Lisa Sokolov is a wonderful vocalist, improviser and composer, one of the few artists who�is really able to work avant garde influences with elements of R & B, soul and folk in song formats. Her roots are in the New York downtown scene and she has played and recorded with Cecil Taylor, William Parker - on his Song Cycle (Boxholder, 2001) and with the Little Huey Creative Music Orchestra - and vocalist Ellen Christi. Her new, long overdue third solo disc is another testimony to her originality, creativity and impressive musical vision.

Presence is a "progressive journey that moves from the individual experience of 'being human' to the collective experience of humanness," as she writes in the liner notes.�She begins with three songs that deal explicitly with faith. The energetic, spiritual title track ("...There is Presence/Presence everywhere/Hiding/Hiding"), with multi-tracked vocals,�opens the disc and leads into William Parker's gospel "Hopefully," which she performs a capella. After�an updated�version of� Rogers & Hammerstein's "Oh, What a Beautiful Morning," in duet with pianist John DiMartino, she enters into a suite of reflections on the�contrasting feelings in any meaningful relationship. She begins this part of the disc with a beautiful version of Cole Porter's "You Do Something to Me," a stunning duet with bass player Cameron Brown (who has worked before with vocalist Sheila Jordan, among others) in which she demonstrates her lovely rhythmic sense.�She then reconstructs Aretha Franklin's "Chain of Fools,"� pushing the song through deep, throaty groans�and unrestrained shouts to its catharsis, never abandoning the original version's groove.�She sings her�abstract "Hard Being Human," and a fragile, childlike take on Jacques Brel's "Sons Of," as an observation about parenthood.�

This moves cyclically into an acceptance of life and its fragility. An ancient Chinese poem, "Water Lilies,"�arranged by Sokolov; an open, chance-taking and passionate version of Laura Nyro's "And When I Die"; a track�excerpting the poem "The Testing Tree" by�Stanley Kunitz, a quiet version of Lewis and Coots' "For All We Know"; and a splendid, tongue-in-cheek�version of the traditional "Home on the Range."

The disc was recorded live at Tampere Jazz Happening in Finland and at the Vision Festival in New York City, and in a New York studio during 2002, with DiMartino, Brown and long time collaborator, drummer Gerry Hemingway, with whom she recorded his song cycle, Songs (Between The Lines, 2002). Not an "easy background listen", to quote Sokolov, but a very rewarding one.