Water Street Revival

Collection Contents

#		Title	Length
1		Water Street Revival	4:37
2		Our World	6:35
3		Search For Truth	5:58
4		Sanashi	7:55
5		Jet	3:16
6		Thunder And Rain	3:46
7		Portrait Of Ellsworth	7:04
8		June Song	3:39
9		Dock Street Blues	3:44
10		I Love You	6:25
11		Morning Song	5:21
12		Odessa	5:55
13		When I'm With You	2:47

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Description

Personnel:
Andrew Cheshire - guitar
Bryan Carrot - vibes
James Weidman - piano
Lonnie Plaxico - bass
Marcus McLaurine - bass
Greg Bandy - drums
Yoron Israel - drums
Marvin "Smitty" Smith - drums

Recorded 3/1 & 6/25/90; 1/28/91; 2/8/92

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Rabid jazz fans-of which I'm one-tend to be obsessive by nature. We pour over the fine details of the music we love with an almost scholarly fascination; reveling in a new, or previously unexplored artist can be an occasion for discovery, a window onto a world that may look like something we're used to, but because of its perspective, and its unique organization of the figures in it's landscape, lets us see with new eyes, hear with new ears.

Such was my reaction on first hearing Andrew Cheshire's 1997 release, Another View, his second album as a leader. Andrew was an unknown entity at the time. The disc, sent to me for review by my editor at Cadence magazine, slipped into my CD player unassumingly; one more entry to spin a couple of hundred words on before flashing on the next one. But I was immediately drawn in by the music, my blase' demeanor quietly sucker-punched by the edgy, circular guitar riff that kicked off the title piece. What followed drew me in even further, through airy, absorbing tunes with evocative titles like "Secrets," "Diverge,"and "Saturn." The tone was mid-60's Blue Note; the era of Sam Rivers, Wayne Shorter, and Bobby Hutcherson- spacious, almost levitating music, with meaty, intelligent improvising. But the feel of Andrew's music was quite something else; a graceful, lyrical dance of drawings in mist, as viewed through the hot house window of the creative improvising tradition.

Water Street Revival lets us look through the rear window, so to speak, of Andrew's own tradition, allowing us to see some of the path's he's taken to get to his current confluence. The earliest tracks, from 1990, show him already possessed of a delicious tone, an a gentle, unhurried touch that can, nevertheless, prod his band mates into quick-reflex reaction. Andrew's supple rhythmic flexibility, and the attention he gives to the duration of his notes, are reminders that it's not only what notes a musician plays, or how many, it's also the weight of each note, and how it's phrased, that distinguishes a performance.

This "archival" material, as Andrew calls it (sorry, but that's just too dusty a term for music that's so alive) is also proof that Cheshire was bringing strong compositions to the table for his first recording sessions. "Our world," from 1991, is a luscious, floating ballad, with moments that show Andrew could probably make quite a name for himself in the "Lite-Jazz" arena, had he chosen to pursue that direction. "Search For Truth," from the same date, is a particularly strong example of Cheshire's melodic imagination, with a beautiful secondary theme towards the 1:30 mark. The driving "Portrait of Ellsworth" is, perhaps, one of the most stunning display of Andrew's artistry on Water Street, showing how he uses effects, such as delay, to enhance not only his sound, but the totality of the performance. Whether it's the fat chords of the more traditionally jazzy "Jet," or the haunting beauty of the intimate, unaccompanied "When I'm With You," there's a wealth of harmonious byways here.

Water Street itself, at the time of these recordings, was a desolate area of old, closed warehouses near the East River in Brooklyn, where you could feel the peculiar thrill of the original cobblestones under your feet as you walked there. Looking at the great photographer Enid Farber's shots of this area, you can almost feel the chilly secrets that these buildings must have held. Here are some secrets that are now happily seeing the light of day: the bedrock of one Andrew Cheshire, a musician who generates sufficient heat to unlock untold mysteries.

-Larry Nai, Cadence
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