When one thinks of free jazz bassoon, one thinks of Karen Borca. As Ed Hazell's liner notes explain, "No one enlarged the vocabulary of the (bassoon) more than she did. None have translated the blues so deeply into an instrument that is notably resistant to that feeling. None have driven it further from its origins in the classical music repertoire or liberated it more from its mildly comic stereotype." Indeed, Borca has distinguished herself on the instrument for years, often in ensembles with the likes of Cecil Taylor and her erstwhile companion Jimmy Lyons. It is for these reasons that I was surprised to discover this album, Good News Blues: Live at the Vision Festival, was her first release as leader. Especially in this age of musical surfeit, this is not only a shock, but also a minor injustice, one which NoBusiness has fortunately begun to rectify.
From the beginning, Borca comes out breathing fire. Actually, the first three tracks — "Good News Blues", "Something" and the mesmerizing "Cambiar" — were recorded live at the 1998 Vision Festival and feature Borca fuming up and down scales as William Parker and Paul Murphy lay some fittingly rhythm on "Good News Blues" and Susie Ibarra and Parker, now joined by altoist Rob Brown, complete the quartet on "Something" and "Cambiar". This music sounds very much of its time and place (that beautiful late 90s downtown moment) but maintains an intensity that is singularly mesmerizing. How can these musicians maintain such a frenzy, sometimes controlled into jagged melodies (think a further outre Monk or Dolphy, or later Lyons, for that matter) for expanses of 8 to 18 minutes? Just listen to the exchange, the passing of torch, if you will, between Borca and Brown on "Cambiar". This is urgent stuff.
The final cut, "45 Hours/New Piece", involves greater choreography. Recorded seven years later at Vision Festival X, Borca's musical vision has shifted. Energy has given way to control and finer layers. Now a Quintet, with Borca and Brown up front, Newman Taylor-Baker on the drum-set and Reggie Workman and Todd Nicholson laying bass. This band sounds more spacious but also bigger than one might expect. Even as this composition relies more on predetermined (though flexible) structures and dynamics, rather than the full-blast of the first three tracks, Brown, Taylor-Baker, Workman and Nicholson nevertheless carve out the space shine, as Ibarra, Murphy and Parker did before them. All the while, the piece revolves around Borca's inimitable tone, which frequently rides atop those rhythms and even Brown's melodics.
Borca's recorded debut as a front-woman was a long time coming. Let's hope we do not have to wait so long for the next installment.
A happy update: This time, the wait was less than a year. A duo between Karen Borca and Paul Murphy, Entwined, just dropped in mid-November.
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