Nineteenth-century
philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson called art an "expression of nature."
Guitarist Scott DuBois' Winter Light transports the listener on a day's journey
from earliest dawn into deepest night, illustrating the day's changing light
through varied landscapes and weather conditions. He has loved representations
of this evolution in visual art, especially in the paintings of Claude Monet,
who often worked on several canvases at once in order to track the day's
shifting light. Winter Light captures such visions in sound.
"First
Light Tundra" opens with the earliest glimpse of light over a cold,
desolate landscape as birds awake, call, and fly off into the distance. In a
battle between darkness and light, fierce crashing winds obscure the
approaching sunrise with flying snow. The sun triumphs in the end.
"Early
Morning Forest" introduces a stately pine forest soon pierced by rays of
light dazzling snow-filled branches and the white forest floor. Animals call
one another to enter the mass of trees. Deeper in the forest, in the darker
thick brush, an ominous cold mist fills the air. The animals call again after
slowly emerging from the forest into the warmth of the unobstructed morning
sun. "Late Morning Snow" conveys the elegance and peaceful nature of
light on newly fallen snow. A progressively cold stinging wind rises.
"Noon
White Mountain" begins with the day's most powerful light on majestic
snow-capped mountains. They are slowly overtaken by dark clouds. A distant
storm transforms into a passing gentle freezing rain. Then bright noon light
returns. "Afternoon Ice Fog" evokes mysterious light reflections from
the tiny ice crystals suspended in the air. In "Evening Blizzard" the
light is shrouded by the intensity of a snowstorm while peace and tranquility
return in "Night Tundra" where moonlit snow glows in the darkness.
The New York
City Jazz Record has described DuBois' writing as "captivating music for
the meditative thinker." This telling expression goes quite some way
towards unlocking its essence, since the guitarist composes in an associative
way, through pictures. Indeed, Winter Light, which marks his debut as an artist
on the ACT label, has a strongly programmatic concept running right through it.
The listener is taken on a journey through a winter's day. As we witness the
progression from before daybreak right through to the depths of night, DuBois
draws the listener in with sounds vividly portraying myriad shifts in the
balance of light, leading us through different landscapes, and even making us
feel the ever-changing patterns of the weather.
The
guitarist's first five albums have received major critical acclaim. Black Hawk
Dance earned the maximum 5-star rating from DownBeat Magazine. His next album,
Landscape Scripture, was one of the "Top Ten Jazz Albums of 2012" as
selected by the highly influential coast-to-coast American network, National
Public Radio.
Scott
DuBois, the 37-year old American jazz guitarist and composer, is one of the
most important figures on the young New York jazz scene. The New York Times has
praised the way that DuBois "has begun to make waves" with his
"exploratory yet melodic sensibilities, serious compositional
ambitions," and "cohesive looseness against complex subtleties."
DuBois
studied at the Manhattan School of Music. He made his first mark alongside
saxophonist David Liebman, who appeared on DuBois' albums for the Soul Note
record label, Monsoon (2005) and Tempest (2007). DuBois' quartet, with whom he has now been
working for the past decade, consists of some of the world's most in-demand
improvising musicians: German saxophonist and bass clarinetist Gebhard Ullmann,
American bassist Thomas Morgan, and Danish drummer Kresten Osgood. This regular
working band performs DuBois' masterfully-crafted original compositions which
point to future trends. DuBois presents these powerful works with dynamic group
improvisation and interaction, creating massive, colorful landscapes and a
spiritual intensity that cuts straight to the heart.
Scott DuBois
· Winter Light
ACT Music
· Release Date: November 6,
2015
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