Fragments - Josiah DeNooyer (Album Review)
Josiah DeNooyer is a force in West Michigan. Chances are, if you’ve glanced at the jazz scene in the last five years, you have seen him performing all around the region on keys and drums with all current/former WMU students and faculty and the talented, active legends all around the state. He performs in solo, duo, small ensemble, and various church settings with music directors like Jeremy Simpson while also playing with projects like DaVeonce & Da Funk Gang. He is an educator and someone who constantly shares his platform with the community he so passionately serves with his time and talents. All of this to say that when Josiah DeNooyer speaks, the scene listens.
With his latest offering, Fragments, DeNooyer compiles a patchwork of emotionally charged compositions pulled straight from the pages of his own story. These seemingly disparate pieces are linked together through a live performance at Third Coast Recording Company with a mixed chamber ensemble, which includes a traditional jazz quartet paired with a classical string quartet and a special guest for singing and narration. The passion from every performer is palpable, dripping with substance and the collective desire to deepen understanding through the lens offered by DeNooyer’s writing. What unfolds is a beautiful meeting together of minds and spirits for a special night of artistry.
After a brief introduction to set the mood, the album slowly unfolds with “Dreams,” a composition based on the poetic words of Langston Hughes motivating a climb out of writer’s block for DeNooyer to summit past creative peaks. As remarked in the album’s liner notes, dreams start with a single “spark of possibility” that constantly evolves far beyond its initial bounds. When you listen to this tune, you hear the strings and saxophone start the initial seed that blooms into a beautiful waltz that flows into a straight, 6/4 style groove, as if to further indicate how this tune evolves. The slow unveiling of the ensemble mimics a dream taking shape and also lends listening to the entire album experience, as if you were being led through this dream into the hidden truths buried further within the record.
Next comes “Estrellita", a traditional piece of music originally written by Emmanuel Ponce and initially performed by the Plymouth Chamber Players who commissioned an arrangement from DeNooyer. With the additional jazz instrumentation to compliment the in-studio string quartet performing this piece, this live performance includes a hypnotic groove in 10/8 that features the soloing talents of Bill Cessna (keys) and Kyle Burgess (sax) before the strings emerge in the aftermath of the energy built up throughout this section.
Listeners are then introduced to the singing talents of Faith Quashie, a frequent collaborator with DeNooyer that does a beautiful job on “Hold-Held.” This ballad sizzles with a moody undercurrent trying to articulate the feeling of a place that once felt like home but no longer offers the same respite it once did. The tune is scored to reflect this sadness and nebulous feeling of transition through airy textures, harmonies that flow into one another but never feel fully resolved, and the deep presence of each soloist’s offering into the conversation, including a first on the record from bassist Owen Cramer among the piano and sax soloing. “Stutter” shifts the tone immediately with its angular, pointed 13-bar blues melody that is friction that comes with trying to have the external understand the complex internal, with DeNooyer offering this piece as a way to communicate “in ways that words cannot.” The groove opens up to flow without being tied down, allowing for a saxophone solo that glides over top and right into DeNooyer’s drum solo, further communicating his spirit through his medium. The way the tune ends so strongly at the end with such a difficult unison line to execute live is so satisfying too!
To round out this emotional journey, the record ends with these two tunes: “Spiral Bound” and “Sunshine.” Both are based on lines of poetry narrated by Faith Quasie, and with these lines of poetry come more opportunities to text paint and colorfully accent the mood. “Spiral Bound” focuses on how a spiral bound notebook can be filled with ideas while the binding never truly feels stable; more like a chaotic unraveling of those moments just waiting to happen. Instruments ebb and flow underneath narration that flows through ideas like a notebook filled with pieces of the same story expressed in different ways. Chromaticism building tension then opens up into a gorgeous ballad section, all to eventually shrink down to an intimate pairing of pizzicato strings and soft piano. “Sunshine” rounds out the album with shimmering stanzas that serve to shine a light brightly on those DeNooyer holds dear, especially those encouraging him to breathe in a deeper life and delight in the sun nourishing your spirit. This calm, reflective tune dotted with brighter timbres also includes vocal effects to enhance the narration and a fugue to segue into the final, grand gesture of this dynamic, well crafted experience.
And with the applause at the end, Fragments comes to a successful close, thus transitioning this whole experience into another fragment of space time, never to truly be experienced the same way again. Sure, the players can return and the setting can be used again, but these tunes speak to such emotional depths that resonate through one's lifetime. There’s a reason we often return to old songs that used to light up our world, only to find the ashes of a world that has long since vanished. Additional listens will reveal sonic crannies left unexplored and new contexts for processing these emotional depths towards becoming whole. Every member involved crafted something special and performed beautifully, and if Josiah DeNooyer is not aware of it already, the many fragments of this special community he serves help to make humanity whole as well.
If you want to support this project, the artists involved, and Josiah DeNooyer’s efforts directly, check out his website and the links below to listen to the record, buy some merch, and keep up-to-date when he’s playing this music!
Album Credits:
Alto Saxophone - Kyle Burgess
Piano - Bill Cessna
Bass - Owen Cramer
Drums, composition, arrangement - Josiah DeNooyer
Vocals, narration - Faith Quashie
Violin 1 - Karisa Chiu
Violin 2 - Paolo Dara
Viola - Sava Velkoff
Cello - Piper Meldrum-Roy
Recorded by Raziel Castaneda at Third Coast Recording Company, Grand Haven, MI
Mixed by Samuel Peters
Mastered by Mike Marciano at Systems Two Recording, New York
Support Josiah DeNooyer!
Website: https://josiahdenooyermusic.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/josiah.denooyer/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/musedriano_lyfe/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@josiahdenooyer2776
Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/josiahdenooyer/fragments-a-suite-of-original-music
This link will be updated when the album drops, but for now, click to check out more about this project’s release!