Monitor (Dig) [Import]

Michael Moore | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 12, 2000)
• Original Release Date: September 12, 2000
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Between the Lines
• ASIN: B00002R2QA
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #728,456 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

One hallmark of Jimmy Giuffre's 1960s-era drummerless trio was the listener's inability to differentiate improvised and composed music the band played. American expat saxophonist and clarinetist Michael Moore has been mining at least some of Giuffre's approaches to tone--perhaps unwittingly--for years in his adopted hometown, Amsterdam. Here, he takes a page from the Giuffre trio's book, with a particularly Amsterdam-centric spin. In other words, cellist Tristan Honsinger and pianist Cor Fuhler love to play dittylike melodies (try the folky "Budnike," for one) and then dance around them playfully with shades of dissonance coming from each trio member and some truly unusual sound originating from Fuhler's invented "keyolin"--an inverted, two-string viola connected to a small keyboard. Moore favors long, patient tones and a sometimes tart sound to match Honsinger's here sawing, there rhapsodizing command of the cello. These are pieces that will reward close listening--especially from those who've found Giuffre's trio music captivating. --Andrew Bartlett

From Jazziz

Living in Amsterdam, American expatriates Michael Moore (reeds) and Tristan Honsinger (cello) team up with Dutch pianist Cor Fuhler to follow a superficially simple plan: tonally, two stringed instruments (be they hammered, bowed, or plucked) against and with reeds; compositionally, one performer plays a written melody, the other two accompany him improvisationally. Otherwise, things aren't that simple. These improvisors run the gamut of performing possibilities - from the reserved, in Moore's warm clarinet, to the theatric, in Honsinger's flip-outs on cello, to a grainy skronk from Moore. this is eccentric stuff, but always in a structured context, which makes listening to it such a pleasure.

Being under Dutch pianist Misha Mengelberg's wing has led these three to understand the power of compositional suggestion. Indeed, a minimum of structure controls the music but also motivates it and gives these pieces a sense of surprising development: "Riddled" has Honsinger playing a fragmentary, plaintive melody, then the piece moves into chaos, only to end again sounding like chamber music that could have been composed by Eric Satie. On "Five Bits," Fuhler on Hammond organ presses out modest, charming, petite bits of sound that blend with the longer bowed pieces by Honsinger, himself sounding a bit like a baroque étude gone perverse. And then there's Fuhler's keyolin, a contraption he invented out of a viola. Its bizarrely Asian sound on Fuhler's "Desinteresse en Deviatie" integrates the structural improvisations like peanut butter with chocolate. A tasty surprise.

--Bruce Carnevale, JAZZIZ Magazine Copyright © 2000, Milor Entertainment, Inc.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Michael Moore, Expat American Genius, July 18, 2001

By 

Jan P. Dennis "Longboard jazzer" (Monument, CO USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Monitor (Dig) (Audio CD)

[...] Monitor is probably not the right place to start with Michael Moore. Between the Lines is an unabashedly avant garde label, with Monitor being one of the tamer releases. Better to start with, perhaps, The Clusone 3 (Moore with the incredible Ernst Reijseger and playful Han Bennink), Available Jelly (a sort of little big band), or MGM trio. These works are both more accessible and more representative of Moore's unique genius (good luck finding them, however). Moore has an extensive discography--over a dozen discs on his own Dutch label, Ramboy, solid representation on several Gerry Hemingway discs, he's a featured player in the Instant Composer's Orchestra, etc.

[...] Yes, it is a lot about textures, and it has a certain European austerity, but if you can get beyond what often to American ears is a somewhat sterile esthetic real beauty emerges. It is safe to say that there are sounds on here heard nowhere else in recorded music. It's worth a listen just for that.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not exactly what I expected!, June 25, 2001

By 

Peter Gerdine (TROY, NY USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Monitor (Dig) (Audio CD)

I read Stuart Nicholson's article in the New York Times about European vs. American jazz and bought several albums he recommended, including this one by Michael Moore et al. Best thing about it is the cool silver and green cover! I like to think I am open to new musical forms, but this one I found unappealing in the extreme: percussion, mixing, more style than content. Nils Petter Molvaer I found more accessible ("Khmer"). See the replies in the Letters section of the Times, 6/17/01 for other perspectives.