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| Michaël Attias' Renku Coming Aug. 30th on Playscape On August 30th, Playscape Recordings will release Renku, the debut recording from New York-based saxophonist/composer Michaël Attias' two-year old working trio of the same name, featuring bassist John Hebert and drummer Satoshi Takeishi. Named after a style of Japanese linked poetry, this trio documents an intense but intricate and diversely cultivated sound befitting both its name and the eclectic background of its leader, an Israeli-born son of Moroccan parents who was raised in Paris and the American midwest. Renku features seven Attias compositions, as well as selections by Hebert, collectively composed works by the trio and Thelonious Monk's "Work, " though the group prides itself on blurring the lines between notated music and improvisation. The trio will celebrate the release of their debut recording at Cornelia Street Cafe in New York on September 2nd. "Like the best of his peers, " writes Brooklyn-based journalist/author Steve Dollar in the liner notes, "Attias projects the sound of a man busy thinking. He exposes the process by which that sound is organized into music, using his breath to illustrate a kinetic sonic architecture of bone and pulse, concept and rhythm, thought and execution...[Renku] is all about that exposure. Evoking the spare angularity that prime reedsmen have always found in the trio—the pleasures of Ornette Coleman's classic 1960s three-for-all come to mind, as do the gimlet-eyed rigors of Tim Berne's latter-day outfit Paraphrase—Attias is mindful of composerly trigonometry. He senses how the strengths and signatures of each musician define a coherent structure, and how that structure must constantly shift and circle to the bob and bustle of bass and drums." Critics write that Attias "blows with great authority and passion" (AllAboutJazz.com), recognizing his trio's "knottily vibrant compositions" (Time Out-New York) and "perpetually shifting tunes, richness of timbre, and a singular personality" (Village Voice). A former student of Pat Moriarty, Lee Konitz, Alan Silva, and Anthony Braxton, Attias has performed around the world with musicians including Braxton, Anthony Coleman, Mark Helias, Jim Pugliese, Nasheet Waits, Matt Wilson, Mat Maneri, Ellery Eskelin, and Tom Rainey. After beginning his professional career in Paris, he has spent the last decade living in New York working as a sideman, leading/co-leading Shuffle Boil and the Michaël Attias Sextet, and composing scores for theater, dance and silent film. His compositions can also be heard on recordings such as Coleman's Morenica (Tzadik) and Fred Lonberg-Holm's In Zenith (Miguel). Attias is a 2000 Artists' Fellowship Recipient of the New York Foundation for the Arts, a founding member of Dangerous Ground Productions, and curator of the weekly Night of the Ravished Limbs concert series at Barbés in Brooklyn. write your comments about the article :: © 2005 Jazz News :: home page |