We’ve witnessed and heard testimonies from countless musicians who were forced to struggle—financially and artistically—through the lockdown’s of the pandemic.

For some who have survived, there’s been the silver lining of a shift in perspective. Many artists dug deep in isolation and discovered the solution to long-elusive mysteries. Some let go of the tried-and-true and instead explored new means of expression.

While we’re hopefully emerging from the final Covid surge, it’s a welcome that an artist like Christine Jensen is opening ears to the magic of reflection on her long, turbulent days and months locked down.

The exceptional alto and soprano saxophonist from Canada releases the compelling Day Moon with her impressive quartet on Justin Time Records. The music is at turns, melancholic and ebullient, sober and playful.

It’s a date where she creates an improvisational community of close friends in quartet and duo settings. “I got hit hard by the pandemic because I felt alone and was not doing what I’m supposed to do,” Jensen says. “So, I focused on my saxophones, teaching myself to present my sound, my solo voice. It’s almost like becoming the vocalist.”

1. Day Moon
2. Lined
3. Twenty Twenty Blues
4. Tolos D’Abril
5. Étude de Mars
6. Here’s That Rainy Day
7. Wind Up
8. Balcony Rules
9. Like In Love
10. Girls Can Play The Blues

This expertly conditioned and embracingly impassioned new album opens on the enticingly elegant titular Day Moon (which was actually originally written pre-pandemic for her chordless collective CODE Quartet) and then we are brought her simply divine Quiescence Suite of four tracks; and which was itself written for a commission from New York’s Jazz Coalition that had raised funds for composers, and is inclusive of the Brazilian clave-feel of the at-times mesmerizing Tolos D’Abril, the suite culminating with the simply beautiful, diligently heartfelt Étude de Mars.

Along next is a magnificently cultured rendition of Jimmy Van Heusen’s Here’s That Rainy Day, which is itself followed seamlessly by the organic vibrancy resonating throughout Wind Up, some entertaining, all be they short-and-sweet playful bursts of musical duality then bring Balcony Rules together, the recording rounding out on the alluringly enticing Like In Love, closing on the playful, yet elegantly-hued Girls Can Play the Blues.

Finally, Jensen is happy to play some gigs to support Day Moon. In the future she continues to be on the tenure track at Eastman School of Music and has more music ready to go, including another CODE Quartet album, more recording and performing with her sister Ingrid Jensen and a big band recording to be released by the end of 2023. “It’s all in motion,” she says. “And who knows, maybe even an album of duos in the setting I discovered on Day Moon.”

Stream Étude de Mars, the First Single from Day Moon HERE NOW!

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