Album Review: The World and Its People from Yosef Gutman Levitt

Album:  The World and Its People
Artist:  Yosef Gutman Levitt
Label:  Soul Song Label
Website:  https://yosefgutman.com

Bassist and composer Yosef Gutman Levitt of Jerusalem releases his latest offering, The World and Its People, available from Levitt’s recently formed Soul Song imprint.  Leading a drum-less, chamber-jazz-newgrass foursome influenced in part by The Goat Rodeo Sessions with Chris Thile, Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer and Stuart Duncan, Levitt delivers a collection of atmospheric melodies and spiritual renderings that have a soothing effect on the listener.

The tracks are Levitt's original works cowritten and arranged by producer Gilad Ronen, with meaningful contributions from Levitt’s close musical associates Tal Yahalom on nylon and steel string acoustic guitars, Omri Mor on piano and Yoed Nir on cello.  Pairing elements of orchestral spirituals, country dance, Indian-Asian folkloric, ambient jazz, and improvisation, the quartet dazzles the listener with both earthy and ethereal tones, both pastoral and celestial textures, demonstrating that diverse expressions when well-honed are aesthetically pleasing to the human ear.

The music has both an ancient and a modern quality to it.  Levitt uses an upright bass as well as his unique five-string acoustic bass guitar built by Harvey Citron, Steve Swallow’s luthier.  The bass guitar resonates a tender and expressive voice that has a nurturing effect on the listener, awakening latent or dormant sensations.

Opening the recording with the sonically atmospheric "Awakening," the spiritual levitates its audience with Omri Mor's spacious keys, projecting a meditative vibration as the elegant whirls of Yoed Nir's cello form cascading streaks.  "Shifting Sky" switches the direction of the recording into a cheerful dance with delightful aerials in the instrumentation, heightened by the swirling strings of the cello.  The mood turns reflective through the title track as the soft instrumentation lulls the listener into a state of peacefulness.

The succor-infused emanations of "B’nei Heichala" are shrouded in ethereal riffs that transform to a folksy, Baroque-like quadrille through "Dancing Together," as the earthy tone of Mor's keys leads the dance.  The somber mood blanketing "The Shepherd" instills a lamenting lilt in the cello's strings that inflects an Indian-Asian tint.

The soft billowing strings of the cello truss up "Morning Star" in a tenderness that emotes an uplifting energy, a celestial quality that transitions to a pastoral vista through "Nigun Tzemach Tzedek."   The atmospheric and folksy texture is augmented by the country twang of the cello strings, which return in "David's Harp," transfixing the listener's attention on the storytelling-like verses.

The recording closes with "Purim Lanu," fashioning willowy silhouettes from the guitar and cello strings, creating ballet-like arabesques and battlement tendus.  The lamenting tone of the aerials is punctuated by the purposeful movements of the piano keys as though focused on a mission, steering towards a destination, portraying a determined will and single-mindedness.

Yosef Gutman Levitt and his fellow musicians have created something special with The World and Its People.   The music touches the human spirit, steering it towards a peacefulness that is all-consuming.

Musicians:
Yosef Gutman Levitt - bass and composer
Tal Yahalom - nylon and steel string acoustic guitar
Omri Mor - piano
Yoed Nir - cello