Newvelle Records • The Renewal Collection
ewvelle Records, the French jazz label launched a few years ago, does things a bit differently, issuing its purist recordings in groups of LPs (and now digital files). Elan Mehler, the label's director and an accomplished jazz pianist, chooses a host of known musicians who have recorded for various labels. The music is "really about my personal preferences," Mehler told me some time ago. "I look for music that is melodically driven, soulful and usually simple, . . . with compositional elements perhaps more stressed than improvisational elements." Newvelle's previous releases were sold in lots of six titles, each a numbered series that came in a handsome slipcase box. Newvelle kept a semi-regular release schedule until the COVID-19 pandemic, which put life as we all knew it on hold. The Renewal Collection is Newvelle's answer to the pandemic, its unknown, hardship, turmoil and, now, continuation of something like normal life. While earlier Newvelle records were pressed on clear vinyl, the Renewal LPs are jet black. I don't know if there's a buried message there, but the return to what's considered usual does seem in keeping with the theme of renewal. In previous reviews of Newvelle releases, I've remarked on a similarity to ECM recordings. This time, though, there is a direct connection: saxophonist Dave Liebman released one of ECM's iconic titles of the 1970s with Lookout Farm, a large-ensemble recording of high ambitions and long selections -- there are only three cuts in total. Here, his Trust and Honesty features an unusual trio of Liebman -- on soprano and tenor saxophones, and flute -- with guitarist Ben Monder and bassist Jon Hébert. That lineup might imply a "Liebman with strings" session, but instead we get a collage of textures and traditions, the musicians playing as much with each other as off each other, all in the context of a ballads-only collection. In contrast, Nadje Noordhuis' Full Circle features all original compositions and a lineup of Fred Hersch on piano, Thomas Morgan on bass and Rudy Royston on drums. Noordhuis' tone on the trumpet (and also on flugelhorn) is emotive and pure, reminding me of Miles Davis, and the compositions here are challenging and unique -- qualities that would surely have interested Davis. The playing is pensive and expansive, giving the music space to bloom. Saxophonist Michael Blake was a member of the Lounge Lizards, and the sextet on Combobulate features a band with an unusual combination, brass with drums: Blake on tenor and alto saxes, as well as flute; Bob Stewart and Marcus Rojas on tuba; New Yorkers Steven Bernstein on trumpet and Clark Gayton on trombone; and Allan Mednard on drums. The sound has some of the punctuation -- booms and blats -- of New Orleans, as the band ambles through a collection of Blake's highly original compositions. For me, the highlight of The Renewal Collection is There Is A Dance, a group of original compositions from pianist Elan Mehler that is a tribute to his late mother. Joining Mehler are Newvelle alumni: bassist Tony Scherr and percussionist Francisco Mela. The trio plays a series of spare sound collages, juxtaposed with the triumphant, and hummable, theme of "When You Were Blind." The album's sequencing seems to mirror the changing moods of the COVID age: from off-centeredness, instability and sadness to optimism. Multi-Grammy-winning Marc Urselli recorded and mixed the sessions at East Side Sound in New York, and Josh Bonati did the mastering from 24-bit/88.2kHz digital files. The music has Newvelle's standard quietude along with subtle shadings and bursts of transient impact, the realistic sound enhancing the music's many moods. The four 180-gram records were pressed at Gotta Groove Records in Ohio, using patented Groovecoated Stampers, a proprietary type of LP stamper with a special coating that, according to Gotta Groove, "can dramatically increase the lifespan of the stamper, and reduce high-frequency loss." Housed in gatefold sleeves that feature black-and-white photography, each record continues to show the attention to detail that has gone into Newvelle's previous releases. Attention to detail also sums up Newvelle's
entire musical output. "It has been such a joy to return to the recording studio this
past fall," Elan Mehler has said about these LPs. Amen to that. |
