Clarinetist Anat Cohen's Joyful Claroscuro

The award-winning, Israeli born Clarinetist Anat Cohen’s latest release is Claroscuro (Anzic). Cohen and her clarinets and saxophones are joined on this recording by her quartet of pianist Jason Lindner, bassist Joe Martin and drummer Daniel Freedman. There are also appearances by Paquito D’Rivera on clarinet, Wycliffe Gordon on trombone and Gilmar Gomes on percussion.

The album takes it title from the Spanish word describing the play of light and shade (chiaroscuro in Italian) and was a title that Cohen believes most accurately describes “the contrasts within the sounds of the album mainly between light (buoyant and joyous) and dark (multi-layered and intense).” The music exhibits playfulness on Lindner’s Anat’s Dance, exhilaration in the duet with D’Rivera on Pixinuinha’s Um a Zero, as well as melancholy on another duet with D’Rivera on Artie Shaw’s Nightmare. There is an intensity manifested by the clarinets on that number that contrasts with the pensiveness Cohen, on tenor saxophone exhibits during Abdullah Ibrahim’s The Wedding. 

In addition to the variety of emotions expressed, Cohen transverses the traditional and the modern. La Vie En Rose, a song associated with Edith Piaf. H Wycliffe Gordon adds trombone (with some nice growling mute playing) and a Louis Armstrong-inspired vocal in addition to Cohen’s lovely clarinet that would bring a smile to Barney Bigard. A favorite selection is the contemporary rendition of Pixinuinha’s classic choro Um a Zero, with the dazzling clarinet duets between Cohen and D’Rivera. On this, percussionist Gomes and drummer Freedman also get some of the spotlight. Cohen, on tenor saxophone, plays more contemplatively in her interpretation of the afore-mentioned rendition of Abdullah Ibrahim’s The Wedding. This is the final selection in another outstanding recording from one of today's most significant jazz voice. 

My review copy was provided by a publicist for the release. Here is Anat Cohen and her quartet in performance. 

Anat Cohen's Marvelous Village Notes

Anat Cohen certainly has established herself among the rising new performers in jazz today. The following review originally appeared in the November 2008 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 310), although I have made minor edits. I believe I received a review copy from Jazz & Blues Report.
One of the many prominent Israeli born jazz artists to come to our attention, Anat Cohen has been receiving critical kudos from the jazz press as well as making her mark. The first female horn player to headline the Village Vanguard, she has opened eyes and ears with her marvelous reed playing.

This writer was captivated by her performance as part of the United Jazz Orchestra led by Paquito D’Rivera at the 2007 Duke Elllington Jazz Festival. Her latest album is the marvelous Notes From the Village (Anzic), and has her backed by Jason Lindner on piano; Omer Avital on bass; and drummer Daniel Freedman, with guitarist Hekselman appearing on three of the eight performances.

This is lively and uplifting music from the start with the opening Washington Square Park, incorporating latin elements along with modern and traditional jazz. the music sings and its hard to resist the urge to dance with this including Hekselman’s twisting, lively solo and Cohen’s serpentine soprano sax playing here. Its followed by Cohen’s lovely ballad Until You’re in Love Again, with its echoes of Gordon Jenkins’ Goodbye, with her lovely woody clarinet tone evoking Goodman’s legacy before taking the song into a new direction. It is as indicative as any track here showing the freshness of her music and playing.

Cuban composer Ernesto Lecouna’s Siboney, features an arrangement by Lindner which fuses elements of tango with the Afro-Cuban foundation as Cohen’s horn sings again. She plays bass clarinet on the lovely, wistful rendition of Coltrane’s After the Rain, with Lindner taking a nice solo. J Blues is a lively original with her playing mesmerizing, while her interpretation of Sam Cooke’s A Change is Gonna Come, opens with a work song like tempo as emphatically laid out by drummer Freedman, while her playing is both soulful and thoughtful.

A playful rendition of Fats Waller’s Jitterbug Waltz takes this out on another high note with a very fresh, effervescent arrangement by Cohen and her sax weaving its magic throughout, concluding a CD of music rooted in the past and present yet looking forward to the future. It certainly will add to the many kudos she already has received.