Marc Johnson, Elaine Elias: Swept Away (ECM/Ode)

 |   |  1 min read

Johnson, Elias: B is for Butterfly
Marc Johnson, Elaine Elias: Swept Away (ECM/Ode)

Longtime followers of the ECM label will register that this one ticks any number of the right boxes: the line-up of pianist Elaine Elias, bassist Marc Johnson, drummer Joey Baron (a working trio in their own right) and tenor player Joe Lovano is one of those modest "supergroup" aggregations of talent which the label does so effortlesly.

This is unashamedly lyrical, melodic music which swings gently, references restrained post-bop and Middle Eastern harmonics (One Thousand and One Nights) and pays fastitious attention to detail (the appropriately titled Johnson ballad Midnight Blue where Lovano takes you on a ruminating walk through the empty and dark streets of Manhattan).

Early up is an immediate highpoint: Elias' gentle tribute to the late Michael Brecker (she was once in Steps Ahead with him) on the sad It's Time where Lovano slows things to a stately and low pace as Elias drops in romantically rippling lines behind. To some extent it and Midnight Blue have their conceptual equal in the quiet Foujita (again by Johnson) which is elegantly spare and barely-there.

And as with many American jazz musicians -- Charlie Haden immediately comes to mind -- they go back to a traditional song as source material: the closer here is a solo turn by Johnson on Shenandoah in which he begins by picking out the notes slowly as if finding his way into this old warehorse and evoking a time long gone.

It is a wistful and nostalgic note ending this album which -- although it hardly breaks any new ground -- aims more for the heart than the head, and hits that target every time in way which, as Bob Marley said, makes you feel no pain.

Like the sound of this? THen check out this.

Share It

Your Comments

post a comment

More from this section   Jazz at Elsewhere articles index

KIM PATERSON PROFILED, AT AUDIOCULTURE (2019): The modest star of New Zealand jazz

KIM PATERSON PROFILED, AT AUDIOCULTURE (2019): The modest star of New Zealand jazz

In 2012, when the album The Duende by multi-instrumentalist Kim Paterson was released, he was widely acknowledged as one of the senior statesmen in New Zealand jazz. Yet his catalogue of... > Read more

Dino Saluzzi/Anja Lechner: Ojos Negros (ECM/Ode)

Dino Saluzzi/Anja Lechner: Ojos Negros (ECM/Ode)

Argentinean bandoneon player Saluzzi (along with Astor Piazzolla) is widely and correctly credited with bringing this instrument to universal attention through his early work with jazz musicians... > Read more

Elsewhere at Elsewhere

JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT; THE RADIANT CHILD, a doco by TAMRA DAVIS (Roadshow)

JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT; THE RADIANT CHILD, a doco by TAMRA DAVIS (Roadshow)

The art critic Robert Hughes didn't have much time (but some sympathy for) New York painter Jean-Michel Basquiat. In a brutal essay in The Republic in '88 -- after the death of the painter at age... > Read more

THE FAMOUS ELSEWHERE WORLD MUSIC QUESTIONNAIRE:  Wade Schuman of Hazmat Modine

THE FAMOUS ELSEWHERE WORLD MUSIC QUESTIONNAIRE: Wade Schuman of Hazmat Modine

Of their unusual name, lead singer Wade Schuman says “HAZMAT is an American English word for Hazardous Materials, AKA dangerous materials, you see it on the sides of trucks or special... > Read more