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Bassist Mark Egan Teams With Guitarist John Abercrombie and Drummer Danny Gottlieb For Ambitious 2-CD Set on Wavetone Records

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One of the premier electric bassists of contemporary jazz, Mark Egan has distinguished himself as an in-demand session player, valued sideman and respected leader in his own right. His distinctive fretless bass sound has graced countless jazz and pop albums as well as award winning movie and television soundtracks. A charter member of the Pat Metheny Group, he has played on multi platinum-selling recordings by Sting, Arcadia and Joan Osborne and has also recorded with the likes of Roger Daltry, Sophie B. Hawkins, Marianne Faithful, David Sanborn, John McLaughlin and the Gil Evans Orchestra. But nowhere else does Egan reveal as much as he does on As We Speak, his daring, highly interactive trio outing with jazz guitar great John Abercrombie and former Pat Metheny Group bandmate and Elements co-founder Danny Gottlieb on drums.

An ambitious two-CD set released on Egan's own Wavetone Records, the wide open blowing and improvisational abandon heard on As We Speak is a change in direction from the bassist's previous Wavetone release, Freedom Town. “That was a collection of songs that I had composed and produced at my studio, Electric Fields," says Mark of that 2001 outing. “It was based more on my compositions and orchestrations featuring such great musicians as Bill Evans and Lew Soloff, in contrast to a bass trio improvisation feature, which is what this new recording is all about. I wanted to capture an intimate as well as progressive side of my playing on a recording."

From the Ornette-ish title track to the evocative and bluesy 6/8 vehicle “Mississippi Nights" (reminiscent of Charles Mingus' “Goodbye Pork Pie Hat"), from a lightly swinging extrapolation on the jazz standard “Alone Together" to the edgy, aggressively swinging “Next Left" and purely improvised encounters like the conversational “Dream Sequence" and the explosive “Time Out," Egan and company demonstrate an uncanny chemistry on As We Speak. “I like the openness of the trio and yet at the same time it's much more demanding than playing with a larger ensemble," says Egan, “because the trio setting presents a different functional responsibility for the bass. It's not only about supporting but soloing and interacting with the soloists as well. And with players like John and Danny, it's such a creative wave to ride. They have the depth and flexibility to take it anywhere, and it's totally interactive all the time."

Other highlights on this freewheeling affair include Mark's reflective rubato piece, “Tone Poem For My Father," which closes Disc 1 on a crystalline note, his sublime ballad “Your Sweet Way" (written for his wife Connie), the subdued swinger “Shade And Shadows" and the expansive “Plane To The Trane" with its allusions to John Coltrane's anthemic “Naima." The twisted blues of “Depraw" (that's 'warped' backwards) features a tricky, Monkish head along with some outstanding extended solos from both Abercrombie and Egan while the slamming modal romp “Stiletto" is fueled by Gottlieb's insistently swinging backbeat. “Three-Way Mirror," a gentle waltz-time ballad that Mark wrote more than 20 years ago for Elements' second record, Forward Motion, features some of the bassist's most expressive playing on the date while he conjures up a wholly unique approach to playing harmonics on the evocative closer to Disc 2, “Summer Sand."

Says Egan of this flexible and highly interactive session: “It really allowed everyone's sensibilities to work as a unit so that everyone could flow and be creative with the music. And for me, I wanted to create plenty of space for John because he's such a melodic fountain and has such an evolved harmonic and rhythmic approach. His note choices are always so interesting and his way of extrapolating on a theme is just amazing. He's such a seasoned player with a completely unique sound and approach."

Abercrombie's penchant for delving into the harmonic fabric of a given piece and extrapolating in the moment is also readily on display in this sparse trio setting.

“It's such a positive and creative challenge playing with John," says Mark. “The key approach for me was to listen, compliment and at the same time propel the music forward with Danny. It's an interesting process and definitely keeps you on your toes."

Throughout As We Speak, drummer Gottlieb underscores the action by cooking on a low flame with briskly swinging brushwork. Switching to sticks when the music calls for it, he will also fuel frenzied crescendos with his muscular playing, as on “Vanishing Point," which peaks with a vicious distortion-laced solo by Abercrombie and is powered by Gottlieb's all-out bashing on the kit. Says Egan, “It was Danny's choice to rhythmically orchestrate each composition. He would just come up with different approaches on different tunes drawing from our thirty-year relationship as a rhythm section. Danny always kept in mind the overall tone and curve of the recording, which was to play dynamically. I wanted this recording to have a wide dynamic range both in texture and intensity. And also I wanted to utilize Abercrombie's very empathetic sound with Danny and myself fitting into his space, so to speak."

Egan says that his concept for this trio with Abercrombie and Gottlieb was in part inspired by Gateway, Abercrombie's acclaimed trio with drumming great Jack DeJohnette and renowned bassist Dave Holland. “When I started working on this project I was listening to the Gateway recordings and really tuned into that space from a compositional and conceptual point of view," says Egan, who studied bass with Holland in the mid 1970s. “I've been a big fan of Dave's since his days with Miles Davis and have closely followed his career since then, so it's just natural that I'd listen to Gateway. I really like their concept and the openness of that group, so I started writing a lot of songs with that framework in mind to fit this trio."

Over the last four years, the in-demand bassist has been a regular member of jazz guitar great Larry Coryell's trio, with drummer Paul Wertico. He appeared on Coryell's 2003 recording Tricycles (on which Egan composed the title track). In 2004, Mark toured world wide with another jazz guitar icon, Pat Martino, and last year recorded with saxophonist and Elements bandmate Bill Evans on his 2005 Grammy-nominated Soulgrass album along with banjo virtuoso Bela Fleck and drummer Vinnie Colaiuta. Egan also appeared on pop star Cyndi Lauper's 2005 recording, The Body Acoustic.

His playing on As We Speak represents a highwater mark in his recording career to date. “I wanted to go for a very open and extended approach for this one," he says “I love playing in a creative trio setting and I don't feel that I have ever captured a side of my playing on record where I have done as much extended playing as I do on this one.

I really wanted to explore that side of my playing in a setting with such great musicians as John Abercrombie and Danny Gottlieb “.

He succeeds in great measure on As We Speak.

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Depraw
Mark Egan
From As We Speak
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