Wadada Leo Smith's Great Lakes Quartet: The Chicago Symphonies
TUM

Wadada Leo Smith, Vijay Iyer & Jack DeJohnette: A Love Sonnet for Billie Holiday
TUM

Eighty would appear to be the new forty—for Wadada Leo Smith, at least. A finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in Music, the trumpeter has been the recipient of countless awards over the course of a five-decade career, released more than fifty albums as a leader, and shows no signs of easing up. Two recent projects add to those TUM issued in 2021 to celebrate his birthday, with the six projects totaling a staggering twenty-two CDs. The label's 2022 schedule includes two box sets, one a seven-CD affair featuring twelve string quartets and the other Emerald Duets, a four-CD package pairing the trumpeter with Pheeroan akLaff, Han Bennink, Andrew Cyrille, and Jack DeJohnette. For now, however, there's The Chicago Symphonies by Smith's Great Lakes Quartet and A Love Sonnet for Billie Holiday, which pairs him with pianist Vijay Iyer and DeJohnette.

Smith designed his Chicago Symphonies to honour pivotal cultural contributions Midwesterners have made to American society, and a simple scan of the track titles reflects that gesture. Great jazz artists, from Amina Claudine Myers and The Art Ensemble of Chicago to Muhal Richard Abrams, Leroy Jenkins, and Anthony Braxton, and visionary political figures Abraham Lincoln and Barack Obama are referenced in the titles of the homages. Helping Smith realize his vision on the four parts are Henry Threadgill (alto saxophone, flute, bass flute), double bassist John Lindberg, and drummer Jack DeJohnette, with Jonathon Haffner (alto, soprano saxophones) in place of Threadgill on the fourth. As large as a project as it is, it's not overwhelming: with only one of the discs pushing past the forty-minute mark, each symphony is a generally compact statement. The performances with the Threadgill unit were recorded in 2015, by the way, the one with Haffner three years later.

Predictably, Smith's idea of what constitutes a symphony differs from the norm. While each of the pieces contains movements, the music isn't notated as it would be in a classical score. Written parts function as structural and directional guidelines that are built upon by the musicians, and improvisation, responsiveness, and personal expression are central to the collective undertaking. The performances often unfold at a relaxed tempo tailor-made for the ponderous, exploratory approach Smith favours; at other times, however, the pace accelerates and the four interact with aggressive purpose. Regardless of such changes, DeJohnette and Lindberg provide a flexible, ever-evolving, and inventive base for Smith and Threadgill to emote against, resulting in music that advances with a natural assurance and ebb-and-flow.

The bassist impresses throughout for his precision and authoritative presence, while the drummer enriches the performances by complementing his kit with percussive colourations. He often, for instance, elaborately ornaments the others' playing with cymbal rolls and splashes; it's not uncommon either for him to stray from strict time-keeping yet still expertly maintain the music's pulse (e.g., the fourth symphony's “The Visionaries, Abraham Lincoln and Barack Hussein Obama”). On muted and open horn, the ever-resourceful Smith is in strong, robust voice throughout; hear him tear through the blustery “For Alto; In the Orchestra: N-M488; Anthony Braxton: Operas” movement in the Pearl Symphony like some torrential Chicago wind and then wax philosophical during the subsequent “Leroy Jenkins Mixed Quintet Sonics: Dance Opera.” With his instantly identifiable alto tone, Threadgill shows himself to be an excellent sparring partner whose flute and sax playing, not surprisingly, recalls his own Air period when Smith sits out and the group temporarily becomes a trio.

The evidence at hand indicates track titles weren't arbitrarily determined. In the Gold Symphony, for example, the second movement, “Joyful, Sound and the Numbers; People: The Art Ensemble of Chicago,” does, in fact, call to mind the driving pulse the AEC would get up to when Famoudou Don Moye and Malachi Favours were at the helm, and while no one would mistake Smith for Lester Bowie, his attack exudes the exuberance and brashness of his late counterpart. The opening movement of the Diamond Symphony is titled “The Rare Air Songs In Sonic Forms and Metrical Folding: Henry Threadgill, Steve McCall and Fred Hopkins,” and here too the fluid interactions between flute, bass, and drums evoke the telepathy the Air members shared (there are even moments where the music could be mistaken for Bowie sitting in with Threadgill's trio). The drummer's similarly acknowledged in in the title of the symphony's fourth movement, “Jack DeJohnette: A Special Edition, New Directions and the Sonic Rhythm Units,” the track elevated by Smith's powerful declamations and a slippery, fleet-footed statement from Threadgill on alto.

The fourth disc's Sapphire Symphony distances itself from the others in featuring New York saxophonist Haffner and also in dedicating its five movements to Lincoln, the sixteenth President of the United States of America, and Obama, the forty-fourth. Smith's reason is simple: “If their ideas didn't happen, we'd be in worse shape than we are in now.” In the second movement, “Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg: Two Seven Two, 1863 Movement,” a palpable sense of urgency is conveyed by repeating five-note figures Lindberg uses to animate a performance enlivened by Haffner's buoyant solo. Obama's honoured in three movements, the penultimate one inspired by his appearance at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama on March 7th, 2015 and crowned by scorching runs from Smith and deft rejoinders by Haffner. And lest anyone think the energy level might be depleted by the project's end, the blistering “Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th President of the United States of America” takes it out on a roar.

Though Smith's collaboration with Iyer and DeJohnette is overshadowed by the magnitude and conceptual scope of the Great Lakes Quartet set, A Love Sonnet for Billie Holiday is no mere footnote. There's much to recommend the release beyond the fact that it documents the three performing together for the first time. The pianist and drummer have both played with Smith before in different lineups of the Golden Quartet, but never before have the two recorded with the trumpeter at the same time. That Iyer and DeJohnette haven't played together before is itself surprising, given the substantial histories each has amassed.

Another key aspect of the release, recorded on November 22nd, 2016, is that compositions come from all three, not Smith alone. Whereas he's credited with the title track and one other, his partners contribute a track apiece, and the album concludes with one credited to all three. As the album title indicates, the project also perpetuates Smith's penchant for titling pieces after iconic figures, with Holiday and Anthony Davis receiving nods this time around. Two other details are worth noting: first, that Iyer supplements acoustic piano with Fender Rhodes, Hammond B-3, and electronics, which helps distinguish the recording; and, second, that the absence of a bassist encourages an even more liberated approach to playing by the three.

As evidenced by the extended drum intro to “Billie Holiday: A Love Sonnet,” the relaxed, explorative feel that permeates much of The Chicago Symphonies informs the playing on the single-disc release too. Smith doesn't directly quote a Holiday vocal melody or associated classic in fashioning a tribute to the singer; instead, he invokes her spirit through his approach to phrasing, use of space and silence, and in the music's general lamenting tone; Holiday's thus alluded to rather than referenced literally. Smith's playing is as strong and vibrant as it is on the box set, and his responsive partners complement his lead with their own sympathetic expressions. Smith's other composition, “The A.D. Opera: A Long Vision with Imagination, Creativity and Fire, a dance opera (For Anthony Davis),” stretches out for an eighteen-minute trek that alternates between bluesy and contemplative passages to ones more furious and tumultuous.

In introducing “Deep Time No.1” with Fender Rhodes and an excerpt of Malcolm X from his “By Any Means Necessary” speech, Iyer's piece immediately distances itself from the opener. While electronic treatments add a trippy, dreamlike quality to the piece, muted trumpet, cymbal showers, and rippling electric piano imbue the playing with a drifting, meditative character that at certain moments recalls In A Silent Way. Speaking of Miles, the closing “Rocket,” which the trio created collectively in the studio and which pairs blowing by Smith with organ and a skipping drum pulse, could pass for a newly discovered run-through from the He Loved Him Madly or On the Corner sessions. “Song for World Forgiveness,” an ecstatically rising plea for peace by the drummer that's appeared on earlier recordings in different arrangements, receives a memorable treatment by the trio, with the heights scaled by Smith's plaintive horn ably supported by Iyer's rippling backdrop and powerful accompaniment by the composer.

January 2022