The Squid's Ear Magazine


Modirzadeh, Hafez: Post-Chromodal Out! (Pi Recordings)

The next step in Iranian-American saxophonist Hafez Modirzadeh's quest to create a seamless cross-cultural exchange of musical structures between the Persian dastgah and American jazz.
 

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Personnel:



Hafez Modirzadeh-alto saxophone

tenor saxophone

Amir ElSaffar-trumpet

Vijay Iyer-piano

Ken Filiano-bass

Royal Hartigan-drums

Guests:

Danongan Kalanduyan-kulintang

Faraz Minooei-santur

Timothy Volpicella-electric guitar


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UPC: 808713004427

Label: Pi Recordings
Catalog ID: Pi 44
Squidco Product Code: 16613

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2012
Country: USA
Packaging: Cardstock gatefold foldover
Recorded on February 15th-16th, 2012 at Park West Studios, Brooklyn, NY by Jim Clouse.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Post-Chromodal Out! is an important new release from Pi Recordings that represents the next step in composer/saxophonist Hafez Modirzadeh's 30-year quest to create a seamless exchange of musical structures across all cultures. It is the culmination of a system he calls "chromodality," which Modirzadeh originally developed to integrate Persian tones with Western equal temperament to further explore harmonic possibilities in jazz. He has since expanded his concept to encompass a "post-chromodal" approach in which all kinds of intervals co-exist; one with meta-cultural potential that allows each musician to use his own distinctive voice to explore music from a full palette of tonal possibilities. The result is not simply some sort of mash-up; it is no less than an effort to altogether transcend cultural differences.

The post-chromodal concepts were first put into practice by Modirzadeh with Iraqi-American trumpeter Amir ElSaffar in their co-led project Radif Suite (Pi 32), which the New York Times called "scintillating... a radical cultural exchange" and "thick with ideas and inspiration" by the Los Angeles Times. Here, as on Radif, Modirzadeh and ElSaffar utilize extended technique to achieve intervals between major and minor. Through the use of alternate fingerings and changes in embouchure, they are able to subtly manipulate pitch, allowing them to break free of the boundaries of equal temperament into new tonal orientation. Post-Chromodal Out!, however, takes the concept one step further through the introduction of a piano re-tuned to variations on Persian temperaments devised by Modirzadeh. Set with three-quarter tones (not quarter tones, but large half-steps, or small whole-steps) integrated with intervals common to equal temperament, the instrument requires the pianist to take a completely new approach. Leaping headlong into this music is pianist Vijay Iyer, who takes on the re-tuned instrument with an improvisatory mastery befitting his own reputation for combining jazz with the music of different cultures. Modirzadeh had this to say about Iyer: "I have approached many pianists over the years, but Vijay was the only one to physically sit down at a beat-up old upright I had retuned, to trust in the possibilities, and make it happen. His confidence to move through vulnerable realms demonstrates great mental endurance, collaborative spirit, patience and love. He applied enormous will and understanding, taking on what is at stake with uncompromising determination." The band also includes Ken Filiano on bass and royal hartigan on drums, both of whom have worked with Modirzadeh for over 25 years and each a seasoned explorer of cross-cultural musical possibilities in his own right. Also on board are guest artists Danongan Kalanduyan on the Filipino kulintang, Faraz Minooei on santur, and Timothy Volpicella on electric guitar, who help to further establish the meta-cultural nature of this music.

Modirzadeh, who is of Iranian-American descent, grew up mostly in Northern California and started playing saxophone at the age of 12. He spent his teenage years hanging out at clubs like the Keystone Korner in San Francisco, seeking guidance and inspiration from many of the saxophone legends who passed through town like Sonny Stitt, Dexter Gordon, James Moody, Joe Henderson, and Sonny Simmons. After graduating college he studied for a time at New England Conservatory before returning to California to continue studying the Persian dastgah with master musician Mahmoud Zoufonoun. These teachings helped convince Modirzadeh to pursue his own path in jazz, one steeped in the musical traditions of Iran. He received his masters from UCLA before moving to the East Coast in the mid-1980s to try out the New York jazz scene and to pursue a doctorate at Wesleyan University. It was during this time that he developed his original chromodal concept, which was subsequently the subject of his doctoral dissertation. In New York he played with groups such as Charlie Persip's Superband and Fred Ho's Afro-Asian Ensemble but overall found that attempts to try out his new concept were mostly met with disdain. He tells of a typical scene: "I went to a popular jam session in lower Manhattan to try this concept in public. Before the end of my first chorus, the leader of the session pulled the horn out of my mouth and dragged me off the stage by my neck strap, yelling 'You can't just get up here and play like that!'"

Modirzadeh would eventually move back to California, where he is now a Music Professor of World Cultures at San Francisco State University. As years turned into decades, and although awarded two NEA Fellowships and a Fulbright, still, the feeling never escaped Modirzadeh that his life's work was slowly dying on the vine. The story might have ended there if not for a serendipitous visit to Ornette Coleman's home in New York City in 2007. Modirzadeh had been interested in finding out how it was that after years of developing his own musical approach through Persian and various other non-western systems that he would somehow arrive at a tonal language similar to Coleman's. A single afternoon visit turned into days of discussion and playing, leaving Modirzadeh convinced of the need for a universal "post-chromodal" approach that breaks free of all cultural barriers. Consequently, Coleman invited Modirzadeh to play with him at the 2007 San Francisco and Monterey Jazz Festivals.

A year later, the reinvigorated Modirzadeh met Amir ElSaffar at a recording session in New York. According to ElSaffar their connection was immediate: "Our chemistry was uncanny, unlike any I had experienced with any other musician. Beyond our similar cultural backgrounds, there was a resonance in his sound, and openness and acceptance in his approach that encouraged creativity and spontaneity every time that we played together." ElSaffar proceeded to study with Modirzadeh, and their partnership results in the release of Radif Suite in 2010.

Vijay Iyer says of Modirzadeh: "The scope of Hafez's synthesis of concepts across cultures is staggering. There is great detail in his critical engagement with traditional intervallic systems, tuning systems, and modes, and there is also a grand sweep to his vision across disciplines and historical eras. In spite of its technical complications, there is genuine heart to this music and a real spiritual clarity. Modirzadeh is not simply a 'scholar' or 'musicologist,' but a genuine artist, with a profound, lifelong stake in the unification of research, creative work, and personal inner quest that is expressed in his music."

Post-Chromodal Out! is comprised of two suites: "Weft Facets" by Modirazdeh and "Wolf and Warp" by James Norton, who was commissioned by Modirzadeh to compose an independent work with the intention of demonstrating the expansiveness of this approach to re-tuning. When asked the reason for his urgent imperative to re-tune the piano, Modirzadeh replied: "The standardized temperament for piano, as beautiful as it is, carries an unbalanced weight of influence over players and listeners, leading many to believe that there is no other resonance to work with but this one. This creates a value system that is unjust and ultimately limits the discovery of other, more personal tuning possibilities. By retuning the piano - the one instrument that imposes a dominant influence on the world's music - the musician is freed to explore all tonal possibilities." The result is music that is like nothing that has been attempted before, one that promises to shake the harmonic foundation of Western culture's tempered system."-Pi Recordings


Artist Biographies

"Saxophonist/theorist Hafez Modirzadeh has performed, recorded, published and lectured internationally on original cross-cultural musical concepts which include "Convergence Liberation" (in Critical Studies in Improvisation, 2011), "Compost Music" (in Leonardo, 2009), "Aural Archetypes" (in Black Music Research, 2001), as well as "Chromodality" (for Wesleyan University, 1992). Twice an NEA Jazz Fellow, Dr. Modirzadeh received a Senior Fulbright Award in 2006 to work with Flamenco and Gnawan traditions in Andalucia and Morocco, and again in 2014, to research Turkish Makam harmonization in Ankara. He is currently a Professor of Creative/World Music at San Francisco State University."

-Hafez Modirzadeh Website (http://hafezmodirzadeh.com/bio)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Described by The New York Times as a "social conscience, multimedia collaborator, system builder, rhapsodist, historical thinker and multicultural gateway," VIJAY IYER has carved out a unique path as an influential, prolific, shape-shifting presence in twenty-first-century music. A composer and pianist active across multiple musical communities, Iyer has created a consistently innovative, emotionally resonant body of work over the last twenty-five years, earning him a place as one of the leading music-makers of his generation.

He received a MacArthur Fellowship, a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, a United States Artist Fellowship, a Grammy nomination, the Alpert Award in the Arts, and two German "Echo" awards, and was voted Downbeat Magazine's Jazz Artist of the Year four times in the last decade. He has been praised by Pitchfork as "one of the best in the world at what he does," by the Los Angeles Weekly as "a boundless and deeply important young star," and by Minnesota Public Radio as "an American treasure."

Iyer's musical language is grounded in the rhythmic traditions of South Asia and West Africa, the African American creative music movement of the 60s and 70s, and the lineage of composer-pianists from Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk to Alice Coltrane and Geri Allen. He has released twenty-four albums of his music, most recently UnEasy (ECM Records, 2021), a trio session with drummer Tyshawn Sorey and bassist Linda May Han Oh; The Transitory Poems (ECM, 2019), a live duo recording with pianist Craig Taborn; Far From Over (ECM, 2017) with the award-winning Vijay Iyer Sextet; and A Cosmic Rhythm with Each Stroke (ECM, 2016) a suite of duets with visionary composer-trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith.

Iyer is also an active composer for classical ensembles and soloists. His works have been commissioned and premiered by Brentano Quartet, Imani Winds, Bang on a Can All-Stars, The Silk Road Ensemble, International Contemporary Ensemble, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, LA Philharmonic, American Composers Orchestra, and virtuosi Matt Haimowitz, Claire Chase, Shai Wosner, and Jennifer Koh, among others. He recently served as composer-in-residence at London's Wigmore Hall, music director of the Ojai Music Festival, and artist-in-residence at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.

A tireless collaborator, he has written big-band music for Arturo O'Farrill and Darcy James Argue, remixed classic recordings of Talvin Singh and Meredith Monk, joined forces with legendary musicians Henry Threadgill, Reggie Workman, Zakir Hussain, and L. Subramanian, and developed interdisciplinary work with Teju Cole, Carrie Mae Weems, Mike Ladd, Prashant Bhargava, and Karole Armitage.

A longtime New Yorker, Iyer lives in central Harlem with his wife and daughter. He teaches at Harvard University in the Department of Music and the Department of African and African American Studies. He is a Steinway artist."

-Vijay Iyer Website (https://vijay-iyer.com/about/)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Ken Filiano performs throughout the world, playing and recording with leading artists in jazz, spontaneous improvisation, classical, world/ethnic, and interdisciplinary performance, fusing the rich traditions of the double bass with his own seemingly limitless inventiveness. Ken's solo bass CD, subvenire (NineWinds), received widespread critical praise. For this and numerous other recordings, Ken has been called a creative virtuoso, a master of technique ... a paradigm of that type of artist... who can play anything in any context and make it work, simply because he puts the music first and leaves peripheral considerations behind.

Ken composes for his quartet with Michael Attias, Tony Malaby, and Michael T.A. Thomspon; a collective with Attias and Tomas Ulrich; and for his decades-long collaborations with Steve Adams and Vinny Golia. His prolific output also includes performances and/or recordings with artists including Bonnie Barnett, Rob Blakeslee, Bobby Bradford, Taylor Ho Bynum, Roy Campbell, John Carter, Nels Cline, Alex Cline, Connie Crothers, Mark Dresser, Ted Dunbar, Marty Ehrlich, Giora Feidman, Bob Feldman, Eddie Gale, Georgian Chamber Orchestra, Dennis Gonzalez, Lou Grassi, Phil Haynes, Fred Hess, Jason Hwang, Joseph Jarman, Sheila Jordan (with the Aardvark Orchestra), Raul Juarena, Joe Labarbera, Joelle Leandre, Frank London, Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, Tina Marsh, Warne Marsh, Dom Minasi, Hafez Modirzadeh, Butch Morris, Barre Phillips, Don Preston, Herb Robertson, Bob Rodriguez, Roswell Rudd, ROVA Saxophone Quartet, Ursel Schlicht, Paul Smoker, Chris Sullivan, Peeter Uuskyla, Fay Victor, Biggi Vinkeloe, Kenny Wessel, Andrea Wolper, Pablo Ziegler. With Tomas Ulrich, Elliott Sharp, and Carlos Zingaro, he is a member of T.E.C.K. String Quartet.

Ken has been a guest lecturer, performer, and workshop leader at institutions in the United States and Europe. He earned a MM from Rutgers University and is currently on faculty at Mansfield University."- All About Jazz

-Pi Recordings / All About Jazz (https://pirecordings.com/artist/Ken_Filiano)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Royal Hartigan is a percussionist who has studied and performed the musics of Asia, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas, including indigenous West African drumming, dance, song, and highlife; Turkish bendir frame drum; Japanese taiko drumming; Philippine kulintang gong and drum ensemble; Chinese Beijing, Cantonese, and Kunqu opera percussion; South Indian solkattu rhythms; Korean Nong ak drum and gong ensemble; Javanese and Sumatran gamelan; Gaelic bodhran; Native American drumming; Dominican merengue; Brazilian samba; Cambodian sampho drums and Vietnamese clapper percussion, European symphony; and African American blues, gospel, funk, hip-hop, and jazz traditions.

He was awarded an AB in Philosophy from St. Michael's College in 1968, specializing in medieval metaphysics and the existentialism of Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Satre. He received a BA degree in African American music at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1981, studying with Roland Wiggins, Frederick Tillis, Reggie Workman, Archie Shepp, Max Roach, and Clifford Jarvis. royal earned his MA and Ph.D degrees in world music at Wesleyan University in 1983 and 1986, studying intensively with ethnomusicologist David McAllester and Bill Lowe, Bill Barron, Ed Blackwell, Freeman Donkor, Abraham Adzenyah, and other master artists from Java, India, and Ghana, West Africa.

He has taught ethnomusicology, African drumming, and world music ensemble at the New School for Social Research in New York and the Graduate Liberal Studies Program at Wesleyan University. royal helped develop and taught graduate and undergraduate courses in world music, large and small jazz ensembles, experimental music ensemble, Asian music ensembles (Philippine kulintang and Javanese gamelan), African American music history, and West African drumming and dance at San Jose State University before assuming a position as Assistant Professor in world music at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth. He has taught Music Theory and Fundamentals, Western Music history, and Introduction to World Music. He currently teaches music of the African Diaspora, area studies, and World Music Survey. He has served on the music department curriculum development, the CVPA lecture series, and the University Cultural Diversity committees as well as initiating grants for numerous workshops and concerts of world music during the 1999-2000 academic year.

His publications include Cross Cultural Performance and Analysis of West African, African American, Native American, Central Javanese, and South Indian Drumming, a 1700-page analysis of world drumming traditions (the Edwin Mellen Press); articles in Percussive Notes, World of Music, Annual Review of Jazz Studies, and The African American Review; and a book with compact disc, West African Rhythms for Drumset (Manhattan Music/Warner Brothers). He has given lectures and clinics on world music and jazz in Africa, China, Europe, and North America. He travels to West Africa each summer to teach, perform, and do research, collaborating with J.H. Nketia at the Institute for African Studies, University of Ghana, and the musicians at the Dagbe Cultural Center, Kopeyia village, Volta Region, Ghana.

He has performed, given workshops, and recorded internationally with his own quartet (Blood Drum Spirit, 1997 and Ancestors 2000), Juba (Look on the Rainbow 1987), Talking Drums (Talking Drums, 1985 and Someday Catch, Someday Down, 1987) the Fred Ho Afro-Asian Music Ensemble (We Refuse to Be Used and Song for Manong, 1988, Underground Railroad to My Heart, 1994, Monkey Epic:Part 1, 1996,Turn Pain Into Power, 1997, Monkey Epic Part 2, 1997, Yes Means Yes, No Means No! 1998, Night Vision 2000), Hafez Modirzadeh's Paradox Ensemble (Chromodal Discourse, 1993 and The Peoples Blues, 1996, The Mystery of Sama 1998), the David Bindman-Tyrone Henderson Project (Strawman Dance, 1993 Iliana's Dance, 1996), and Nathaniel Mackey (Songs of the Andoumboulou, 1995). He has released a documentary and artistic video of his work in West Africa and its relation to the African American music cultures (Eve)."

-Royal Hartigan Website (http://www.royalhart.com/Bio/bio.html)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. Facet Thirteen 2:57

2. Facet Fourteen 8:26

3. Facet Fifteen 1:49

4. Interlude I 2:44

5. Facet Sixteen 1:46

6. Facet Seventeen 6:04

7. Facet Eighteen 1:49

8. Interlude II 2:06

9. Facet Nineteen 0:41

10. Facet Twenty 3:12

11. Facet Twenty-One 2:48

12. Facet Twenty-Two 3:36

13. Interlude III 1:47

14. Facet Twenty-Three 0:55

15. Facet Twenty-Four 3:11

16. Interlude IV 2:24

17. Facet Twenty-Five/Reprise 2:16

18. Wolf One 1:57

19. Wolf Two-Piano Solo 0:57

20. Wolf Two-Ensemble 3:40

21. Wolf Two-Bass Solo 1:44

22. Warp Three-Ensemble 2:39

23. Warp Three-Drum Solo 1:00

24. Warp Four 2:29

25. Wolf Five-Part One 2:41

26. Wolf Five-Part Two 2:44

27. Wolf Six 2:43

28. Wolf Seven 2:40

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Jazz
NY Downtown & Jazz/Improv
Pi Records
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