ELLEN ROWE QUARTET

VINTON’S COVE

Smokin’ Sleddog Records

Ellen Rowe, piano; Dennis Carroll, bass; Pete Siers, drums; Mike Sakash, saxophones. FEATURED GUEST: Sunny Wilkinson, vocals.

Ellen Rowe’s music always touches something deep in my spirit.  This album is no exception.  The pianist and composer was inspired by her deep love of nature, music and human connection.  “Vinton’s Cove” is a place near and dear to Rowe’s heart. Located on Maine’s Kezar Lake, a place where her family maintains a cabin. There, she has spent many reflective moments.

The quartet takes flight on the first tune that celebrates the resilient birds of this area.  Mike Sakash tells their story through the bell of his horn in a wonderful way.  Then Dennis Carroll steps into the spotlight on his double bass, unfolding his own improvised story.  Rowe holds the band together on her 1905 rebuilt Steinway that’s been in the family since the mid-1940s.  There is deep history buried in that instrument and in this album, like hidden treasure.

Rowe has composed five sensitive and compelling songs for this project.  The other five tunes are standards that she has reinvented in her own creative way.  On two of her original songs, she collaborated with jazz vocalist and educator, Sunny Wilkinson.  I find “The Phoenix” to be a melody that is both challenging and lovely.  Something about this song reminds me of the great Flora Purim. Wilkinson’ voice is crystal clear and pitch perfect. She scat sings for a while, flying above the tenacious rhythm section like one of those celebrated loons Ellen Rowe tributes. This time, Sakash uses a soprano saxophone during his solo.  All the while, the great Pete Siers pushes the rhythm ahead like a steamroller.  I had the pleasure of working with this drummer many years ago and always appreciated his technical wizardry and dependable time keeping. I believe Rowe feels the same.  Siers has been her drummer of choice on all but one of her album releases.

This song is one that’s been in Ellen Rowe’s repertoire of originals for several decades. Here is a presentation where she played it as a duo with Andrew Bishop on saxophone at the University of Michigan School of Music a few years ago.  She is an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Jazz & Contemporary Improvisation at this highly acclaimed mid-western university.

I enjoyed Rowe’s arrangement of Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now” tune and the reinvention of the familiar jazz standard “All the Things you Are.”  But it’s her original music that I am most enamored with, songs like “clipped in Blues” and “Ebb & Flow” show the many sides of Ellen Rowe on her instrument.  She easily moves from lowdown blues to Straight-ahead jazz, always with a magnetic melodic integrity, one that draws the listener into her music.

This is a jazz album to brighten and expand any collection.

Reviewed by Dee Dee McNeil

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