Disc review | The harpist made a record that is like a refuge from noise

Jazz / album

Nala Sinephro: Endlessness. Warp Records.

★★★★★

It is this sneaking has been heard in recent years no matter what!

The first reaction of the Londoner Nala Sinephron to the light-sounding second album is a breeze. It is due to the fact that minimal spiritual ambient jazz has been one of the clear trends in jazz internationally in recent years. It has also been seen in Finland.

But the critic is paid not to make a judgment based on one listen. Not much, but still.

I end up listening almost without realizing it Endlessnessthis warm record, more than ten times in a couple of days. Since then, there has been no need to count how long the record has kept company. The album became like a ghost that moved into my house and won’t leave.

A harpist Nala Sinephro’s debut album Space 1.8 (2021) was an event in jazz in its year of publication. It also brought him to perform at Flow as one of the highlights of the festival. At the concert, Sinephro’s band breathed the same air and delivered a low-key but captivating experience, which the new album’s effortlessness reminds us of.

Endlessness is easy listening music at its best. Of ten parts Continuum-the album, consisting of the work, is in the tradition of spiritual jazz, Alice Coltrane and by Pharaoh Sanders with in the same continuum.

The album is like a sister work to Sanders, which appeared a few years ago, of Floating Points and for an excellent record by the London Symphony Orchestra Promises (2021). It consisted of one nine-part work, in which acoustic instruments, electronics and string arrangements were also magically intertwined.

Thematically, the album sticks to the basics of spiritual jazz. In Endlessness that is, infinity is about rebirth and the search for connection, longing for something beyond the immediate senses. It requires strong immersiveness, which Sinephro and his band realizes brilliantly and seamlessly, especially considering that the lineup varies somewhat.

On the saxophone has performed at Pori Jazz last summer Nubya Garcia. Drums vary Natcyet Wakili and the rock band Black Midin Morgan Simpson. In Sinephro’s own playing, the harp makes even more room for synthesizers. Arpeggios bring to mind by Steve Reich the works in particular Continuum 9’s during.

There is no need to expect the typical basic structure that plays between the theme and the solos. In Continuum 2 Sheila Maurice-Grey the flugelhorn is mixed in the background and plays almost in unison with the synthesizer mat. Garcia’s saxophone brings out the string orchestra.

In these moments, the record inhabits its players in its utopian state of infinity in a wonderful way. It’s rare to hear when a record creates its own sounding space, where even unexpected events feel natural. The recording and mixing emphasize a common space free from heroism, when Continuum 10’s during, the drum improvisations click in the background, probably to the chagrin of many drummers, like the poppers banging in the distance.

In this time, spiritual and ambient jazz is like a refuge from all the noise. Its popularity in recent years is easy to understand. This kind of music has always sought to create other spaces where transcendental peace resides. Endlessness is like a snapshot of that state with no beginning or end. You can hear it continuing even after the actual album is over. That’s also why the record is left – or simply forgotten – playing over and over again.

Of course, the house will become haunted if you invite the ghost in yourself.