Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by Jerome Wilson

Cadence Magazine, Jan-Feb-Mar 2009

On Radiola Australian saxophonist Andrew Robson leaves the piano out and leads a trio with galvanic force. Robson plays actual or implied tribute to several other saxophonists here. “Big Ben” is a fat rocking Blues dedicated to Bennie Wallace and “Lace Work” is a lyrical soprano piece with a calypso backbeat dedicated to Steve Lacy. On “Amber Room,” Radiola,” and “Cosmology” there is a liquid
quiver to Robson’s playing that recalls Ornette Coleman though his actual tone is bigger than Coleman’s.

Steve Elphick’s and Hamish Stuart’s slick and sympathetic rhythms are crucial to the session and they really show their stuff on the funk-New Orleans-African highlife hybrid, “Radiola,” as Robson goes on an amazing tear of warbling, soulful virtuosity.

The trio also mixes in Celtic folk melodies on the strutting soprano feature, “Carillion,” and “Brindabella” where Robson plays solo recorder on a Celtic theme that slides into an undulating
North African melody when the bass and drums come in. This CD is an insinuating mix of passionate playing with world rhythms.

Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by Aaron Searle

Music Forum

Vol. 15 No. 2, February - April 2009

IIt seems that Australian saxophonists have a particular predilection for playing in trios with bass and drums. This format which is commonly referred to as a “sax trio” was unknown to earlier generations of jazz musicians. Gerry Mulligan raised eyebrows by launching his “pianoless” quartet in 1952, but it took another five years before Sonny Rollins did away with the second horn on his Way Out West album. Ornette Coleman’s Live at the Golden Circle from 1965 utilized the sax trio in a free jazz setting, spawning many imitators, but it took until the 1990s for the sax trio to really cease being a novelty and become part of the jazz mainstream, largely due to high profile trios led by saxophonists such as Branford Marsalis and Kenny Garrett.

All the same, the sax-bass-drums format remains much less common than trios led by pianists, organists or guitarists, so it is interesting to note that Australia’s relatively small jazz scene should produce so many ensembles of this nature. Perhaps the most celebrated local sax trio is that of elder statesman Bernie McGann, who has been working in this setting for nearly three decades. Other local sax trios include those led by Matt Keegan, Sandy Evans, Julien Wilson, Fiona Burnett and Dave Jackson (Trio Apoplectic).

This edition of Music Forum feature reviews of two new sax trio recordings. The first is Andrew Robson’s Radiola. This is the third album by Robson’s longstanding trio with steve Elphick on bass and Hamish stuart on drums. The album features nine of Robson’s original compositions including tributes to fellow saxophonists Bennie Wallace (“Big Ben”) and Steve Lacy (“Lace Work”) That Robson should pay homage to Wallace and Lacy is revealing. Like them, Robson is a saxophonist who is equally at home in traditional and avant garde settings. He has studied the history of jazz saxophone but is not constrained by its conventions.

Throughout Radiola Robson’s bepbop training frequently shows through, however many of the pieces reflect a more ethnic influence. A case in point is Mata Hari, possibly the album’s standout track. With its loping bass line and the tribal quality of Stuart’s hands on his drum skins, the ensemble texture evokes the gentler side of John Zorn’s Masada quartet. Robson’s also, often siuous and muscular, expresses an unsentimental vulnerability in this track which shows the maturity of his vision.

Both Robson’s alto and soprano saxes are luminous throughout this album. His soprano has a warm yet slightly reedy tone which makes it the perfect vehicle for Robson’s more lyrical statements. Carillion (composed for his son James) begins with an appealing melody harmonized between the soprano and the double bass. Elphick then lays out as the sax and drums duet with gradually increasing intensity before the bass re-enters for the final melody statement.

On Brindabella, Robson eschews his saxophones, playing descant recorder instead. for those of us who recall struggling through Ode to Joy on recorder in primary school, it is instructive to hear Robson take the little instrument through its paces. He plays it not in the manner of the Baroque revivalists, but in a style that brings to mind the diverse world of ethnic flutes. Robson’s unaccompanied introduction sounds somewhat like the Celtic tin whistle of Joanie Madden and Michael McGoldrick, but once the rhythm section enters with Stuart’s mallets and gongs and Elphick oscillation between the tonic and dominant it is the sound of the middle east that is implied. One could easily imagine the strains of a distant ney carried on the wind across north African sand dunes.

Radiola is a superb album, full of diverse colours and shades. The latest chapter in the history of the Andrew Robson Trio will leave you impatient for the next installment.

Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by John Shand

Spectrum, The Sydney Morning Herald, Aug 30-31, 2008

It's only four months since we last reviewed an Andrew Robson CD, the haunting Bearing the Bell, which had arrangements of Thomas Tallis hymns for two saxophones, trombone and bass. This new album is a return to the jazzier soundscape of his trio with bassist Steve Elphick and drummer Hamish Stuart.

Return, yes, but also another step forward because beyond the expected exceptional playing and some of Robson's finest compositions to date, Radiola's superb recording quality brings the sounds bursting into the room with naked authenticity. His alto cavorts and spirals with wild abandon moment, then seems to pinch you or stop the breath the next.

The haunting composition Mata Hari is an instant classic, its snaking melody underpinned by gloriously subtle playing from Stuart, while on Halcyon Days, Elphick takes one of those stare-into-the-abyss solos as only he can in this country. Beautifully breaking up proceedings is the unearthly solo recorder on Brindabella.

Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by Peter Wockner

Limelight Magazine , September 2008

4 stars

Not ideal for insomniacs. The infectious Transylvanian-flovoured blues, "Big Ben" for Bennie Wallace, was still spinning around in my head at 2am in the morning. Robson plays alto, soprano and recorder on this 2005 trio recording featuring Steve Elphick (bass) and Hamish Stuart (drums). From his Irish piper on recorder to Middle Eastern trance on soprano, with clear influences from Bernie McGann's upwardly truncated spirals, coupled with his own rapid fire discharge of ideas abundant, Robson has produced an amalgam of vast breadth. Robson's origional melodies are doubly effective when played in unison with Steve Elphick's warm bass tone. Exquisite.

Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by Roger Mitchell

Sunday Herald Sun (Melbourne) July 20, 2008

4 stars

There's disorder in the house, as Warren Zevon would put it. shares are falling, temperatures rising and super suddenly not so. At such times music can express our pain (Scott Tinkler's solo trumpet, perhaps) or soothe our soul.

Robson's trio offers a sublime escape. In it's second album with this line-up (composer Robson on saxophones and descant recorder, Steve Elphick on double bass and Hamish Stuart on drums), the trio celebrates the freedom of reeds and devote space and unhurried time to expressing the depth of bass and drums.

Robson displays the resonance, delicate lyricism and robust soulfullness attributed to Bennie Wallace, to whom he pays tribute in Big Ben. And his intricate swinging Lace Work is fitting homage to soprano saxophone Steve Lacy.

But Robson offers much more than due deference, lovingly exploring variations in melody and tempo with great finesse.

Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by John McBeath

The Weekend Australian, July 19-20, 2008

4 stars

This is the third album from Sydney saxophonist Andrew Robson's trio, which since 1995 has included bassist Steve Elphick and Drummer Hamish Stuart, and it charts the continuing development of an esteemed group. There are diverse influences evident here: Mata Hari is based on an eastern European dance rhythm, while the Asian-influenced Brindabella has Robson on Evocative descant recorder. Big Ben, a tribute to US tenor saxophonist Bennie Wallace, is intricately clever down-home blues. Playing mostly also on these tracks, Robson takes up the soprano for Lace Work, a smart title for a tribute to US master sopranoist Steve Lacy, who died in 2004. This piece, with it's catchy theme, moves in and out of tempo, features a rhythmically driven bass solo backed by Stuart's intelligent drumming and displays Robson's swinging ability and surety of command. The leader, on the trio's only melodic instrument, is exposed here, but with deeply creative support delivers a strong performance, never losing focus.

Radiola - Andrew Robson Trio

reviewed by Adrian Jackson

Rhythms Magazine, August 2008

Saxophonist Andrew Robson has been a prominent figure on the Sydney scene over the last decade, with Ten Part Invention, The World According the James, or Jackie Orszaczky’s bands (to name just a few), but most notably as leader of his own trio, with bassist Steve Elphick and drummer Hamish Stuart. He released two impressive CDs with the trio for Rufus (Scrum in 1998 and Sunman in 2000), before adding Alister Spence’s piano for 2001’s On. He was overdue for a release, and while Radiola doesn’t offer any major changes in direction, it does confirm that this is a first-rate band, and Robson an impressively mature soloist and composer.

Robson’s compositions - which range in style from the bluesy “Big Ben” or “Cosmology” to the exotic “Mata Hari” or “Brindabella”, which starts out like an almost-familiar folk melody – provide attractive springboards for his poised, cogently-developed improvisations. He plays soprano saxophone (on the Steve Lacy dedication, “Lace Work”) and recorder for further variation at the start of “Brindabella”. These are effective changes, but the alto sax in his primary instrument, with a greater strength of sound and range of expression than he achieves on the soprano.

Stuart takes on a supporting role, locking into his colleagues’ lines with notable sympathy. Elphick likewise provides unerring support for Robson, but also weighs in with some very well-measured solos. Anyone who has enjoyed the Trio’s previous releases will be sure to enjoy this one too.