Nightfall

Quercus (June Tabor - Iain Ballamy - Huw Warren)

Released on 4/28/17 by ECM Records
Main artists: Quercus
Genre: Jazz

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The trio known as Quercus took shape during the sessions for June Tabor's stellar 2005 album At the Wood's Heart. Their self-titled debut offering was cut during a concert on a 2006 tour and issued by ECM seven years later; it was celebrated across the globe. Nightfall was cut in a studio in Somerset and produced by pianist Huw Warren and saxophonist Iain Ballamy. The album's program consists of folk songs, four standards of different varieties, and a pair of original instrumentals that display Warren's and Ballamy's dialogic abilities and add to the group zeitgeist of discovery and invention.
Tabor amply lives up to her reputation for being the world's greatest living Anglo folksinger. Her manner of drawing hidden meaning from lyrics is equaled only by her canny ability to imbue melody with the ghost traces of history. Perhaps this is why the trio can get away with opening an album with the old farewell nugget "Auld Lang Syne." While nearly all English speakers from several generations know the traditional melody put to words by poet Robert Burns, it's never been heard like this: as a welcome, an offer of commitment, a portent to destiny. It remains bittersweet, but memories shared are offered as invitations to create new ones. The 19th century "Once I Loved You (The Irish Girl)" is introduced by Ballamy's mournful tenor saxophone, paving the way for Tabor's slightly smoky contralto revealing the lyric tragedy; they are both essentially vocalists exchanging phrases, underscored by Warren's dirgey embellishments. The hinge track is the jazz standard "You Don't Know What Love Is." Foreshadowed by Warren's elegant piano, Tabor's clean-throated delivery elucidates the timelessness of the romantic blues in contrast. "The Manchester Angel" reveals the trio's ability to offer a narrative. Tabor and Ballamy exchange voices, outlining the lyric's projection of hope and despair as Warren's playing unveils the simmering drama within. It's contrasted by Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice It's Alright." This version is less a personal manifesto than a tender but wrenching confession of resolve. Ballamy doesn't enter until two thirds of the way through with a solo that entwines with Warren's piano and exposes the sweet but affecting blues in Dylan's melody. When Tabor re-enters for the last verse, this interaction informs her utterance and a new world opens. This manner of inverting the obvious is also displayed on the trio's interpretation of the ever-mysterious folk song "Cuckoo." Here it's a haunted love song, full of unbridled eros and unquenchable want. The record turns back on itself with Stephen Sondheim's "Somewhere" from West Side Story. Like its bookend "Auld Lang Syne," it lacks the usual sadness or tragedy and is instead pregnant with possibility, as new horizons come into view. The interplay between Tabor and Ballamy is genuinely tender; when Ballamy enters, he elegantly adds the final element that points to the inevitable daybreak on the other side of Nightfall's title. This set soulfully and exponentially expands the palette and possibility displayed on the trio's debut.

© Thom Jurek /TiVo

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Nightfall

Quercus

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Auld Lang Syne