Featured Artist: Ambrose Field - John Potter

CD Title: Being Dufay

Year: 2009

Record Label: ECM New Series

Style: Other

Musicians: John Potter (tenor), Ambrose Field (composer, live and studio electronics)

Review:

Based on vocal fragments by Renaissance composer Guillaume Dufay (1397-1474), this outing proves that virtually any combination of musical expressionism is possible, and with this release, the output equates to a magical experience.  Here, Ambrose Field sets the backdrop via live and studio electronics for acclaimed tenor, John Potter as an ethereal encounter with the past comes to fruition during the modern age.

It’s a very special album, indeed.  With Field’s polytonal sound sculptors and Potter’s golden and pristine delivery, the duo shapes a nouveau set of interlinked works that intimate an uncannily natural coexistence.  It’s a sanctifying listen, due to Potter’s spirited vocals atop Field’s multihued plane of electronics treatments.  They contrast and complement via an assortment of heavenly musings that promote inner peace amid a captivating sequence of streaming effects, enhanced by the classic ECM Records aesthetic.

On the title track “Being Dufay,” Field’s expansive and shadowy shadings, provide Potter with a forum to instill notions of a divine journey into parts unknown.  In other movements, they coalesce for sweeping pastiches of sound, amid vast mystical environs, comprised of soft, yet penetrating mosaics that transmit a sense of meeting the supreme creator.  In turn, the duo’s synergy and focused methodology translates into a sparkling gem of an album that instills endearing sentiment and cleverly engineered storylines that touch the heart and warm the soul.

Record Label Website: http://www.ecmrecords.com

Reviewed by: Glenn Astarita

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