Cory Smythe, piano; Steve Lehman, sopranino saxophone; photo by Michael Jackson
When saxophonist Steve Lehman performs, I try to hear him whatever the setting. His octet, concertizing in Philadelphia for Ars Nova Workshop Saturday, March 21, plays richly microtonal yet melodically entrancing and rhythmically propulsive, synchronized music — partaking of a concept called “spectralism” — that brings to mind both Dolphy and Messiaen. In a sax-bass-drums trio, Lehman , honored in 2014 with a Doris Duke Performing Artist fellowship, is the complete, compelling post-modernist. He has genuine affection for and comprehension of what’s been blown by Charlie Parker and Lee Konitz as well as Jackie McLean and Anthony Braxton.
Lehman’s duet with pianist Cory Smythe at Constellation in Chicago on March 7 was unlike any Lehman concert or recording I’d heard before, including a playful yet serious exploration of his instruments’ sonic possibilities as just one aspect of several interactive spontaneous compositions. Each of the pair’s eight or ten separate pieces (who was counting?) incorporated immediate choices and reactions within specific, well-defined frameworks. Variety was something the duettists had thought hard about, resulting in penetrating entries into some refined concepts. I didn’t take notes, so now my details are a bit fuzzy. But —
Some pieces included pre-created digital sounds triggered by one or the other of the musicians as separate projections or fields which either/both responded to or at least took in to account, so the effect was like the ensemble being a trio or quartet. In others pieces, Lehman and Smythe started from acoustic precepts or properties, like SL blowing an alto sax with its mouthpiece off, both of them trading in extremely staccato phrases, CS continuously sweeping the keyboard as a starter or foundation for extrapolation. That Lehman is an exciting and technically virtuosic soloist in relatively straight-ahead jazz contexts — here he plays “Jeannine” — was never far from my mind while listening to him, although no bebop or swing components were obvious in what he did. That Smythe, a member of the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) could create complex streams of simultaneously fresh and idiomatic piano music, maneuvering with considerable “freedom” but using a vocabulary completely devoid of blues references or inflections, surprised and impressed me.
Both musicians spoke candidly about their work to the audience after the show, which was produced by the Illinois Humanities Council. I pressed Smythe on his forays being derived so exclusively from Western European “classical” piano traditions, and he responded with modesty, “Dozens of pianists do that now.”
“Dozens,” I asked. “Like who?”
He offered some names — Craig Taborn, for one — but in my recent listening, Smythe is unique. That is not to say that he, akin to Steve Lehman, does not have like-minded peers. But if they’re truly like-minded and actually peers, they must be every bit as well-educated and broadly informed, original and individualistic as Smythe and Lehman, those attributes being basic to their musical identities.
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