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Jacob Garchik: Assembly

By John Chacona
June 7, 2022
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Trombonist

Jacob Garchik

trombone

" data-original-title="" title="">Jacob Garchik has an interest in musical subtraction. His 2012 release The Heavens: The Atheist Gospel Trombone Album (Yestereve Records) presented religious music stripped of religion. Clear Line (Yestereve Records) from 2020 featured a 13-piece big band with no rhythm section. Now comes Assembly, an inquiry into what a jazz quintet sounds like when added to itself.

Garchik declares both method and intent in his song titles; the first three cuts are "Collage," "Pastiche" and "Bricolage." The first lays a series of portentous, fanfare-y unison band statements over the distant chatter of the quintet playing some up-tempo bebop workout. It's as though an open studio mic picked up the sound of a stray earbud playing a Steve Lacy /

Roswell Rudd

trombone
1935 - 2017

" data-original-title="" title="">Roswell Rudd track during the session. "Pastiche" begins with what might pass as a lost recording of the 1976

Anthony Braxton

woodwinds
b.1945

" data-original-title="" title="">Anthony Braxton Quartet with

George Lewis

trombone
b.1952

" data-original-title="" title="">George Lewis playing a long, snaky line with uncanny precision. After Garchik's straight-ahead solo on blues changes, the opening line returns at an impossible tempo in a mad dash to the finish line. It must have been electronically manipulated, though considering the capabilities of saxophonist

Sam Newsome

saxophone, soprano
b.1965

" data-original-title="" title="">Sam Newsome,

Jacob Sacks

piano

" data-original-title="" title="">Jacob Sacks on piano, bassist

Thomas Morgan

bass, acoustic

" data-original-title="" title="">Thomas Morgan and drummer

Dan Weiss

drums

" data-original-title="" title="">Dan Weiss, one never knows.

Multiplication drives the somber,

John Coltrane

saxophone
1926 - 1967

" data-original-title="" title="">John Coltrane-ish "Homage" by building a 13-piece band (two saxophones, four trombones, four pianos, four basses and three drummers) through overdubs. "Fanfare" alternates slices of a tender piano/trombone duo on

Duke Ellington

piano
1899 - 1974

" data-original-title="" title="">Duke Ellington's "In A Sentimental Mood," played straight and with a lyricism worthy of

Lawrence Brown

trombone
b.1907

" data-original-title="" title="">Lawrence Brown, with a hectic, up-and-down stepwise figure for full band. Compare and contrast.

There are elements of

John Zorn

saxophone, alto
b.1953

" data-original-title="" title="">John Zorn's jump cut method in Garchik's madness as well as a Braxtonian fondness for setting multiple spinning figures in motion against each other, as he does on the dizzyingly looped "Id��e Fixe." No studio trickery was used to make the digeridoo sound at the beginning of "Fantasia." Sam Newsome did that in real-time through defiantly analogue means, attaching a hose to his soprano saxophone to drop its range. It's an example of how Garchik inoculates the project from tedious self-indulgence with a healthy dose of genuine curiosity and playfulness.

Conceptual jazz never sounded like so much fun.

Learn more about our star rating system

Track Listing

Collage; Pastiche; Bricolage; Homage; Fanfare; Id��e Fixe; Fantasia; Impromptu; Reverie.

Personnel

Jacob Garchik

trombone

Sam Newsome

saxophone, soprano

Jacob Sacks

piano

Dan Weiss

drums

Thomas Morgan

bass, acoustic

Album information

Title: Assembly | Year Released: 2022 | Record Label: Yestereve Records

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Jacob Garchik Concerts

Apr 21 Tue

Stephan Crump - Slow Water

Krannert Center For The Performing Arts
Urbana, IL

Apr 24 Fri

Stephan Crump - Slow Water

The Cleveland Museum Of Art
Cleveland, OH

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