Vijay Iyer / Wadada Leo Smith: "Passage"
Aside from his joint reputation as a gripping jazz improviser and as a composer of engaging chamber works, pianist Vijay Iyer also has a talent for curation. You can observe this in his range of covers (on albums like Accelerando), as well as in the diverse lineup he’s drawn to his current residency at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s new performance venue.
It’s impossible not to detect a similarly purposeful—even activist—strain in his upcoming third release for the ECM label, called A Cosmic Rhythm With Each Stroke. A duo recording with veteran trumpeter-composer Wadada Leo Smith, it marks Smith’s first appearance on ECM since the 1993 solo set Kulture Jazz. Since then, Smith’s ambitious output, including the 2012 Pulitzer Prize-finalist release Ten Freedom Summers, has appeared on a variety of smaller labels. Early on in his career, Iyer played in Smith’s “Golden Quartet.” Now, in the aftermath of Iyer’s MacArthur “genius” grant win, the pianist has the cachet to bring Smith’s art to a wider audience—and to honor an elder whose fusion of improvisatory and notated-composition efforts have been an influence on his own development.
“Passage” is the album’s first track, composed by Iyer. His opening progression carries an elegiac feel. When the trumpeter joins, his accompaniment is initially serene and breathy—though not for long. In short order, Smith toys with dissonant lines and experimental effects that create a dreamy tension with his generally quiet playing. Iyer is the dramatist in the background: taking care not to tread too heavily during Smith’s more delicate figures, and then surging ahead with ringing chords and fast arpeggios. Instead of handing the baton back and forth, improvisation and composition operate simultaneously—making this a fitting opening to a collaboration that adds to creative legacies from two different generations.
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