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Benjamin Koppel: White Buses: Passage To Freedom

By Doug Collette
December 28, 2023
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Benjamin Koppel: White Buses: Passage To Freedom

If saxophonist/composer/bandleader

Benjamin Koppel

saxophone, alto
b.1974

" data-original-title="" title="">Benjamin Koppel has proven anything over the last few years, it is that he has no trouble finding sources of inspiration for his work.

Whether it is just for the sake of blowing with a redoubtable rhythm section in the form of bassist

Scott Colley

bass
b.1963

" data-original-title="" title="">Scott Colley and drummer

Brian Blade

drums
b.1970

" data-original-title="" title="">Brian Blade on Perspective (Cowbell Music, 2023) or illustrating his own range of style with The Ultimate Soul & Jazz Revue (Cowbell Music, 2020) and The Art of The Quartet (Cowbell Music, 2020), Koppel invariably has no difficulty finding where and how to find the ways and means to make memorable music.

No doubt White Buses: Passage To Freedom was another example of his discerning instincts. But it may be fair to conjecture that, at the time the album was scheduled for release, this redoubtable musician had no idea how relevant his work would be in regards to the warfare in the Middle East in the autumn of 2023.

The prolific Danish artist's corps of accompanists is as imposing as his concept. Vocalist

Thana Alexa

vocals

" data-original-title="" title="">Thana Alexa, drummer

Antonio Sanchez

drums
b.1971

" data-original-title="" title="">Antonio Sanchez and Colley (again!) are only three participants elucidating a thirty-plus piece narrative devoted to the rescue of prisoners from Nazi war camps at the end of World War II. Yet from the restless piano of

Uri Caine

piano
b.1956

" data-original-title="" title="">Uri Caine on "Two Birds In A Nest" to the cello from

Henrik Dam Thomsen

cello

" data-original-title="" title="">Henrik Dam Thomsen and additional keyboards by

Soren Moller

piano

" data-original-title="" title="">Soren Moller, all involved are as sensitive to the arrangements as to their interactions with the aforementioned vocalist and rhythm section.

And that is not to overlook the impassioned hornplaying of Benjamin Koppel himself. "The Devil Under The Skin" is hardly the only cut on which the sounds he coaxes from his instrument marry the forlorn and the resolute; it is a mix of emotions as nuanced as his arrangements, as well as the sonics he co-produced with Jeff Levenson in sessions at Sear Sound in New York City.

Quick spoken interludes, designated "testimonials," never really descend to the intrusive over the course of the album (though there is the nagging temptation to program the compact disc to play only the instrumentals in direct succession). Instead, such snippets provide respite from the cumulative intensity of cuts such as "I Was Terrified" and "Talking About Food."

With recapitulation and punctuation for the recordings in the form of a twelve-page booklet boasting the same glossy finish as the sleeve, Benjamin Koppel and company take listeners there and back on White Buses: Passage To Freedom. The locations and circumstances upon which this piece is based are particular to its time, but the range of emotions from exultation ("My Father") to despair ("Rumours"), mirrored in the instrumentation and compositions, imbue a perpetual pertinence to these pieces, individually and as a whole.

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Track Listing

Introduction / Testimonial I; The Devil Under the Skin; Testimonial II; The Woman with Her Violin; Testimonial III; I Was Terrified; Testimonial IV; Talking About Food; Testimonial V; Two Birds in a Nest; Testimonial VI; The Planes in the Sky; Testimonial VII; Rumours; Testimonial VIII; Die D?nen Raus; Testimonial IX; My Father; Testimonial X; The White Bus; Testimonial XI; The Goodbye; Testimonial XII; Potsdam; Testimonial XIII; The Welcoming pt. 1; The Welcoming pt. 2; Testimonial XIV; Awake or Dreaming; Testimonial XV; Fantastic Miracle; Testimonial XVI; The Golden Carriage.

Personnel

Benjamin Koppel

saxophone, alto

Thana Alexa

vocals

Uri Caine

piano

Henrik Dam Thomsen

cello

Soren Moller

piano

Scott Colley

bass

Antonio Sanchez

drums

Album information

Title: White Buses: Passage To Freedom | Year Released: 2023 | Record Label: Cowbell Music

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