Home » Jazz Articles » Extended Analysis » Peter Sprague: The Peter Sprague String Consort: The Wild Blue
Peter Sprague: The Peter Sprague String Consort: The Wild Blue
Peter Sprague
guitarb.1955
Dianne Reeves
vocalsb.1956
Charlie Haden
bass, acoustic1937 - 2014
Pat Metheny
guitarb.1954
One of his projects is the ensemble known as the Peter Sprague String Consort. It's essentially a septet that marries a string quartet (violinists Bridget Dolkas and Jeanne Skrocki, violist Pam Jacobson and cellist Carter Dewberry), with a jazz trio comprising Sprague, double bassist 
Bob Magnusson
bass, acoustic
b.1947
Mixing strings with jazz has always been a hit and (mostly) miss proposition. Whenever an orchestra is used, it often sounds like an artificial sweetener—for instance the strings on all those Creed Taylor productions of albums by guitarist 
Wes Montgomery
guitar
1923 - 1968
Antonio Carlos Jobim
piano
1927 - 1994
Chick Corea
piano
1941 - 2021
John McLaughlin
guitar
b.1942
The disc begins with the ambitious, episodic title track, "The Wild Blue," (that's what Sprague, an avid surfer, calls the ocean ). The dialogue between the semi-dissonant strings and the jazz trio sounds evocative of Bartok filtered through Corea with Sprague's virtuoso nylon-string guitar doing his own thing entirely. It has three or four distinct moods and works impressively as an opener. "The Beatles" has some definite Beatle-like harmony; mostly it sounds as though someone asked George Martin to compose an instrumental companion piece to "Yesterday" with much hipper changes.
Things really begin to pick up with the third selection, "The Bomb Scare Blues." It's the kind of archetypal blues form that Sprague is known for: harmonically dense with surprising turns and twists along the way. What makes this unique is how involved the string quartet is in the melody—they're all over and under it. This piece is already a killer when double bass master Magnusson takes it up several notches with an incredible melodic gem of a solo. It's often lamented in jazz that "strings can't swing," but in this case at least—with Sprague writing their obbligatos—they do. Next up is an astonishing performance of J.S. Bach's "Prelude Number 9." It is layered inside a swinging trio arrangement so hip you may have to double-check the track list to be sure it was Bach.
Chick Corea's "Day Danse" from his My Spanish Heart, (Columbia, 1976), is next, and it's a great blend of flamenco guitar work coupled with a call and response section with the strings. Somehow, this selection ends sounding more "classical" than the Bach piece. "Karin's Psalm" definitely defies all style boundaries: it starts off with gorgeous string harmony, then 
Lenny Breau
guitar
1941 - 1984
Speaking of India, that's also at least the partial inspiration for another one of this album's highlights: "Mahavishnu." The tune starts out with Sprague playing some wicked raga-type licks on top of his over-dubbed tamboura. Then the strings enter with intricate, dissonant lines that are highly evocative of McLaughlin's orchestrations on Visions Of The Emerald Beyond (Columbia, 1975) and Apocalypse (Columbia 1974). It's an amazing approximation without ever sounding like an imitation. It's more of an affectionate nod to some of McLaughlin's most fertile periods of creativity. The album finale is "Isfahan," (Chick Corea, not Billy Strayhorn), and it's a brief, but furious closer. Sprague has an intimate connection to the music of Corea: he's the official transcriber of six of his albums, about which Corea himself said: "I don't know anyone I would trust more to correctly transcribe my improvisations."
The Wild Blue is a beautifully written, performed and engineered disc. It was recorded at SpragueLand Studios, the Encinitas, California studio that Sprague has operated for several years now. This is high fidelity material all the way. If you want to hear some truly innovative modern music—with unique instrumentation, excellent soloists and great songwriting—grab a listen.
Tracks: The Wild Blue; The Beatles; The Bomb Scare Blues; Prelude Number 9; Day Danse; Karin's Psalm; Mudra; The Duke; Mahavisnu; Isfahan.
Personnel: Peter Sprague: guitars, tamboura (9); Bridget Dolkas: violin; Jeanne Skolki: violin; Pam Jacobson: viola; Carter Dewberry: cello; Bob Magnusson: double bass; Duncan Moore: drums; Ron Wagner: tablas (9).
">Personnel
Peter Sprague
guitarPeter Sprague: guitars, tamboura (9); Bridget Dolkas: violin; Jeanne Skolki: violin; Pam Jacobson: viola; Carter Dewberry: cello; Bob Magnusson: double bass; Duncan Moore: drums; Ron Wagner: tablas (9).
Album information
Title: The Peter Sprague String Consort: The Wild Blue | Year Released: 2010 | Record Label: Unknown label
Tags
Comments
PREVIOUS / NEXT
Support All About Jazz
All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.
Go Ad Free!
To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.Showcase
Buy Now
Featured
Carnaval - The Songs Were So Beautiful
By Antonio Adolfo buy
