For those unaware, s0nic 0penings, the brand new album from Patrick Brennan, expands upon compositional “what-ifs” and the plasticities of rhythm section dynamics.

In this instance, tilting curvaceous interrelates fourteen possible extensions of its core material’s potential to develop in multiple directions simultaneously.

As with Ellington, Monk, Mingus, Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Henry Threadgill and many other A.A.C.M. composers, Brennan generates specific sonic and conceptual environments for collective improvisation.

The music’s orienting matrix is constructed from a series of melodically coded polyrhythmic cells whose connective tissue may suggest nearly unlimited transformations.

“Brennan has crafted a musical path that is open in its candor and indebtedness to all facets of black music,” Ludwig van Trickt notes in All About Jazz. “Much like trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, the alto saxophonist brews a thicket of his own distinct musical language that ‘unlike much contemporaneous vanguard music is built specifically upon the potentialities of swinging and polyrhythm.’ This means moving the expressive expansiveness of trap playing and the drum choir into ‘the foreground of an entire orchestra’s intelligence.’”

01 - 14. Tilting Curvaceous

On what is a quite exceptional listen, impassioned and elegantly crafted new recording, the fervent first track gets us in the mood from the off and is backed seamlessly by the more languishing second part, the third a finger-snapping, foot-tapping experience, the fourth a controlled jam, the fifth a more structured, at times veritably ethereal affair, the sixth a cinematic piece that could reflect NYC at rush hour, and then we get the triumphant sounds within the seventh piece brought forth.

Along next is the eighth work, an ardently rambunctious piece and that is in turn followed by the ninth, a quietly serene moment, whereas the next has a funky groove running through it, the eleventh a cultured, perhaps even playful work, the next having an Eastern flair to it, the recording rounding out on a joyous cut, closing on the fourteenth track, a .46 second, individually melodic affair.

New York City based composer, saxophonist & bandleader Patrick Brennan first formed his long term, rhythm-section-centric ensemble s0nic 0penings in 1979, which has since performed and recorded internationally in multiple configurations.

Alongside this he’s initiated and recorded a number of collaborations, most notably with bassist Lisle Ellis, the duo terraphonia with the Portuguese electro-acoustic prepared guitarist Abdul Moimême, and the Sudani Project with Gnawi Ma’alem Najib Soudani of Essaouira, Morocco.

Brennan additionally performs unaccompanied (rōnin phasing) and has, since 2014, sustained and conducted his large ensemble transparency kestra. He is also the author of the book Ways & Sounds (Arteidolia Press, 2021), which explores some of the formal implications of music’s internal social interactions for composition & listening.

Drummer Michael TA Thompson, Hilliard Greene, bassist, Brian Groder playing both trumpet and fluegelhorn, along with pianist Rod Williams together share extensive histories in the development of this music. Each of their voices and sensibilities shapes the music’s distinct, in-depth ensemble sound.

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