Love Sacred & Profane
Release date 5th August 2022
Inspirational Pianist Recruits Special Guests For Landmark Album
33 Records is proud to announce the release of Welsh pianist and composer Geoff Eales’ 15th jazz album, Love Sacred & Profane, on 5th August. A digital only single, ‘The Sword’, was issued on 9th July.
As in his critically acclaimed 2016 record Transience, celebrated vocalist Brigitte Beraha is at the heart of a series of emotionally charged songs. However, on Love Sacred & Profane, Beraha is not the only storyteller, as Eales explains:
As more and more songs wrote themselves, I heard different voices in my head. I believe the inclusion of Jacqui Hicks, Jenny Howe and Brenda Ford on this collection makes for a broader, deeper palette – a smorgasbord of sounds, textures and colours if you will – than otherwise would have been the case.
Love Sacred & Profane is a genre-busting tour-de-force that reflects on the enigma of love with all its complications and contradictions. Eales employs a stellar cast of musicians to help deliver the message: bassist Matt Ridley and drummer Sophie Alloway are a potent force in the engine room, whilst Mark Lockheart, Jason Yarde, Ben Waghorn, Shirley Smart, Carl Orr and Andy Findon add colour, bite and energy with their stunning performances.
As a composer, Geoff Eales loves to tear down musical barriers and nowhere is this more apparent than on Love Sacred & Profane. Debussy’s Danses Sacrée et Profane is referenced in Prologue and Epilogue, serving to book end the collection. The Sword is a fusion roar-up, Feather Light’s Latin groove is a nod in the direction of Chick Corea, the asymmetrical rhythms of the title track are redolent of Eastern European folk music; Frazzled combines disturbing dissonant off-centre riffs with dystopian free-wheeling improvisation. When Beraha and Lockheart soar towards heaven in Saint Hildegard’s glorious O Virtus Sapientiae all earthly troubles and profanities are cast aside. But there is still time to party in The Final Twist.
An album launch party is being held on 12 July at 1901 Arts Club, 7 Exton Street, London SE1 8UE, to which I have been fortunate enough to be invited and will report back after the event.
SimplyJazzTalk 