Charlotte Greve is an Austrian saxophonist based in New York who explores just about everything in new music, from jazz to contemporary classical, including pop art, electro, etc. Waterbodies is her first album under her own name, and it showcases indeed eclectic affinities, not always successful in terms of fluid transitions, but very often stimulating in terms of piquing the interest of music enthusiasts.
Regarding the stylistic range represented in the album, Greve says:
It captures the full range of what I’ve been drawn to musically. Rather than narrowing things down, I wanted to open them up, placing these disparate influences side by side and trusting their connection would come through because they’re all channeled through me.”
So much so that after the introduction in the form of a floating ballad of The Well (very beneficial), Greve follows with the art/chamber pop spirit of Wave, whose referential waves bring us back to something like Owen Pallett’s Final Fantasy. It continues somewhat in this vein with Hidden Threads and Lighter Blue, although with a more restrained, intimate energy, where Greve’s voice, treated in multi-tracks, resonates ghostly. Own Lap begins in an impressionistic atmosphere supported by delicate electro and a quivering guitar, to which is added, no less, the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra, a luxurious support to Greve’s voice, which sings a somewhat indie, melancholic melody. The orchestral army is initially used with great gentleness and restraint, which demonstrates the composer’s intelligence in this context. That said, Greve gradually builds an emotional ascent that reaches an emotionally moving sensory climax, slowly fading into silence. Frankly superb.
Membrane returns to previous art-pop colors, in a light and airy groove, where Greve’s vocals bring her closer to the world of Sufjan Stevens, before being joined by her own saxophone. In Swim, the sinuous gestures of the saxophone, piano, and a rhythmic section immerse our listening in an estuary where ambient, impressionist, and traditional jazz music blend together. Olive Tree moves into a stripped-down space, for Greve (sax, voice, piano) and drums. A vaguely neoclassical repetitive base holds a slightly plaintive melody, replaced by the dreamy saxophone. Something dreamlike as well in Desert Song, with an amplified Greve vocal, over stellar synth arpeggios, and a sober pop beat, at least in the first two-thirds of the piece. The third takes on a much more energetic tone and an exciting urgency.
22, the penultimate piece brings back the classical forces of the Bratislava Orchestra, in a sound structure initially tinged with mystery, bathing in a rather enchanting nocturnal shadow. As far as I’m concerned, despite her stimulating skills in the art-pop and jazz sections, it is in the realm of orchestral song that Greve truly excels above all. Her treatment of the orchestra is extremely successful, and the juxtaposition she makes with her very embodied singing, the expressive saxophone, and the strong rhythms is truly memorable.
Scorpio, the last composition on the program, is like a pleasant snack that somewhat revisits the atmospheric post-minimalist writing of the beginning, with a repetitive saxophone and an angelic choir.
