THINGS TO DO IN PARIS / SIKORA: Jeu de Paume. Wallaby Visit. Victor’s Arena. Forest Walk. Meet Me in the Courtyard / Catherine Sikora, t-sax; Ethan Winograd, dm / private release, available on Bandcamp (live: Paris, fall 2014)
SANCTUARY – SOLO IN PARIS / SIKORA: Sanctuary / Catherine Sikora, t-sax / private release, available on Bandcamp (live: Paris, August 2, 2020)
These two recordings give further evidence that Irish-born saxist Catherine Sikora is one of the premiere improvisers of our time, an artist of uncompromising invention as well as one who always plays from her heart and soul. Indeed, I have told her via e-mail that her music touches me in a way that most modern jazz rarely does because there is something very earthy, almost sensual about her playing, and these recordings only confirm that feeling.
Things to Do in Paris comes from a session taped six years ago but just released now. As in most of her impromptu improvised solos, Sikora plays with form and shapes; she relates certain inspired figures to each other, thus managing to create a feeling of continuity throughout each piece. Drummer Winograd is a fine player who primarily adds color and a variety of asymmetrical rhythms to each piece as it is created.
Because it is improvised and largely bitonal music, it is difficult to describe in words, but by and large Sikora plays mostly “inside” while projecting the feeling of “outside” jazz via her deep knowledge of harmony. She also spices up her playing with a number of coloristic devices, among them growls, buzzes and moments when she seems to be playing her tenor on the edge of the mouthpiece, all of which holds the listener’s attention. I was particularly struck by Wallaby Visit with its fast eighth-note figures which she connects, slows down and expands upon in a most brilliant fashion. Indeed, I liked it so much that I played it twice. By the five-minute mark, Winograd is very much a partner in creation, matching Sikora’s unusual rhythmic patterns perfectly or, at times, playing against them.
But then, listen to Victor’s Arena and you’ll know what I mean when I speak of her earthy, sensual playing. No other living saxist can compare to what she does here, and it is the very sound of her instrument that adds to the feeling. In each of the previous recordings by her that I’ve reviewed, there hasn’t been one in which I have not felt an almost personal connection to her playing. Is she trying to communicate with each and every listener through her music? I don’t know, but even if it is just that she is trying to express herself, she is doing do in a way that achieves the same end. It also amazes me how many different rhythms and figures she can come up with. I sometimes wonder if she’d do the same thing within the confines of a structured song. I think she would.
In Forest Walk, Sikora seems to be purposely going outside her comfort zone to play rasping, edgy figures. This must be one sinister forest she’s walking through! And there are some hesitant moments in this forest walk, as if neither she nor Winograd are certain where to place their next step, yet they always manage to move forward. The finale, Meet Me in the Courtyard, has a looser, funkier feel to it thanks to Winograd’s excellent drumming.
The long, improvised solo Sanctuary is another thing completely. This is slow, rapt, deeply personal music, as close to raw expression as one is likely to get. And believe it or not, Sikora actually does more things with her tenor here than on the whole of Things to Do in Paris. I urge you to listen very carefully to this long (24-minute) solo, for despite its generally slow pace there is more going on than in an entire hour-long album from many another sax player. Once again, Sikora manages to both create and connect different improvised figures, and to a certain extent she is freer without a drummer because she now needs no other musician to “follow” her or “support” her in what she plays. My late, dear friend, jazz critic Ralph Berton, never understood long a cappella saxophone solos like those that Coleman Hawkins and Sonny Rollins recorded, but to my mind they were utterly brilliant and forerunners of what Sikora does here. No, her playing is not as “outside” as that of Ivo Perelman, but it doesn’t need to be. She is perfectly expressive in what she does, in fact even more personal in expression than Perelman. He does indeed play even wilder music, but wild is not necessarily a personal expression. If nothing else, Sikora is extremely personal, even intimate, in every note and phrase she plays.
These two releases are yet further laurels in Sikora’s crown. You’ll have a hard time convincing me that she isn’t the best living female saxophone player in jazz.
—© 2020 Lynn René Bayley
Follow me on Twitter (@artmusiclounge) or Facebook (as Monique Musique)
Read my book, From Baroque to Bop and Beyond: An extended and detailed guide to the intersection of classical music and jazz
THE ART MUSIC LOUNGE 