Album Review: Diversity from Zlatko Kaučič
Album: Diversity
Artist: Zlatko Kaučič
Label: Not Two Records
Website: http://www.kaucic-zk.si/discography.htm
Pure, unadulterated self-expression is channeled into a stream of impromptu notes and improvised chord sequences on Diversity, a 5-CD compilation from percussionist Zlatko Kaučič. Collaborating with Kaučič on the recording are Agustí Fernandez on piano, Evan Parker on tenor saxophone, Rafal Mazur on acoustic bass, Lotte Anker on tenor, alto, and soprano saxophones, Johannes Bauer on trombone, and vocalist Phil Minton. The material on the CD's was recorded at several jazz festivals from 2012 to 2016, providing audiences with an aural portrait of Kaučič's musical journey during this phase of his life.
Known for his nonconformist tendencies when composing music, Kaučič invites his team of musicians to play from impulse, expressing their thoughts and emotions in their music, treating their instruments like a paintbrush that channels their individual ideas into the tangible form of music. Thus, making it possible for the musicians to share themselves with their audience. There is no rhyme or structure to the compositions on Diversity but memories, feelings, and thoughts put to music in a language that the individual musicians speak and understand. When recreating these compositions, the musicians simply recall the impulses that first generated their notes, chord sequences, and combinations.
For audiences, interpreting these musical collaborations is challenging and likely not the purpose of the compilation. Rather, audiences should take note of Kaučič's method of playing as an example of performance art that shows the musicians as being daring, openly communicative, and able to create what Kaučič calls a social utopia as the musicians improvise their parts while being mindful, respectful and conscientious of one another's space. At times, the cluster of sounds create a jarring cacophony of friction, chaos, contrasting voices, and disjointed masses. There are vastly more moments of dissonance than melodic harmony as the individual conversations of the musicians collide into each other, even pile on top of one another. The music becomes a portrait of real life, depicting the friction, clashing and disharmony that goes on in the world.
Diversity may not be composed to be an easy listening album but its value is in being a performance art piece. The tracks each evolve independent of one another, moving through various stages and morphing organically. There is an untraceable pattern to Kaučič's method of leading his team as a composition may begin slow and pensive or feral and chafing then take a number of twists and turns, abruptly gathering to a frothy clump and receding suddenly, slashed by piercing notes, obtuse bursts, and a labyrinth of crazed lesions. Nothing is scripted but solely based on the character of the individual musicians who ad-lib freely, speak openly, and perform randomly. The compilation is comprised of the multiple languages imagined and played by the musicians coming together. The pluralistic condition of the collaborations make for a discordant recording that peacefully works together. Hence, producing a social utopia, which Kaučič's strives to achieve on the tracks.
Musicians:
Zlatko Kaučič - drums, percussion, and zither, Agustí Fernandez - piano, Evan Parker - tenor saxophone, Rafal Mazur - acoustic bass, Lotte Anker - tenor saxophone, alto saxophone, and soprano saxophone, Johannes Bauer - trombone, Phil Minton - voice
Diversity: https://www.discogs.com/Zlatko-Kau%C4%8Di%C4%8D-Diversity/release/12130132
Artist: Zlatko Kaučič
Label: Not Two Records
Website: http://www.kaucic-zk.si/discography.htm
Pure, unadulterated self-expression is channeled into a stream of impromptu notes and improvised chord sequences on Diversity, a 5-CD compilation from percussionist Zlatko Kaučič. Collaborating with Kaučič on the recording are Agustí Fernandez on piano, Evan Parker on tenor saxophone, Rafal Mazur on acoustic bass, Lotte Anker on tenor, alto, and soprano saxophones, Johannes Bauer on trombone, and vocalist Phil Minton. The material on the CD's was recorded at several jazz festivals from 2012 to 2016, providing audiences with an aural portrait of Kaučič's musical journey during this phase of his life.
Known for his nonconformist tendencies when composing music, Kaučič invites his team of musicians to play from impulse, expressing their thoughts and emotions in their music, treating their instruments like a paintbrush that channels their individual ideas into the tangible form of music. Thus, making it possible for the musicians to share themselves with their audience. There is no rhyme or structure to the compositions on Diversity but memories, feelings, and thoughts put to music in a language that the individual musicians speak and understand. When recreating these compositions, the musicians simply recall the impulses that first generated their notes, chord sequences, and combinations.
For audiences, interpreting these musical collaborations is challenging and likely not the purpose of the compilation. Rather, audiences should take note of Kaučič's method of playing as an example of performance art that shows the musicians as being daring, openly communicative, and able to create what Kaučič calls a social utopia as the musicians improvise their parts while being mindful, respectful and conscientious of one another's space. At times, the cluster of sounds create a jarring cacophony of friction, chaos, contrasting voices, and disjointed masses. There are vastly more moments of dissonance than melodic harmony as the individual conversations of the musicians collide into each other, even pile on top of one another. The music becomes a portrait of real life, depicting the friction, clashing and disharmony that goes on in the world.
Diversity may not be composed to be an easy listening album but its value is in being a performance art piece. The tracks each evolve independent of one another, moving through various stages and morphing organically. There is an untraceable pattern to Kaučič's method of leading his team as a composition may begin slow and pensive or feral and chafing then take a number of twists and turns, abruptly gathering to a frothy clump and receding suddenly, slashed by piercing notes, obtuse bursts, and a labyrinth of crazed lesions. Nothing is scripted but solely based on the character of the individual musicians who ad-lib freely, speak openly, and perform randomly. The compilation is comprised of the multiple languages imagined and played by the musicians coming together. The pluralistic condition of the collaborations make for a discordant recording that peacefully works together. Hence, producing a social utopia, which Kaučič's strives to achieve on the tracks.
Musicians:
Zlatko Kaučič - drums, percussion, and zither, Agustí Fernandez - piano, Evan Parker - tenor saxophone, Rafal Mazur - acoustic bass, Lotte Anker - tenor saxophone, alto saxophone, and soprano saxophone, Johannes Bauer - trombone, Phil Minton - voice
Diversity: https://www.discogs.com/Zlatko-Kau%C4%8Di%C4%8D-Diversity/release/12130132
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