A protean
musical force who reveals new sonic realms with each project, Jeff Denson
decided to see what it sounds like when his worlds collide. The bassist,
composer, professor and bandleader has produced an array of astonishing music
since settling in the San Francisco Bay Area. He's explored intricate harmonic
soundscapes in Electreo with drummer Alan Hall and bassoon and electronics
virtuoso Paul Hanson, and reached his widest audience collaborating with the
octogenarian alto legend on 2015's The Jeff Denson Trio + Lee Konitz. His new
album Concentric Circles, just released on his Ridgeway label on June 24,
combines the talent-laden personnel of Electreo and the Jeff Denson Trio in a
startlingly original quartet.
Featuring
Electreo's Hanson and Hall and the Jeff Denson Trio's pianist Dan Zemelman,
Concentric Circles is a breathtaking acoustic project that focuses on the
bassist's finely wrought compositions. While only two tracks feature his vocals,
Denson's writing is deeply informed by his connection to the voice, a lyrical
sensibility that manifests itself in his breathtaking bow work and gracefully
flowing pizzicato lines. While he draws personnel from two ongoing ensembles,
Denson sees Concentric Circles as encompassing yet another distinct creative
domain by building on the intricately constructed chamber jazz of Secret World,
his 2012 album featuring trumpeter Ralph Alessi, drummer Dan Weiss and pianist
Florian Weber (his partner in the acclaimed collective trio Minsarah).
"I
started with the concept of bringing these two groups together, so that's one
set of circles," Denson says. "And I'm writing music dealing with
interlocking melodies, wheels within wheels, themes exploring constant change
and the world we live in. It's really a follow up to Secret World, a setting in
which I'm really free to write and compose. The pieces aren't lead sheet style
compositions. The forms are pretty complicated, with a lot of through-composed
parts, written out second lines and improvised sections that touch on my
circles of influence-jazz, free improv, chamber music, and the centrality of
the voice."
Marked by
rapid movement and vivid incident, the album opens with "City Life,"
a tune built on an unusual subdivision of seven inspired by the relentless
momentum of New York subways. Like a Mondrian grid, the piece turns an abstract
representation into the pulsing embodiment of urban experience. Driven by
Zemelman's hurtling left hand, "Anticipation" exemplifies Denson's
gift for crafting extended melodic lines. Navigating the long form and the
unexpected harmonic progression with seeming ease, these consummate musicians
make his highly challenging piece sound like an oft-played jazz standard.
One of the
many pleasures provided by Concentric Circles is the way in which Denson and
Hanson blend their sumptuous sounds. On "A Thought That Lingers" it's
often impossible to distinguish between the double reed and the arco bass as
the episodic, multi-meter tune moves from the lush opening harmonies to the
jagged, almost atonal middle section and the concluding return to comforting
tonality. Like Electreo, Denson sees the ensemble as a forum for exploring
Hanson's unprecedented mastery. "Almost immediately after meeting him I
put Electreo together and we started doing gigs in different settings," he
says. "In addition to being a hyper virtuoso, Paul is arguably the top
improvising bassoonist in the world."
Denson's
formative source of inspiration, the voice, moves to the foreground on
"Wishing Well," a gently imploring chamber jazz setting that serves
as an open letter to a close friend. He puts his voice to very different use on
"Once the Door Opens," a ravishing piece in which Denson's lithe bass
moves in a different meter than his wordless vocal line. A spiritually charged
journey, the song builds to an exquisite intertwined harmonic dance between
bass, vocals, and bassoon. While conceived with lyrics, "Time Waits for No
One" turned into an instrumental number with Denson bowing the melancholy,
almost brooding melody.
The album
closes with Duke Ellington's classic lament "I've Got It Bad." It's a
brief solo bass tour de force, rendered entirely with ringing harmonics, an
exercise that flows from Denson's continual quest to bring the bass into new
territory. "I wanted to see what I could do to make it sound like a
chordal instrument," he says. "You can make the bass sound like a
flute or angels singing, so you wouldn't even know it's this gigantic wooden
box."
Make no
mistake, Denson writes difficult music. The marvelous coherence and captivating
interplay on Concentric Circles is a testament to these musicians' capacious
skills. Zemelman is "a very creative and very musical player who's really
interested in straight ahead jazz," Denson says. "But he's also very
open, and a great reader. He's a great melodic improviser, who can bridge these
different sounds I'm interested in with his classical background. And Alan is
awesome, a super creative person. He's a fantastic visual artist who does
mixed-media work with photography and found objects. And of course he's a
virtuoso drummer, with amazing rhythmic control, and an incredible amount of
power and energy he can bring to a group."
Born on Dec.
20, 1976 in Arlington, Virginia, Denson grew up in the orbit of Washington, DC.
After playing alto sax from third grade through junior high he gave up the
horn, but was drawn back to music when friends in high school recruited him as
a singer for rock bands. When one of those groups also needed a bass player, he
took over the spot and before long found himself drawn to the jazz and funk
electric bass pantheon, "Players like Jaco, Bootsy Collins, and Stanley
Clarke served as the gateway," Denson recalls. "When I heard the
virtuosic electric playing in fusion, that opened the door to jazz."
Listening to Miles Davis led him to the double bass, but it was Mingus who
inspired him to give up his Fender. "I heard 'Haitian Fight Song' where he
plays that amazing intro, and that was the defining moment," Denson says.
"I knew I'd never be able to make sounds like that on an electric
bass."
Although he
was offered a visual arts scholarship to DC's vaunted Corcoran School of the
Arts, Denson decided to study at Virginia Commonwealth University, where his
passion for music gradually eclipsed his interest in painting and photography.
He also studied jazz, theory and sight reading at Northern Virginia Community
College while supporting himself freelancing around DC, playing jazz,
orchestral music, rock covers, and leading his own funk combo as a bassist and
vocalist. Earning a scholarship to Berklee College of Music, he quickly fell in
with German pianist Florian Weber and Israeli drummer Ziv Ravitz, fellow
students with whom he formed Minsarah. The collective trio released its debut
album on Hubermusic, and followed up in 2006 with a critically hailed eponymous
album on Enja Records. While touring internationally with the group Denson
managed to maintain a rigorous academic career.
Recruited by
Florida State University, he earned an MM in Jazz Studies and discovered an
affinity for teaching. Preparing to move to New York City upon graduating Magna
Cum Laude in 2005 he ran into bass giant Mark Dresser, who had just been hired
as a professor at UC San Diego. With Dresser's encouragement and a full
scholarship, Denson relocated to Southern California and earned his doctorate
in contemporary music performance with an emphasis on composition. Throughout
his San Diego sojourn, Denson continued to tour widely with Minsarah, and it
was during a spate of 2006 concerts in Germany that Lee Konitz first heard the
band, "the start of a great adventure," Denson says. "The stuff
we do is very different than any music in his canon. Lee is a true improviser.
He doesn't play licks. He really responds."
With Minsarah
serving as his band, the critically hailed Lee Konitz New Quartet debuted on
2007's Deep Lee and followed up with 2009's Live at the Village Vanguard, which
earned the 2010 Album of the Year Award from France's Jazzman Magazine, and
2014's Standards Live: At the Village Vanguard (all on Enja). Denson went on to
demonstrate his vast versatility with simultaneous duo releases, interpreting
American hymns and spirituals with powerhouse San Diego pianist Joshua White on
I'll Fly Away and recording an album of free improvisation with Swiss clarinet
virtuoso Claudio Puntin on Two. Since relocating to the East Bay in 2011 to
take on a full professorship at the California Jazz Conservatory, Denson has
forged ties with some of the Bay Area's top players, including clarinetist Ben
Goldberg and guitarist Mimi Fox. A prolific composer and arranger, he's written
music for an array of jazz settings, from big band to trio, as well as for
string ensembles, solo bass, and a chamber opera.
He's brought
his many pursuits under one umbrella with the recent unveiling of Ridgeway
Arts, a non-profit designed to enhance and fortify the Bay Area scene, and to
make a strong contribution to the national landscape of jazz and the arts in
general, through a four-pronged plan of expression, education, presenting and
documentation. He introduced the
initiative with The Jeff Denson Trio + Lee Konitz, and followed up with Arctic
by Alan Hall's critically hailed electric ensemble Ratatet. With Concentric
Circles, Denson continues to expand Ridgeway's possibilities, building bridges
between artists, students, and audiences "to get the music to
people," he says. "It's a vehicle for music that gets lost amidst the
dross of mass culture."
