Randi Pontoppidan and Martin Fabricius – Clouds

Jazzfuel

Vocalist Randi Pontoppidan and vibraphonist Martin Fabricius met while studying under Jamaaladeen Tacuma at a jazz workshop in 2016. Jamaaladeen insisted on recording an off the cuff session with the two and after that release, the pair continued working together, collating the pieces to be recorded for this album whilst working on other projects.

Clouds‘ long gestation introduces a sense of comfort between the two players and an otherworldly ethereality that places the eleven compositions collected here well outside  any prevailing styles.

Randi’s voice has a power and clarity that fairly leaps from the speakers. You can hear the sound reverberate around the room as the notes peak and then diminish. Both Randi and Martin also add electronics, and these textures are far harsher than the vocals might expect, layered tones shivering the speaker cones and grinding at the light. Lighter vocal loops and even throat singing accompany the commanding main voice, and there is a hint of a mindful Gregorian vibe in some of the pieces evoking imposing edifices, voices raised high to hidden cloisters.

I am a big fan of the vibraphone in general, but its use here is about the least insistent I have experienced. Martin is happy for the distant chimes to add texture and nuance to the drifting pieces and were they enter into more exploratory areas, the vibes are almost let loose and allowed to drift with the breeze, acting along with offshore cooling sentiments as foils to the exquisite keening as it ranges from dreamy abstraction to more considered romantic melancholy.

The backing is featherlight at all times and the kinds of clouds conjured up are the fluffy, beautifully shaped kind that epitomise a lazy summer’s day. There are points where Randi takes a step forward and I couldn’t help feeling if the likes of Sarah Vaughan were ever given an opportunity to just free themselves and react to the prevailing sounds, this would be the end result. They end up looser, with the more elusive notes captured and and re-purposed, words savoured as the unforced pace ensures the right direction.

The use of echo gives things a diffuse quality, rippled against a pure sky, electronics buzz closely and the single vibe peals ring constantly, a metronomic setting for the soaring, unfettered voice. The wordless passages conjure up a dreamlike quality, the tranquil pace always accompanied by a patient silence awaiting an opportunity to enter and stretch the moments even further. Towards the end, the senses are stretched to the maximum as ethereal sounds appear from the clear sky like phantoms, dissipating into inevitable peace.

If these pieces were ever used for soundtrack purposes, very little would happen, but it would look calmly exquisite.

-Mr Olivetti-