For the last two months I’ve been listening to albums from Seattle musicians that I selfishly have put off writing about because then you’d know, too. I don’t what it is about the discovery of music that turns us all into Gollums, but the first step is to admit the problem. The second is to start typing.
These albums are from Seattle’s “other” music scene (i.e., not on Sub Pop)–their artists may or may not sport beards, but the main thing is they’re not alternative rock. Seattle is filled with small music groups that fill a niche, whether it’s jazz, choral, or chamber music, or hybridizations thereof. You used to have to track them down on rare live appearances, but thanks to advances in recording technology (and technological affordability), they’re turning out all kinds of music on CDs and online.
Thanks to the internet, these groups can be more indie than indie: Zubatto Syndicate’s CD was funded by Kickstarter. They can also be more esoteric than even the most esoteric record store could hope to shelve. The Esoterics choir has 12 CDs out, from their latest collection of Samuel Barber’s choral works to collections inspired by sonnets, Islam, and the mandala. And the Jason Parker Quartet surprised everyone by turning Nick Drake into “Endlessly listenable, accessible, genius jazz,” raved The Examiner.com. Not satisfied with that Spekulation mashed up Parker’s take with Jay-Z.
Since Jason Parker very occasionally writes about jazz here, I’ll just point you to that Examiner review. But Zubatto Syndicate and The Esoterics are fair game.
A 12-piece ensemble led by composer and guitarist Andrew Boscardin, Zubatto Syndicate resists classification by pulling in rock, hip-hop, funk, soul and Brazilian music and hitting Frappé on the blender. You still get the impact of Big Band jazz, but phrases jump you like a cougar from the brush–you did not see that coming.
“The fusing together of disparate sounds and ideas–pop and jazz, combining orchestral winds with electric sounds, the new and the traditional,” writes Boscardin, “is a central theme for the band.” He found his objective correlate in vintage science fiction art (the CD cover art is by science-fiction artist Franco Brambilla), loving the tension between an art caught between the future and its own history.
It’s impossible not to unbutton your shirt when you hear the Brazilian samba swagger through “Saturn 9,” or strut to the bluesy “The Trouble With Earth Women,” but my favorite on the disc is “A Brief History of Time,” where Boscardin buries a muscular hip-hop groove under woodwind and synthesizer and lets it dig its way out. Listen to the whole album online. Or stop by the legendary Blue Moon on June 11th for a live performance (9 p.m., $5 cover, 21+).
Eric Banks’ choir The Esoterics is probably the most adventuresome vocal group Seattle has to offer, but the group’s recording of Samuel Barber’s choral works is also a labor of love: It was recorded for Barber’s centenary, at Seattle’s Holy Rosary Catholic Church. (It’s the first recording to bring together his setting of Hopkin’s “God’s grandeur” and “Motetto on Words from the Book of Job,” which, Banks says, Barber had intended to be performed as a single cycle.)
Barber didn’t write that much for chorus, so his output in that vein fits neatly onto a single disc, though the works, from across the span of his composing career, should dispel the myth that Barber would have been happier being born in 1850. From the evidence here, he could have managed centuries earlier, for one thing: “The Monk and His Cat” from the Hermit Songs, contrasts vividly with “The Virgin Martyrs.”
If you’re a fan of his Adagio for strings, you will likely swoon too over his soaring “Agnus Dei”–I try to stop myself from getting sucked in, but fail each time. For three choral works usually sung with accompaniment (“Easter chorale,” “A stopwatch and an ordnance map,” and “Sure on this shining night”), Banks had the ensemble sing the instrumental parts (for brass, timpani and piano) as well as the choral parts.
“Chorus member” is not a high-paying gig, you may be interested to know, or even a paying gig at all, and these are not easy works, but Banks leads his dedicated singers well. He has a fondness, I think, for innovative voices as well–even en masse, his Esoterics maintain a uniquely identifiable sound.
