Country : Canada Label : Justin Time Genres and styles : Contemporary Jazz / Modern Jazz Year : 2022

Chet Doxas – Rich in Symbols II

· by Frédéric Cardin

Rich in Symbols II is the Canadian jazz equivalent of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition. While the first album was broad in scope, this synesthetic second opus (Doxas spontaneously associates images with music in his head) focuses on his native country. Featured here is the Group of Seven, the Canadian collective of early 20th-century painters who brought the country into pictorial modernity and are perhaps Canada’s leading ambassadors in the visual arts world today (along with Riopelle and Borduas).

The sober and bare landscapes of the seven chosen paintings are transformed into intimate and melancholic sound spaces, sometimes even threatening, even if the light always manages to slip through the interstices of the worst darkness. One senses the coldness inherent in these Nordic canvases that are both smooth and mineral, contemplative and imposing, solitary and universal.

Atonal tingles skilfully rub shoulders with sinuous lyrical moments to create an atmosphere of pervasive sensory modernity. Doxas has made a heartfelt and lasting tribute to his homeland, having been exiled to Brooklyn for the past few years.

One must admire the works of A.Y Jackson, Frank Carmichael, Lawren Harris, as well as Tom Thomson and Emily Carr (two artists who were not officially part of the Group but who are frequently associated with it) to fully feel the thrill of the frost, the bliss of the great spaces and the solitary infinity to which these masterpieces call us. Masterful.

Doxas (sax, clarinet and soundtrack) is brilliantly accompanied by Jacob Sacks (piano and mellotron), Joe Grass (pedal steel, guitar and banjo), Zack Lober (double bass) and Eric Doob (drums and sound programming.) Sam Roberts narrates a text by Doxas himself, inspired by the painting “The Front of Winter,” by J-E-H MacDonald.

Latest 360 Content

Rebecca Foon & Aliayta Foon-Dancoes – Reverie

Rebecca Foon & Aliayta Foon-Dancoes – Reverie

Misc – Beat Bouquet

Misc – Beat Bouquet

Heaven FM – A Surreal Broadcast from the Beyond

Heaven FM – A Surreal Broadcast from the Beyond

Guillaume Lefebvre – Au loin

Guillaume Lefebvre – Au loin

Angel Wang; Phoenix Orchestra – Phoenix Rising

Angel Wang; Phoenix Orchestra – Phoenix Rising

The Centre des Musiciens du Monde’s music Tree that brings people together

The Centre des Musiciens du Monde’s music Tree that brings people together

Festival Classica | Pavane For a Flaxen-Haired Gypsy Girl

Festival Classica | Pavane For a Flaxen-Haired Gypsy Girl

Festival des Saveurs | Carminda Mac Lorin, The Woman of Many Hats

Festival des Saveurs | Carminda Mac Lorin, The Woman of Many Hats

SAT X EAF | Amselysen and The Ideal Perfume of A Serial Killer

SAT X EAF | Amselysen and The Ideal Perfume of A Serial Killer

Festival Classica 2025 | Women’s Cellos

Festival Classica 2025 | Women’s Cellos

Nuits d’Afrique 2025: ALL About The Program

Nuits d’Afrique 2025: ALL About The Program

Festival Classica: An Ode to Hope with Elvira Misbakhova

Festival Classica: An Ode to Hope with Elvira Misbakhova

Festival des Saveurs | Aldo Guizmo Goes “Str8 Forward”

Festival des Saveurs | Aldo Guizmo Goes “Str8 Forward”

Deafhaven – Lonely People with Power

Deafhaven – Lonely People with Power

Transforming Hiroshima mon amour into contemporary opera: Christian Lapointe and Rosa Lind tell the story

Transforming Hiroshima mon amour into contemporary opera: Christian Lapointe and Rosa Lind tell the story

Sparks – MAD!

Sparks – MAD!

“Hiroshima, mon amour”: An Evening to Remember

“Hiroshima, mon amour”: An Evening to Remember

Peter Murphy – Silver Shade

Peter Murphy – Silver Shade

Ken Pomeroy – Cruel World

Ken Pomeroy – Cruel World

Art of the Line: Klangkarussell’s Euro Vision at SAT

Art of the Line: Klangkarussell’s Euro Vision at SAT

Festival des Saveurs | Closing With Reggae

Festival des Saveurs | Closing With Reggae

Centroamérica – a powerful docu-play about truth and connection in an age of distance and denial

Centroamérica – a powerful docu-play about truth and connection in an age of distance and denial

Lido Pimienta – La Belleza

Lido Pimienta – La Belleza

Tamir Barzilay – Phosphene Journal

Tamir Barzilay – Phosphene Journal

Subscribe to our newsletter