Short Reviews [Janel Leppin - 2024 - "Ensemble Volcanic Ash. To March Is To Love"]

As well as releasing a new album with her partner Anthony Pirog, Janel Leppin has also found time to record a new Ensemble Volcanic Ash album which was recorded live in the studio. She provides cello and piano, while Anthony is on guitar, and they were joined by Sarah Hughes and Brian Settles (Jason Moran, Chad Taylor) on saxophones, Larry Ferguson on drums, and Luke Stewart (Irreversible Entanglements, David Murray) on bass. Obviously scored as opposed to fully improvised, this is described by the label as being progressive chamber jazz with the steely avant-garde that descends from Julius Hemphill's 1972 debut album, "Dogon A.D.". That landmark recording featured one of Janel’s major influences, the late cellist Abdul Wadud, and she honours him on the first track of this release with "Ode to Abdul Wadud". She actually bookends this album with a nod to her other great cello influence, Pablo Casals ("Casals' Rainbow"), while she also pays direct homage to Hemphill with the track "As Wide as All Outdoors" as this was inspired by one of his quotes, "Jazz is as wide as all outdoors." In many ways it is difficult to equate this Janel Leppin, tearing her cello to pieces, with the person who sings so gently backed with pop synths on the second half of "New Moon In The Evil Age", as they are operating in totally different musical universes, let alone worlds. Here we have a group of musicians taking on the world and creating RIO/jazz which is somehow both commercial and experimental at the same time, taking us on a journey to where we know not, but very happy indeed to be included on the ride. Anthony often takes a back seat to everyone else, with the twin saxes vying with Janel for dominance and her combination with the bass of Luke often provides a very heavy bottom end, although it is not unusual for Luke to also go off on a melodic tangent. One of the joys of this is the way we get repeated themes, especially on songs like "Union Art", which then allows the soloists to go off and have some fun, yet there is still plenty of space within the arrangement so it never feels to dense but is controlled with lightness even when it all goes over the top. Of the two recent releases featuring Janel and Anthony this is undoubtedly my favourite, but both are very worthy indeed of further investigation.