Jonah Parzen-Johnson – You’re By no means Actually Alone
(We Jazz Data WJLP64. Album assessment by Frank Graham)

Initially from Chicago and a former pupil of the AACM’s Mwata Bowden, Brooklyn-based baritone saxophonist and flautist Jonah Parzen-Johnson is a uncommon specialist in that almost all difficult of disciplines, the solo recital. During the last decade or so he has developed a vocabulary that’s uniquely his personal, juxtaposing the prolonged methods of the avant-garde with a clean-lined melodicism drawn from his parallel curiosity in people music.

You’re By no means Actually Alone is the saxophonist’s third outing for Helsinki’s We Jazz Data, following within the path of the reside Helsinki 8.12.18 and 2022’s Think about Giving Up, reviewed for LJN by Dick Hovenga. In contrast to these earlier recordings, the place Parzen-Johnson augmented his solos with a self-built analogue synthesiser and samples, the eight exceptional items offered listed here are completely acoustic. With no place to cover each word should rely, and Parzen-Johnson responds with an emotional directness that’s merely not possible to disregard.

The melodic opener “After I Really feel Like Myself” jogs my memory of Jimmy Giuffre’s occasional work on the baritone, Parzen-Johnson’s use of damaging house nearly as putting as his means to counterbalance timbral extremes. Halfway by way of the wistful “Not Writing About This” he segues right into a sequence of lengthy, didgeridoo register notes, whereas the doleful melody of “Everybody Is Someplace” is embellished with chordal multi-phonics within the fashion of Albert Mangelsdorff. “There Is So A lot I’m Afraid Of” and “There Is So A lot I Remorse” are items for flute, the previous characterised by extra throaty multi-phonics, the latter possessing a zen-like calm. “The Braveness Tune” may nearly be a battle hymn, Parzen-Johnson’s chest-rattling fog-horn blasts tipping a nod to Mats Gustafsson. However the buzz-saw overtones, “What They Love” once more harks again to the folksy aspect of Giuffre, whereas the closing “Named For You” may nicely be Parzen-Johnson’s “Physique & Soul”, a virtuosic efficiency which comes straight from the center.

Solo saxophone recordings could be one thing of an acquired style, however when the artist is as resourceful and artistic as Jonah Parzen-Johnson they turn out to be important listening.

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LINK: Bandcamp. Launch Date 8 Mar 2024