The Best Jazz on Bandcamp: January 2022
There’s a bittersweet quality that Sara Schoenbeck brings to any project. The way she channels a melody through her bassoon carries with it a little bit of melancholia, a thin ray of sunshine, a pervading sense of the blues. It always resonates like mad. That quality was on full display in two recordings with Wayne Horvitz’s Gravitas Quartet (with Horvitz, Ron Miles, and Peggy Lee). This set of duets with Horvitz, drummer Harris Eisenstadt, flutist Nicole Mitchell, guitarist Nels Cline, saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell, pianist Matt Mitchell, bassist Mark Dresser, pianist-vocalist Robin Holcomb, and cellist Peggy Lee shows that those qualities have become even more nuanced, and broadcast with even greater feel.
