New York – St. Johann – (March 2017)
REEDEER (Collective)
total playing time: 53:29
Evil Rabbit Records
fay victor – vocals
elisabeth harnik – piano
dominic lash – double bass
1 barbed
2 frontman
3 drip
4 drop off
5 the attic
6 bridged
7 tight tangle
8 this is…
all added lyrics written by fay victor
*drop off: lyrics from “sometimes” (composed by f. victor/ j. v. dijk)
Reviews for New York-St. Johann
REDDEER [FAY VICTOR / ELISABETH HARNIK / DOMINIC LASH] – New York – Johann (Evil Rabbit 26; Netherlands) Featuring Fay Victor on vocals, Elisabeth Harnik on piano and Dominic Lash on double bass. Although these three musicians come from much different backgrounds: Victor (Brooklyn), Harnik (Austria) and Lash (UK), they met at a residency in upstate New York in 2010. The music here was recorded at I-Beam in Brooklyn in 2011 and at Festival Artacts in Austria in 2012. I am longtime fan of “jazz” vocalist Fay Victor, whose enchanting and soulful voice can be heard on a half dozen different discs and who has collaborated with Other Dimensions in Music and Roswell Rudd. Austrian pianist recently recorded in the DEK trio with Ken Vandermark, as well as working with Gianni Mimmo and Alison Blunt. UK bassist Dominic Lash is a member of the great Convergence Quartet which includes the great pianist Alexander Hawkins, plus working with Axel Dorner, Tony Bevan and the Wandelweiser Composer Collective.
Both sessions are superbly recorded, the instruments and voice closely mic’d, the balance just right. There is a good deal of suspense going on here. Ms. Harnik appears to be playing inside the piano, ever so carefully, hushed tinkles, eerie fragments, floating in the air. Ms. Victor’s voice has never more magical, lush, cautious, thoughtful, sumptuous than it does here… eventually erupting into a more scary section as when she chants the word “anyway”, repeating it and then twisting it inside out. Fay allows herself to get carried away… soaring, jabbering and even screaming at times. She taps into the crazy spirit that is inside all of us but that we are often afraid of letting out. Even when things quiet down to a whisper level, the trio still express extremes weaving their sounds carefully around one another. When Ms. Harnik speeds up midway through, she starts to move closer to those Keith Tippett-like lightning fast lines, also muting certain strings the way Mr. Tippett also does at times. The further that Ms. Victor goes out, the more the rest of the trio stretches beyond anything we might expect. In many ways this is one of the best improv sessions I’ve heard in recent times since this trio plays consistently as one dynamic force, taking off for points unknown, unafraid of going too far into the other worlds that Sun Ra used to talk about. The is one dynamite, edge-of-your-seat set, taking us all on a journey upwards and onwards. – Bruce Lee Gallanter, DMG
St John’s inclusion of vocalist Fay Victor in a trio with the pianist Elisabeth Harnik and bassist Dominic Lash become – quite magnificent New York. Since word fragments float around, concrete lyric is introduced. Victor, who calls such divas like Sarah Vaughan or Betty Carter as main influences, evident in this format from a completely different angle, open, spontaneous and directly related to Jazz & Poetry. Reminds you that most of the great Jeanne Lee. The tracks of ReDDeer trio recorded the meritorious artacts Festival in St. John, the New York recordings are duets between Harnik and Victor. All great examples of instinctive understanding, deeply felt and widespread mutual appreciation. And the shortest track Drip, a good two-minute duet voice / piano, even the fun of it is wonderfully expressed.
September/ October 2017, freistil #74 http://www.freistil.klingt.org
“The Austrian pianist Elisabeth Harnik, American vocalist Fay Victor and English bassist Dominic Lash find each other by communicating without taboos through their instruments. Fascinating, sometimes bizarre musical stories are the result.” Geert Rijssen, in December 2017, Cross-Over
http://www.muziekmozaiek.be
“There is no doubt that Fay Victor is a vocalist who goes beyond most. She has a strong jazz approach in what she does, after studying with Sheila Jordan, and this approach takes her into the free improvisation. She has a very strong voice as magic, and along with, especially Harnik’s expressive game, this becomes an almost unbeatable combination. And behind it all, Lash keeps it all together with nice bass games. Together, this becomes a strong musical experience. Whether Victor is singing wordlessly, shouting, reciting text or just improvising with the other two, we notice the strength of what she performs. Harnik’s piano game can often remind Cecil Taylor, but I think she has her own ability to communicate with fellow musicians in a way it’s been a long time since we’ve heard Taylor do. …And together this smells of dynamite. Strong dynamite. And the three perform these improvisations so much that they get locked in the chair and can not get out before the 53 minutes and 29 seconds the record is over. Greatly!”
– Jan Granlie, Salt-peanuts.eu