JAZZ ALBUM REVIEWS IN THE AUSTRALIAN
In September, 2017 Eric Myers commenced reviewing jazz albums in the Review supplement of The Weekend Australian. All reviews in this folder are written by Myers.
JAZZ
THE BACH PROJECT
MICHELLE NICOLLE
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Earshift Music
Five stars
Published in the Weekend Australian, August 26, 2023
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If there’s such a phenomenon as the perfect jazz singer, Michelle Nicolle is far and away my choice. She has beautiful sound quality in all registers, a faultless vibrato and, in the difficult art of scat singing, only the brilliant artists Kristin Berardi and Sharny Russell, in the Australian context, come close to her. This album, a jazz treatment of various J S Bach pieces, is one in which to luxuriate. Her brilliant trio, well-recorded here — Geoff Hughes (guitar), Tom Lee (double bass) and Ronny Ferella (drums) — has never sounded better. Along the way, Nicolle provides definitive versions of two classic standards, Horace Silver’s Lonely Woman and Monk’s Round Midnight, plus a version of Bach’s March in D Major, which serves as a tribute to Ornette Coleman. Deprived of product, it has taken me too long to fully appreciate the artistry of this wonderful Melbourne-based singer, originally from Adelaide. I’m glad to say that, courtesy of this great album, the penny has finally dropped.
Eric Myers
JAZZ
HEARING
MIKE NOCK
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ABC Jazz
Four-and-a-half stars
Published in the Weekend Australian, September 2, 2023
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This is the legendary Mike Nock’s first solo piano album since 1993, when he recorded his album Touch in the ABC’s Eugene Goossens Hall. Thirty years later, Hearing was recorded in the same venue, producing an album that provides valuable insights into Nock’s exquisite pianism. The mood is overwhelmingly elegiac. While most of the album’s 13 tracks are brief, its highlights are four tracks where Nock stretches out for more than six minutes apiece. They include Vale John, a tribute to drummer John Pochée, who died shortly before this recording session took place, and the lovely Bernie McGann composition Spirit Song, a reminder that Pochée and McGann were the first two Australian jazz musicians that 18-year-old Nock met when he arrived from New Zealand in 1958. Spirit Song, now a much-recorded classic, gets a most sensitive and affectionate reading — as does Jonathan Zwartz’s And In The Night Comes Rain, wherein Nock demonstrates his great ability to maximise the beauty inherent in another composer’s set of chord changes.
Eric Myers
JAZZ
DELVE
UNDERWARDS
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Earshift Music
Four stars
Published in the Weekend Australian, September 16, 2023
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This unusual album features ten interesting compositions from Sydney’s Ellen Kirkwood, inspired by the ways in which humans experience nature. Her explanatory notes, available on Bandcamp, are detailed and fascinating. Other than Kirkwood (trumpet, voice, percussion), Underwards includes Hilary Geddes (guitar, effects), Nick Henderson (bass, synthesizers) and Adam Inman-Hislop (drums, percussion). Inspired by night skies, waterways, mountains et al, Kirkwood says her music manifests her current efforts towards a greater understanding of Indigenous connections to Country. Six tracks refer to the Capertee Valley, where in 1830 Dabee clan members were massacred by European settler troops. Percussive or synthesizer figures are utilised, in order to suggest natural sounds, and Kirkwood is not averse to modifying her lovely, rounded tone on trumpet to create sound effects. Frequently those effects morph into extremely authoritative trumpet solos. Other notable features of Delve are Kirkwood’s wordless vocals, doubling composed lines, and the remarkable playing of Geddes, whose guitar solos can move seamlessly from restraint into blazing high energy.
Eric Myers