Search - Joe Morris :: Cloud of Black Birds

From Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grapelli to John McLaughlin and Jerry Goodman, the pairing of guitar and violin in jazz comes with a lot of baggage. Guitarist Joe Morris and violinist Mat Maneri emptied the clichés from their trunks before they recorded A Cloud of Black Birds--this quartet doesn't sound like anyone else. Morris's vocabulary is defined in part by what he doesn't use; he shuns effects and hardly ever plays chords. Instead he uses intricate, quizzical melodies as launch pads for dense, single-note flurries whose organization reflects his studies of both West African kora players and free-jazz pianist Cecil Taylor. Maneri's pungent, slurred attack subtly shades the spaces in Morris's carefully articulated lines. They don't trade licks but weave in and out and around each other with an intricacy that repays repeated listenings. The flexible rhythm section of Chris Lightcap on double bass and Jerome Deupree on drums negotiates the transitions between swinging unison passages and pulseless abstractions with impressive ease. --Bill Meyer