Album Review: Unfoldings from Ian Wardenski Quintet

Album:  Unfoldings
Ian Wardenski Quintet
Label Name: Self-Released
Website:  http://ianwardenski.com
https://ianwardenskiquintet.hearnow.com

Unfoldings is the third offering from Ian Wardenski Quintet, featuring Wardenski's wife, soprano vocalist Tamara Tucker.   The recording is a five-movement suite composed by guitarist Wardenski.  Joining him are alto saxophonist Mercedes Beckman, pianist Savino Palumbo, bassist Amy Shook, and drummer Frank Russo.  Experimenting with rhythmic patterns and phrasing, Wardenski illustrates his leanings as a theorist, integrating erratic movements and constructs that randomly shift.  The compositions are orderly in a sporadic and chaotic fashion with instruments spreading, spiraling, flaring and withdrawing in an arbitrary formation.

Tumultuous and fiery, "Movement I" is orderly chaos with each musician inputing dynamic verses to the cooperative.   Shook opens "Movement II" with bowing bass lines, which are interceded by Russo's funky drumbeats, Palumbo's jangly keys, and Wardenski's piercing guitar shreds.  Cooling the turbulent waves is Beckman's fluttering musings on the alto sax.

Tucker's high-pitched howls move in and out of "Movement III," receding as Beckman's saxophone swirls lead into Palumbo's nimble doodles on the keys, shifting the course of the composition's construct.  "Movement VI" opens with a dramatic soliloquy on Palumbo's keys that intimates an array of melodic phrases moving back and forth between blissful to erratic.  The eerie passages give the track a ghostly sheen.  The spectral acoustics open "Movement V," traveling into complex rhythmic patterns and sporadic phrasing.

Wardenski’s quintet is an innovative ensemble that integrates the individual freedom, spontaneity, and improvisation of an intimate jazz cooperative.  The ensemble explores and experiments with rhythmic organization and collaborative constructs.  Wardenski is Chair of Performing Arts, and is a Full Professor of Music at Anne Arundel Community College in Arnold, Maryland. He teaches courses in music theory, composition, sight singing and ear training, jazz harmony, jazz history, and guitar. Ian is also the music director for the AACC Small Jazz Combo, as well as the AACC World Class Jazz series.   His compositions demonstrate his penchant for working with theories about rhythm, harmony, and cooperative constructs.

Musicians:
Ian Wardenski – guitar
Tamara Tucker – voice
Mercedes Beckman – alto sax
Savino Palumbo – piano
Amy Shook – bass
Frank Russo – drums