Vignettes

After three exceptional trio albums – “Nothing ever was, anyway”, “Amaryllis”, and “Storyteller” –, a poetic, powerful, luminous solo album from pianist Marilyn Crispell. Increasingly Crispell is proving that tenderness and strength can be compatible characteristics, rather than opposites, in improvisation. Cecil Taylor long ago predicted that Marilyn would “spearhead a new kind of lyricism in jazz”, and she is defining it here, on the modestly- titled “Vignettes”.

“I wanted this to be a recording that was thoroughly authentic in feeling,” Crispell says. “Very pared down, with nothing superfluous in it, and at the same time music that was from the heart. And that’s easily said but not so easily done: even in improvisation a lot of activity in the music can simply happen out of fast, nervous energy. I wanted instead focussed energy, where every note and sound and silence has some purpose. Well, here’s an analogy: I was recently reading a book about Chinese five-element acupuncture theory, which suggested that in times of chaos and transition you shouldn’t try and force change, but rather get to a quiet place where you can allow transformation to manifest itself. A lot of my experience with ECM has been like that, allowing a musical direction to emerge rather than artificially forcing it.”

The directions that emerge on “Vignettes” bring Crispell to many different places and by several means. Free improvisation here has the rigour of composition, but pre-composed and partly-composed material also has its place. “Valse Triste” for instance is a piece written during a residency at the Centre Dürrenmatt in Neuchâtel. “Axis” and “Ballade” are themes that have long figured in Crispell’s concerts, integrated in improvisation. “Cuida Tu Espíritu” (Take Care of Your Spirit), is a piece written by flutist Jayna Nelson a friend and neighbour in Woodstock. Arve Henriksen’s composition “Stilleweg” is a piece that Marilyn first encountered in a group led by Danish saxophonist Lotte Anker. She has spoken often in interviews of her temperamental closeness to the Scandinavian musicians. One of her tunes here is titled, after the fact, “Sweden”. She spoke about her connections to North European music in the book “Horizons Touched” (Granta 2007).

“In 1992 I went to Scandinavia for the first time, to play in a Stockholm festival called ‘Solo 92’. Also there was the bass player Anders Jormin. All along, in the context of my solo music, I’d also been playing various ballads, though the primary focus of my music was energy and intensity. When I heard Anders, his playing touched a chord in me that resonated strongly. It would be two years before I’d have the chance to work with him, but in that moment, the seed of change was sown. Thanks to my friend Lennart Nilsson in Sweden, I was able to hear many recordings of Scandinavian folk and jazz musicians (my favourite singer was Lena Willemark). I loved the way the Scandinavian jazz players used elements of their own folk music in their improvisations, and loved their aesthetic of space, beauty and tenderness. Somehow, this was the missing element in my own music, and by absorbing it, I felt that my music was becoming more whole – not changing so much as expanding, to include more of everything that I felt and wanted to express.”