Inventive guitarist Rez Abbasi takes the pulse of the modern guitar trio on his ninth album, Continuous Beat. Embracing
the use of electronics and effects to broaden his sonic palette to a
much further extent than he ever has in the past, Abbasi evolves the
scope and range of possibilities of the traditional guitar/bass/drums
format far beyond its apparent limitations.
“People
often think of the jazz guitar trio and relate it to all things
historical,” Abbasi says. “That's not to say that the Jim Hall trio
records aren’t some of my favorite albums of all time. But it’s 2012 now
and we've heard a lot of purely ‘warm’ guitar trio albums. I wanted to
stimulate the listener’s aural perception throughout the album - to give
them a sense of textural surprise from start to finish that embodies
both that warmth and the desire to push away from the commonplace.”
The occasion for Abbasi’s first ever trio release was his discovery of the very special chemistry between himself, bassist John Hebert, and drummer Satoshi Takeishi. He has known and played with
both for over fifteen years, but their uniting as a trio was a
fortunate accident brought about by unfortunate circumstances.
In
late 2011, Abbasi was looking forward to performing for the first time
with one of his musical heroes, the legendary drummer Paul Motian. He
had composed a number of new pieces for the date, which was to be a trio
with Hebert. Unfortunately, a week before the gig Motian was forced to
cancel due to the health issues that would lead to his passing last
November.
Instead
of canceling the date altogether, however, Abbasi tapped Takeishi to
step in, knowing the Japanese-born drummer’s openness would mesh well
with pieces composed with Motian in mind. “I knew Paul's playing
intimately from recordings and seeing him live multiple times,” Abbasi
says. “I felt this was a good opportunity to write a few tunes with his
character in mind, the operative description being ‘complexity within
simplicity.’ In other words, music that was comfortable enough to play
without a rehearsal, yet stimulating enough to create an interactive
trio sound. That seems to encapsulate his aesthetic.”
Two of those pieces feature on Continuous Beat, whose
title acknowledges the “immortality of great artists” like Motian,
Abbasi explains. With Motian’s death, the album became something of a
loose tribute and includes pieces from two composers associated with the
drummer: Gary Peacock’s “Major Major” and Keith Jarrett’s “The Cure.”
The trio also offers an evanescent arrangement of Thelonious Monk’s “Off
Minor,” a Motian favorite.
“Paul's
life galvanized this project,” Abbasi says, “but then it went further
from there.” The disc begins with the solo “Intro,” which offers a key
to the album’s transformation of Abbasi’s approach. The piece is based
on an Indian raga that the Pakistani-born guitarist has played often,
but by using a reverse delay the material is mutated into something alien and unpredictable that Abbasi can play against, almost a duo with himself.
That
piece is bookended with Abbasi’s warm yet melancholy solo rendition of
the “Star Spangled Banner,” which closes the CD. “Recording that was
kind of cathartic in the sense that being an American at this point in
history can be confusing, especially when you were born in Pakistan,” he
says. “The question of ‘what it means’ arises given the climate of
terrorism, the state of the union, the economy, immigration, et cetera.
So I essentially tried to put the beauty back into my faith, although
I'm not a ‘patriotic’ type at all. The melody has so much energy behind
it that it simply felt right to do a modern day version with modern
harmony.”
Another
meaning behind the album’s title came out of the fact that at the same
time that Abbasi was mixing the session, his mother-in-law was
undergoing triple bypass surgery. Alternating between the ER and the
studio “was strange and emphasized the vitality of the heart,” he says.
That vital heartbeat is evident in the trio’s interactions as soon as
they appear on “Divided Attention” and is maintained throughout Continuous Beat.
Both
“Rivalry” and “iTexture” were written with Motian in mind, the latter
also being a tribute to Apple founder Steve Jobs following his death.
“Back Skin” is a piece built on an Indian form that Abbasi has explored
in different fashion in saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa’s Indo-Pak
Coalition.
In
projects like that trio and throughout his own work, Abbasi continually
explores the conjunction between jazz and South Asian music. The
guitarist moved to the US from Karachi, Pakistan at the age of four and
went on to study at the University of Southern California and the
Manhattan School of Music. He studied Indian music with a disciple of
Ravi Shankar and performed and recorded with jazz greats including Billy
Hart, Dave Douglas, Marilyn Crispell and Greg Osby. His own music has
fused those two sounds in intriguing and surprising ways throughout his
nine releases.
Most
important on this latest album for Abbasi was the chance to reconnect
in such an intimate fashion with two longtime collaborators. “We've
always had a connection,” he says of his triomates, “partly due to the
way we interact as humans, partly due to what our vision of what music
can be, and partly due to our unspoken telepathy. As jazz musicians we
tend to move forward and make new relationships but there also comes a
time to look back at some of our more meaningful relationships.”
Release Date: October 9, 2012
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