Pascal Schumacher

“Sol”

(Neue Meister Music 0301436NM)

Pascal Schumacher – vibraphone, glockenspiel, tubular bells, organelle, Yamaha reface CS

“Sol” represents the first totally solo recording by the Luxembourg born vibraphonist, composer and bandleader Pascal Schumacher.

Luxembourg has a surprisingly vibrant jazz scene and the hugely talented Schumacher, a musician with an international reputation, is one of its leading lights. He enjoys great popularity in his homeland, and also in neighbouring Belgium, and has toured widely throughout Europe and also in Japan.

“Sol” represents his thirteenth album as a leader, with the vibraphonist having made his début in 2004. Schumacher’s early recordings were made in the quartet format and his long running group featuring pianist Franz von Chossy, bassist Christophe Devisscher and drummer Jens Duppe recorded a series of albums including “Here We Gong” (2009) and the highly impressive “Bang My Can” (2011). The latter is reviewed here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/reviews/review/pascal-schumacher-quartet-bang-my-can

In 2010 Schumacher was invited to appear at the London Jazz Festival and delivered a successful performance of the “Here We Gong” material with his quartet. He then returned to the UK with the same quartet to appear at the 2011 Brecon Jazz Festival playing material from the then recently released “Bang My Can”. I was fortunate enough to witness that second appearance and my account of the quartet’s performance can be read as part of my Festival coverage here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/features/article/friday-at-brecon-jazz-festival-12-08-2011

Schumacher has also been part of a successful duo with the Belgian pianist Jef Neve and this pair have also performed at London Jazz Festival. Neve was also part of an early edition of Schumacher’s quartet, pre-dating von Chossy.

I have to admit that since 2011 Schumacher has rather dropped off my radar but a glance at his website http://www.pascalschumacher.com reveals that he has been highly productive throughout the last decade, releasing a further five albums with a variety of musicians, including a number of string players.

Schumacher was trained as a classical percussionist and his music has often explored the hinterland between jazz and contemporary classical music with Schumacher citing the composer Steve Reich as a particularly significant influence. Other classical composers that Schumacher admires include John Adams, Claude Debussy, Erik Satie and J.S. Bach.

In 2019 he premièred his own ten part classical suite “Rosace.8”, which featured him playing with members of the Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg.

Nonetheless the vibraphonist has also been happy to acknowledge pop and rock culture with Radiohead also mentioned as a key inspiration. Meanwhile “Here We Gong” featured a remarkable arrangement of the pop hit “Sing” by the Scottish indie-popsters Travis. On the jazz front Schumacher has made reference to the twin influences of Keith Jarrett and E.S.T.

Other artists and composers that Schumacher has named as influences include Nils Frahm and Olafur and Sven Helbig Chilly Gonzales, Max Richter and Francesco Tristano

The origins of “Sol” date back to 2018 when Schumacher was invited to give a solo vibraphone performance at a festival in Salzburg. The performance proved to be both successful and hugely liberating, strengthening Schumacher’s ongoing love affair with the vibraphone and representing a new kind of intimacy with the instrument.

In many respects “Sol” acts as a companion piece to the classical suite “Rosace.8”. Sol’s fourteen pieces, comprised of twelve original compositions and two covers, take both Schumacher and the listener on a voyage through both outer and inner space in an exploration of both the physical and the mental universe – as the album liner notes, written by the London based journalist, AJ Dehany explain;
“There is an intimacy illuminated within the profound darkness. Circling around the central tableau puts you into a unique, personal one to one reaction. This isn’t just solo music because it is performed by one person, it is solo because it insists on a direct one-to-one intimacy with the listener”.

The album’s twin themes appear to be the vastness of space contrasted to the inner universe of human emotions, as the text of the liner notes endeavours to explain;
“First imagine empty space. Darkness, then a spark, a central light. A lone figure stands by, revealed in a strange ambience of purple and blue and white. In front of him the metallic edifice of a vibraphone. The figure bows, he gazes forward. When he strikes the bars with two blue-tipped mallets in each hand, the notes chime and ring out through the darkness like signals through the cosmos. Shimmering, the volume of the notes pulsates, dilating and swelling in darkness, twinkling and dissolving”.

Dehany recounts that Schumacher made this recording surrounded by a crescent comprised of vibraphones, glockenspiels and tubular bells. Engineer/producer Joachim Olaya also plays a substantial role in the creative process, subtly manipulating the sound of the instruments and subtly deploying a range of post production techniques.

Many of the pieces are short, little more than miniatures, but nevertheless each is more than capable of cramming a great deal of musical and emotional information into a short space of time. The opening “Amarcord” begins with the ethereal chiming described above, before rapidly acquiring additional layers of sound, before just as swiftly fading away again to leave just the eerie twinkling of the bell like vibraphone. It represents a kind of musical sunrise, or even a sort of ‘overture’.

The more substantial “Tropismes” embraces deeper timbres and also electronic sounds, such as the brooding bass line that stalks amidst the forest of arpeggiated tuned percussion. As the music continues it increases in terms of both intensity and complexity, building in layers before stopping very abruptly, as if a tap has been turned off or a switch thrown.

By way of contrast the following “Melancholia” boils things down to their essence with a solo vibraphone performance, the gentle lyricism of which explores both the emotion of the title and the act of resignation that inspires subsequent hope and future happiness. It’s airy, charming and rather lovely.

“Sol” itself explores the possibilities of reverb to create diaphanous layers of vibraphone generated sound, with gently undulating arpeggios pierced by shards of chiming melody. There’s an air of spaciousness about the music that gently draws the listener into its celestial sound world.

It’s a process that continues with the following “Falling, Falling”, with its ethereal delays and echoes. There are also hints of Schumacher’s classical background in the increasingly Baroque and rococo patterns that he sketches with his mallets.

The brief “Twinkle” combines music box timbres with ringing overtones and is succeeded by “Air”, which introduces new sounds to the mix, the organelle helping to bring a distinct church like feel to the music and building upon the Baroque elements introduced previously. There’s also a faintly unsettling feel to the music, an atmosphere encouraged by eerie cello-like sounds.

At this juncture a very familiar melody emerges, the theme from Mike Oldfield’s “Tubular Bells”, originally played on piano but here featuring interlocking layers of tuned percussion, including tubular bells themselves of course. Schumacher brings a darker, more threatening feel to Oldfield’s music that is highly effective. This arrangement also represents a timely reminder of the debt Oldfield himself owed to Steve Reich and the other minimalist composers that helped to inspire the surprise commercial success that was “Tubular Bells”.

Schumacher’s second cover follows immediately, “Tearjerker”, the original a collaboration between Ryuichi Sakomoto, Chilly Gonzales and lyricist Jarvis Cocker. In Schumacher’s hands the piece is intended to express various states of nostalgia, with Sakomoto’s child-like melody hanging in the air in a shimmering, echoing haze of reverb.

There’s a return to original material with “Lift”, a piece that develops from an almost subliminal vibraphone motif, gradually accruing layers of electronic distortion, the atmosphere of the music perceptively darkening as a result. It’s one of the most forceful pieces on the album, and also one of the most unsettling.

The brief “Sous-Conversation” combines an undulating organ like drone with twinkling glockenspiel and the eerie whistle of feedback in a minimalist miniature the recalls the sound of Philip Glass.

“Einklang” (the title the German word for ‘harmony’) at first continues the ethereal mood, but as on the earlier “Lift” the use of distortion again darkens the atmosphere of the music, with electronics again a substantial component of the sound.

The penultimate “Strange” goes through several different phrases and at one juncture finds Schumacher and Olaya layering and manipulating the sound to create an almost choral effect that is suitably grandiose.

The album concludes with a reprise of the opening piece. “Amarcord Fine” serves as a reminder of the cyclical nature of life and of the universe, the phrase “Amarcord” itself a derivation of the Romagnolo phrase “A M’Arcord” or “I Remember”.

Intimate, immersive, frequently beautiful, and occasionally disturbing “Sol” represents an impressive statement from Schumacher that brings together various aspects of his work. Classically inspired compositions sit side by side with jazz improvisation and electronica, with the two rock covers introducing yet another element to the proceedings.

Schumacher plays with great skill, sensitivity and discipline and the role of Olaya and the rest of an engineering team including Mandy Parnell in London and Thorsten Wyk in Berlin shouldn’t be underestimated. The judicious use of electronics adds a fascinating extra dimension to the sounds the various percussion instruments – this is far more than a solo vibes record in the conventional sense.

Nevertheless,  as impressive as “Sol” undoubtedly is I prefer listening to Schumacher’s playing in the company of the quartet that made “Here We Gong” and “Bang My Can”. Here his undoubted virtuosity can be enjoyed in a knottier, more obviously jazz context. That said Schumacher isn’t the kind of musician to stand still or to rest on his laurels and “Sol” is a worthy experiment with much to recommend it.

 

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