ANNE METTE
IVERSEN’S TER-
NION QUARTET
Invincible Nimbus
Brooklyn Jazz Underground
Though she has a longstanding rela-
tionship with the Brooklyn Jazz Un-
derground Ensemble and its imprint,
Danish bassist Anne Mette Iversen has
resided in Berlin since 2012. For Invin-
cible Nimbus, the second album by her
Ternion Quartet, Iversen incorporated
concepts from fugues, Olivier Messi-
aen, and theorist Nicolas Slonimsky
into an improvisational setting. The
results are delivered by a rare blend
of trombone (Geoffroy De Masure)
and alto saxophone (Silke Eberhard),
together with the leader’s bass and
Roland Schneider’s drums.
Both the sound and musical interac-
tion of the Ternion Quartet evoke two
other famous pianoless quartets, those
of Ornette Coleman and Gerry Mulli-
gan. Iversen’s compositions feature rich
counterpoint between the horns, with
the bassist often adding a third voice to
a theme, as in Mulligan’s early record-
ings. The occasional stop-start melodies
are reminiscent of Coleman’s early
work. Eberhard and De Masure play
with an enthusiasm that often recalls
Don Cherry and Coleman. It doesn’t
hurt that Iversen lays down some solid
double-stop grooves too.
But these passing references are
overshadowed by Iversen’s own musical
inventions. The horns state the theme of
“Polychromatic Pictures” out of tempo,
ending phrases with some upper-regis-
ter wails. Instead of keeping it free, De
Masure delivers a rhythmically complex
solo over a steady 6/8 groove; Eberhard
follows, stretching out while the band re-
shapes the background. “Dig Your Heels
In” is built on an uneven meter, which the
horns handle with ease, while “Within a
Diapason” shows they can play it relative-
ly straight. The album also includes brief
tracks titled “Ghost Word” and num-
bered one through three. Consisting of
themes with no improvisation, they range
from 20 seconds to two minutes, serving
as thoughtful interludes between the
longer tracks and adding to the strength
of the whole set. MIKE SHANLEY
YOKO MIWA TRIO
Keep Talkin’
Ocean Blue TearThe hard thing about Yoko Miwa is
that she makes it sound so easy. It isn’t
just that the Boston-based pianist, a
longtime instructor at Berklee, keeps her
harmony elegantly consonant and her
improvised lines tunefully logical; she
also plays with such a big, classically in-
formed sound that even the rough bits in
her music, like the dense, bluesy chords
in her version of Mingus’ “Boogie Stop
Shuffle,” somehow sound ... pretty.
Not that there’s anything wrong with
pretty, but it’s not a quality that the jazz
intelligentsia much values. However, as
Keep Talkin’ makes plain, beauty doesn’t
necessarily mean blandness. Yes, she
makes the most of the melodies in this
album’s Beatles cover (“Golden Slum-
bers/You Never Give Me Your Money”),
but she also makes those melodies feel
convincingly like jazz, a feat too few
improvisers manage.
Likewise, her take on “In Walked
Bud” has a lot going on beneath its
deceptively smooth surface. The chord
hits she drops behind bassist Will
Slater’s statement of the melody make
for a great arrangement, but they also
subtly but cleverly expand on Monk’s
harmonic concepts, just as the left-
hand accents in her solo evoke the
stride roots of Monk’s playing without
being imitative. It’s really inventive,
and deploys a jaw-dropping degree
of technique without ever coming
off as showy. Should we complain
b e c a u s e i t ’ s a l s o v e r y e a s y o n t h e e a r s?
J.D. CONSIDINEFRED HERSCH &
THE WDR BIG
BAND
Begin Again
PalmettoIt’s tempting to assume that the subtlety
and nuance of pianist Fred Hersch’s Be-
gin Again stem from the arrangements
by Vince Mendoza and performances
by German accompanists the WDR Big
Band. Both are, after all, Grammy win-
ners. But while the orchestrations and
conducting of Mendoza and playing
by the ensemble are vital, it’s Hersch’s
unique use of space, and pace, that
most fuel the disc.
If you were to listen without knowing
about it beforehand, you’d probably
never guess which musician was the
bandleader. Such is Hersch’s unique cap-
taincy amid a sea of jazz pianists since
starting his solo recording career more
than 35 years ago (making the fact that
he’s been nominated for 14 Grammys,
but never won, more of a curiosity).
Begin Again mostly features reworkings
from Hersch’s existing catalog, but the
opening title track is the fresh excep-
tion. The pianist doesn’t solo until after
alto saxophonist Johan Horlen, instead
punctuating the lush harmonies of the
13 horn players and accenting the shift-
ing meters of bassist John Goldsby and
drummer Hans Dekker.
“Havana,” from Hersch’s 2012 trio
release Alive at the Vanguard, features a
jubilant reworking by Mendoza that in-
cludes a rousing solo by tenor saxophon-
ist Paul Heller. Other highlights include
the eerie-yet-beautiful “Out Someplace
(Blues for Matthew Shepard),” which
instrumentally imagines the final hours
of the man whose 1998 murder in Wy-
oming helped lead to groundbreaking
hate-crime legislation, and the percolat-
ing “Forward Motion,” which spotlights
trumpeter Ruud Breuls and trombonist
Andy Hunter. The album’s closer, “The
Orb”—from Hersch’s otherworldly 2011
DVD My Coma Dreams—offers a slice
of the pianist’s recollections from a two-
month-long coma caused by pneumonia,
and recovery with the help of his tireless
domestic partner Scott Morgan, at the
point where Hersch’s life truly did begin
again. BILL MEREDITH