by Big Life/In All Seriousness Music Ltd.;
Charles/Davis/Mitchener by PRS. Lyrics by the composers, except ‘UpRoot’ (Lyn Hejinian), ‘Environment
Music’ (Emily Co), and ‘I’ll Meet You There’ (Rumi, trans. Coleman Barks).

Recorded April 19, 20, 2017, at Fish Factory Studios, London, by Benedic Lamdin.
Mixed by Benedic
Lamdin. Mastered by Alex Bonney.
Liner notes: Brian Morton. Photos: Dawid Laskowski, Roberto
Cifarelli.
Cover art & graphic design: Jonas Schoder.
Produced by Alexander Hawkins/Elaine Mitchener
and Intakt Records, Patrik Landolt.

Intakt CD 297 / 2017

 

This quartet represents the collaboration of two of the most distinctive voices of their generation, and stakes out a remarkable common ground from the pair’s vast range of influences and experience. The repertoire fuses Elaine Mitchener’s unique way with both melody and abstraction, with Alexander Hawkins’ idiosyncratic compositional and pianistic world; as well as spotlighting reimaginings of a small number of beautiful Jazz tunes which reveal the influence of precursors such as Jeanne Lee and Archie Shepp. Structurally, the group with Neil Charles on bass and Stephen Davis on drums function as complete equals, veering radically from the traditional norm of ‘singer plus rhythm section’, instead treating this as only one possible dynamic amongst many.
Brian Morton writes in the liner notes: „This is music that speaks directly to our condition, our uprootedness and our strange fixities of purpose alike. It is clever and emotional. It comes out of jazz, and a whole lot else besides. Mathematicians have mostly done their great work by the age of 30. Musicians often continue to mature for decades. Here is a group, populated by some of our most singular and precious talents, whose greatest talent is to communicate, and whose music already bearthe signs of maturity and longevity.









Photos: Dawid Laskowski, Roberto Cifarelli


Alexander Hawkins und Elaine Mitchener legen ihre erste Platte auf Intakt Records vor. Es treffen sich zwei der herausragendsten Stimmen ihrer Generation. Im Quartett mit Neil Charles am Bass und Stephen Davis am Schlagzeug verschmelzen auf eigenste und unkonventionelle Art Melodie und Abstraktion, der Gesang von Mitchener mit dem Pianospiel von Hawkins mit Referenzen auf die grosse Jazztradition von Jeanne Lee und Archie Shepp.
Der Jazzkritiker Brian Morton schreibt in den Linernotes: „Dies ist Musik, die direkt unsere Befindlichkeit anspricht. Sie ist klug und emotional. Sie kommt aus dem Jazz und aus einer Menge anderer Dinge. Hier ist eine Gruppe, in der einige der einzigartigsten und wertvollsten Talente mitwirken, deren größte Fähigkeit ist zu kommunizieren, und deren Musik schon jetzt Zeichen von Reife und Langlebigkeit hat.“

 

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