David Pritchard: Evanescent
Morphic Resonance Music
In the early part of his career, David Pritchard played with vibraphonist Gary Burton, trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, and keyboardist Patrice Rushen, among others. Yet however much the Los Angeles-based guitarist's roots are in jazz, his latest offering, Evanescent, is anything but. If there is a significant gap between his current music and the kind he performed with said luminaries, there should be: having shifted his focus to the acoustic guitar with his 1990 release Air Patterns, Pritchard these days crafts music that's more informed by classical minimalism than jazz; furthermore, the improv spirit that's so fundamental to jazz is absent on Evanescent, the guitarist eschewing soloing for through-composed tapestries created through the intricate layering of acoustic guitar tracks.
Whereas Evanescent's predecessor, 2014's Among the Missing, augmented Pritchard with a small coterie of other instruments (cello, viola da gamba, percussion, etc.), the new release features acoustic guitar only, all of it performed by him except for “Opalescent,” on which he's joined by fellow guitarist Iaonnis Markoulakis. Happenstance is the least applicable word for Pritchard's material; with each piece methodically designed, rigorous is the better term to describe his compositional approach.
The album's character is immediately established by the opening title track's latticework of acoustic strums and picking, the music animated by an insistent flow and regularly shifting time signatures. With its title referring to the building block used in the construction of a mosaic, “Tesserae” proves an apt choice to describe the architectural design of not only this stately setting but all seven. In similar manner, the title “River of Names” emphasizes the momentum characteristic of his music, how it pushes forward with forceful insistence.
The acoustic guitar's inherently sparkling sound grows even more radiant when presented in the multilayered form that it is throughout Evanescent. Associations of various kinds emerge in response, for this listener the image of a pastoral countryside on an early spring-summer's day with leaves covered in dew and sunlight rippling through the trees. Exposure to both it and Pritchard's music can dazzle the senses and replenish the spirit.
At thirty-two minutes, Evanescent is modest in duration and with a single instrument the sound source modest also in the range of timbres presented. It says much, however, about both Pritchard's playing and his compositions that in no way does the release feel lacking. Certainly the seven concise pieces make a compelling collective argument on behalf of their creator's artistry and overall concept.July 2019