Jasper Blom Quartet - Polyphony

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A lustrous double album showcasing just why Jasper Blom is one of the Netherlands’ most prominent, forward-thinking saxophonist-composers in contemporary jazz, Polyphony documents two sold-out live concerts from his quartet at Amsterdam’s BIMHUIS in collaboration with two special solo artists – trumpeter Bert Joris and trombonist Nils Wogram. Blom has been performing in different line-ups for over twenty years with guitarist Jesse van Ruller, bassist Frans van der Hoeven and drummer Martijn Vink; and as this band since 2006, they have released four studio albums. But Jasper Blom isn’t a musician for standing still: “A few years ago, I began experimenting with the idea of guest soloists, inviting US saxophonist Dick Oatts and the late Italian trumpeter Marco Tamburini. That started me thinking about the project in a more structural way.” His creativity is centered around a fascination with mediaeval polyphony. “It’s an intuitive process”, he reveals, “often starting with a fragment of, say, a 500-year-old manuscript, maybe only a couple of bars; and then I mold it, adding or removing elements.” The first set features the quartet’s longtime friend Bert Joris; and Nils Wogram, in the second set, has been on Blom’s radar for years as a particularly original player, composer and improviser: “I’m a fan, and his freer approach is a good match for my music.” The saxophonist revels in that extra voice to write for, more polyphonically, while maintaining improvisational space. “Most of my experimentation begins from the question, ‘What if…?’, with the band reinterpreting my ideas – an exciting way of getting beyond the realm of what I first imagined.” And that phrenology model on the album cover? Owned by a neuroscientist friend and displaying terms such as ‘ideality’, ‘contructiveness’ and ‘self criticism’, it’s seen by Blom as a metaphor or ‘road map’ for what musicians can encounter.