Customer Reviews

Northwest Passage

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

My Dad had a couple early Oregon discs around the house because he had been at the University of Oregon school of music at the same time as guitarist/pianist Ralph Towner and acoustic bass player Glen Moore, who both sat in on his pickup dance band once or twice. Moore remained a friend of the family over the years.

I didn't much like the albums. Too many of the cuts were just too spacey, they didn't go much of anywhere. I liked a little more beat and melody to most of my music, which is why I went for Shadowfax for a while. Oregon's terrific _Ecotopia_ album answered these requirements, however, and this one does even better.

There are so many different ways for music to be beautiful, and a lot of them are here. "Claridade" is delicately regretful, "Under a Dorian Sky" airily menacing (best use of the band's free-form style I've heard), "Fortune Cookie" a quirky bop, "Intro" expansive and introspective, "L'Assassino Che Suona" a typical sample of Moore's oddities (for those who remember "Leather Cats" from _Ecotopia_ or "Cream of Bartok Soup" from his solo disc; the title of this one comes from an Italian female acquaintance who saw the bassist slinking along in his trench coat and took him for an assassin).

"Take Heart," "Joyful Departure" and "Yet to Be" are all upbeat, optimistic, and inspiring. (I've noticed that my local public radio station often uses snatches of these tunes for its incidental music.) For a change of pace, "Don't Knock On My Door" is a sort of East Indian rave-up, with percussionist Arto Tuncboyaciyan burbling vocally.

But my favorite cut is "Nightfall" -- moody and apprehensive, cool yet jittery, eerie and rich. Towner's shifting chords under the main theme send shivers up your spine, McCandless's soprano sax wails over stinging notes from the guitar and aggressive thumps from the bass. It's even better live.

One other thing I don't usually note: The packaging of this CD is gorgeous, too.

I love this album. Progressive jazz at its very best. Buy it!

Only four reviews at the time of this writing... Not popular music for sure. Music from the heart, and you can be sure it speaks to the heart. Complex - yes, sophisticated - yes. But music that one can understand instantly. I have owned all Oregon records in one form or another, and I can confidently say that this particular record is one of their top 5. It has the lyricism, feeling, chops and something else that is hard to define. Also it is more melodic than previous efforts, with less atonal harmony. It seems as if they have set the expirementation aside, and decided to create beautiful, searching music.

I had not heard of this particular group except for an ad in a double reed journal. As an amatuer oboe player, I was curious enough to order the CD and was pleasantly surprised when I listened to it. This is a serious jazz album, with harmonic, melodic and rhythmic complexities to delight any jazz lover looking for something unusual. I was most curious about Paul Mccandless' oboe playing, which was great, as was his soprano saxophone work. But the string bass and percussion were also impressive. I also liked the HUGE variety of styles on this CD; all were played with great finesse, sensitivity, and enthusiasm. This is a great addition to my CD library.

This is a very good sounding disk. There is no distortion, only mild compression, and no clipping. It has been recorded, mixed, and mastered with good sound as the prime motivator. I am quite satisfied with the quality of the sound on this disk.

A great CD, I bought this in an attempt to recall the experience of having just seen Oregon live for the first time. If you enjoy this then do what you have to in order to catch them while percussionist Mark Walker is still with the band. No recording can do justice to Mark's and leader Ralph's live sound. Not to ignore the other musicians but genius is the only term sufficient to convey the captivating and hypnotic spell that Mark and Ralph creates on stage in combination or solo.

Cet album est rare car il introduit une dimension inconnue jusqu'alors des auditeurs. De suites en danses il évolue dans la catégorie des grands. Pour exemple le fabuleux Claridade.

I have recordings from the Vanguard, Electra and ECM days and had decided to try something more recent. Where did the originality go? Some of the other reviews consider this to be a mellower, more melodic sound. I'd call it uninspired pop. It really could pass for Muzak jazz in the department store. There's nothing memorable about it. When musicians have lost the creative juice, they shouldn't waste our money making more CD's. I'll stick with the earlier stuff.