Saxophonist Mars Williams' death in November 2023 from ampullary cancer at only 68 pretty much ruined Christmas forever. The reason for the season had increasingly been his marvelous An Ayler Christmas project, bringing together various avant garde jazz players to interpolate the dedicatee's works with holiday fare. Fruitcake tastes even drier now without it.
In addition to that endeavor, Williams was lauded for his work across an array of left-of-center rock groups (The Waitresses, The Psychedelic Furs, Die Warzau, Ministry, to name just a few) alongside out jazz encounters with the likes of Hal Russell, Ken Vandermark, Peter Brötzmann and his own cooperative projects.
Given that the latter realm is mostly a live experience, Williams can live on in posthumously released concert recordings. A recent one documents a Barcelona duo performance with the younger — yet equally eclectic — Spanish drummer Vasco Trilla. Awakening Nature From Her Dream is aptly titled. Rather than the expected bombast, Williams (credited with reeds and toy instruments) and Trilla (also percussion) hedge towards an atomistic type of space jazz, less supernovae explosions and more the blips and dark matter emanations of cosmic emptiness.
It takes over half of the nearly-14-minute opening "Awakening #1" before things are heard above a whisper, Williams and Trilla evoking the bustle of a Middle Eastern bazaar after sunrise, before quieting back down as the moon climbs over the desert. This is followed by the half-as-long "Awakening #2", building to a gripping and frenetic climax made all the more stirring for what preceded it.
"Awakening #3" is all gesture, texture and pulsation, an exercise in restraint from both participants. The closing "Awakening #4" is probably what the Spanish audience had been waiting patiently for all concert, a blowout recalling similar work by Brötzmann and a mix of every drummer the latter ever worked with, from Han Bennink to Hamid Drake.
It was wise of the principals not to play one continuous set as it allowed for resets and a greater amount of intention and programming than is often heard in free jazz.
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