My September started running into this beautiful, acoustic piece by Aaron Percy, titled In Your Circle. I did not know the author before, and I stepped into this song through one of the musicians involved, the great Seth Tackaberry (here I talked about his work with Cory Wong, among the others). In Your Circle takes a short, intimate glimpse into a complicated relationship, taking advantage of the solid groove provided by Tackaberry (on what it seems to me an upright bass, but in any case it’s something magnificently played, as typically happens with Tackaberry) and by Jordan Rose on drums. Percy plays the acoustic guitar and sings, together with Judah Mayowa, that creates beautiful harmonization on the refrains. In Your Circle is a small gem of a delicate, elegant kind of indie-pop, with lots of autumn vibes, beautifully written and played by a bunch of talented musician. Go and take a listen!
If you are a frequent reader of these pages, you will surely remember how long (and how well) I talked about Lizzy McAlpine and her second, beautiful album, Five Seconds Flat (published on April this year). In the last few weeks, McAlpine started sharing a series of interesting videos on YouTube containing acoustic version of some of the songs included in Five Seconds Flat, and particularly Ceilings, Firearm, Called You Again and Hate to be lame. This last one, performed with the co-author FINNEAS, offers a valid example of how good these songs sound even in their simplest (I would dare to say “poorest”, but it could be misleading) and most minimalist version, a clear indication of how goodly they have been written. You should check all these acoustic videos, but in the meanwhile below you can find the video for Hate to be lame, in my opinion one of the better tracks in the album, so emotionally involving, so pregnant, and featuring an absolutely stunning interplay between the two voices. Have I already said how much I love McAlpine’s voice? Probably not in this short review, but now you know (in case it was not clear).
While October 26 is approaching (on that date her first EP, Infinity, will be published via the English label Young Poets), on September 21 the London based jazz pianist-singer Hohnen Ford dropped her third single, Close To Your Heart. If you followed these monthly Round-Ups on the last couple of months you will know almost everything about Ella’s work: it has rarely happened to me to hear such a powerful and evocative voice in recent years, moreover in an artist with such a marked expressiveness also from an instrumental point of view (she is a fantastic pianist). But when it comes to songwriting, you immediately feels that Hohnen Ford is different from all the others: Close To Your Heart, just like the songs that preceded it, has a distinctive jazzy feel, a beautiful chord sequence and Ella’s voice delicately glides on the piano while the lyrics explores the emotional intricacies of relationships. In Hohnen Ford’s own words, Close To Your Heart is about rekindling love for your person. Daring yourself to love like it’s day one, and acknowledging bad habits. Taking responsibility for your own emotions and being able to laugh at yourself – step outside the emotion in that moment to stop yourself from bickering or causing a fight and remembering why you love that person. I wrote it to remind myself to make sure the hassle and stresses of day-to-day life don’t get in the way of my relationships. Step by step, we are listening to all the songs that will make up the Infinity EP, and every time I have the distinct and strong feeling of being in front of an astonishing artist, who has what I believe and hope is a bright future ahead of her.
To conclude this September Round Up, Snarky Puppy released Belmont on 09/09, three weeks before the publication of their album Empire Central, out on 28/09 for GroundUp Music. Along Belmont, the fusion ensemble led by Michael League collects a series of ideas that come directly from their leader’s childhood: right from the title, Belmont pays homage to the city of Dallas, where League grew up and started playing music. Belmont was in fact the name of the street where League and his family lived, just a few blocks away from Gezellig bar, where the Bernard Wright Trio played every monday night and all the artists and musician of the city met. Bernard Wright was in fact one of the musician involved in the making of this Snarky Puppy album, which will also remain his latest studio performance, since the legendary ’80s funk pioneer passed away at age 58 shortly after the Empire Central recording sessions took place (more precisely, he died on May 19 this year). Belmont draws on this somewhat nostalgic background and features the stanza structure of a ballad tied together with a subtle, underlying flamenco rhythm: the solid groove provided by League carves the background created by the intertwining of the keyboards (Justin Stanton, Bobby Sparks, Bill Laurance and Shaun Martin), and the sparse interventions of guitars and winds sections do the rest. Furthermore, Belmont is literally cut in half by a mesmerizing violin solo by Zack Brock. Built on a subtle and refined sense of nostalgia, Belmont is a great introduction to an album that promises to be much more funky and groovy than the last ones licensed by the American ensemble.
Following a recent tradition, also this post borrows its title from the lines of a poem. The poem is The beautiful changes by Richard Wilbur (1921-2017), one of the greatest American poets of the last century (as well as second poet laureate of the United States, succeeding Robert Penn Warren). You can find the poem just a click away from here or, if you prefer to stay, just scrolling down on this page.
The Beautiful Changes
One wading a Fall meadow finds on all sides
The Queen Anne’s Lace lying like lilies
On water; it glides
So from the walker, it turns
Dry grass to a lake, as the slightest shade of you
Valleys my mind in fabulous blue Lucernes.The beautiful changes as a forest is changed
By a chameleon’s tuning his skin to it;
As a mantis, arranged
On a green leaf, grows
Into it, makes the leaf leafier, and proves
Any greenness is deeper than anyone knows.Your hands hold roses always in a way that says
They are not only yours; the beautiful changes
In such kind ways,
Wishing ever to sunder
Things and things’ selves for a second finding, to lose
For a moment all that it touches back to wonder.