Jamie Baum Septet+: What Times Are These
Sunnyside Records

To say that Jamie Baum's seventh recording and fifth with her Septet+ has been rapturously received isn't overstating it. Deemed a “revelation” by one critic and given five- and four-star ratings by writers at Downbeat and Jazzwise, respectively, What Times Are These earns the accolades it's received for its conceptual daring and commanding performances. When the New York-based jazz flutist challenged her colleagues with charts packed with unusual meters and compositional forms, her stellar unit responded.

Audacity must be Baum's middle name, given the nature of the projects that preceded this latest effort. On In This Life (2013) and Bridges (2018), she delved into South Asian qawwali, Near Eastern maqam, and Jewish sacred musical traditions; while What Times Are These doesn't revisit such paths, it ventures into also-bold territory that sees poetry and spoken word wedded to compelling jazz structures and ensemble expression. Helping the leader express her vision are trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson, alto saxophonist/clarinetist Sam Sadigursky, French hornist Chris Komer, guitarist Brad Shepik, keyboardist Luis Perdomo, bassist Ricky Rodriguez, drummer Jeff Hirshfield, and, on three tracks, percussionist Keita Ogawa. Guest vocalists Theo Bleckmann, Sara Serpa, Aubrey Johnson, and KOKAYI also contribute alongside spoken word turns by Finlayson and Baum herself.

Like many a project emerging from the turbulence of the pandemic, Baum's drew for inspiration from an unexpected source. Sheltering in her Manhattan apartment, she happened upon Bill Moyers's site A Poet A Day, and after being exposed to its daily dose of poetry and related videos of author readings and interviews, the idea for the album began to crystallize in Baum's mind. Why not use such poems as lyrics for vocalists and embed their performances within ones by her ensemble?

Selecting thereafter poems that spoke to her and lent themselves to musical treatment, Baum fashioned material based on texts by contemporary female poets (Adrienne Rich, Marge Piercy, Tracy K. Smith, Lucille Clifton, Naomi Shihab Nye), the result seven poem-based pieces of the album's ten. Although it wasn't clear then whether the material she chose would still resonate when the album was released, Baum discovered that, in fact, the content of the poems is as relevant today, if not more so, than it was four years ago. The album takes its title from Rich's 1995 text “What Kinds of Times Are These,” which in itself encapsulates the chaos of the era out of which Baum's project originated. Bolstered by vocal variety, arresting compositions, and compelling ensemble playing, the album impresses as a powerful, multi-faceted statement significant for acknowledging the uncertainties of our time and the resilience and resolve people demonstrate when faced with such challenges.

Baum neatly frames the recording with “In the Light of Day” and “In the Day of Light,” both tickling the ear with Ogawa's percussion and the muscular punch of the group. Central to Baum's concept is the idea of multiple melodic lines intertwining so as to suggest harmonious co-existence, no matter how unrelated the individual parts might appear. Said concept applies in these cases when the instruments' cross-currents cohere into vivid, polyphonic wholes, and we also witness the leader's decision to not only feature her own playing but give equal weight to that of her partners. The personalized character of the release is amplified when Baum herself recites Piercy's texts in “To Be of Use,” with clarinet and piano as sensitive commentators during the opening of this quasi-chamber jazz performance.

Being the generous host she is, Baum gives her bandmates ample moments to strut their stuff, and Shepik, Sadigursky, and Komer make the most of it. The guitarist, alto saxophonist, and French hornist separately distinguish “What Kind of Times Are These,” “In Those Years,” and “Dreams” with strong statements, and as illustrated by “An Old Story” and “I Am Wrestling with Despair” Finlayson is his usual exemplary self. Perdomo's playing is central to the album's musical identity (check out his spicy Fender Rhodes solo on “An Old Story”), and much the same could be said of Rodriguez and Jeff Hirshfield. Each contributor plays a significant part.

After Rodriguez introduces “An Old Story,” Finlayson lays memorable spoken word over a midtempo funk groove sprinkled with Shepik's Curtis Mayfield-like textures, after which Johnson imparts Smith's grim message about humanity's self-destructive ways. Bleckmann's overdubbed intro imbues Rich's “In Those Years” with enigmatic mystery, after which the mood turns elegiac for words that could have been written expressly about the pandemic, “In those years, people will say, we lost track of the meaning of we, of you. We found ourselves reduced to I”; as compelling is the treatment Baum fashioned for the poet's text, which is as much experimental art song as jazz performance. Serpa's attractive, pliable voice elevates the three songs on which she appears, the lustrous title track first, Nye's heart-wrenching “My Grandmother in the Stars” second, and Piercy's “I Am Wrestling with Despair” third. The album shift gears when KOKAYI enlivens Clifton's “sorrow song” with biting, self-penned flow, his energy matched by the funk pulse of the band and a strong solo by the leader.

August 2024