Paris Move reviews QUARTETS

Our thanks to Thierry De Clemensat, who reviewed Kevin Sun's Quartets for Paris Move. Full text below:

Kevin Sun - Quartets (Eng Review) 
Thierry De Clemensat
USA correspondent – Paris-Move and ABS magazine
Editor in chief Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News

PARIS-MOVE, October 8th 2024

"Indispensable" (A Must, highest rating of 5)

Deeply rooted in a form of contemporary and highly intellectual jazz, saxophonist Kevin Sun presents his works in the album *Quartets*, which you can discover a little after mid-October. According to Kevin Sun: The first side highlights Sun’s “secret quartet,” which includes his longtime collaborators Dana Saul (piano), Walter Stinson (double bass), and Matt Honor (drums). They appear regularly in Sun’s discography in various configurations but have only been brought together on record once before (side 1, “The Middle of Tensions,” from the album *The Sustain of Memory* in 2019). During the pandemic, Sun continued to compose and work on this music with the quartet, which was preparing to present new repertoire in March 2020 before being interrupted. With the start of his weekly residency at Lowlands Bar in Brooklyn in September 2021, Sun was finally able to regularly play this music with the group.
The listener is immediately fascinated, appreciating both the parallel sound explorations and the use of rhythms that provide the basis for timeless melodic lines. There’s a touch of genius here that not everyone will follow, but no matter—art is not up for debate, you either take it or miss it. As for me, it’s a discovery. I had heard of this artist since 2018, but this is the first time I’ve had the chance to listen to his works. The music on the first side reflects Sun’s persistent curiosity about orchestration and compositional possibilities using the classical jazz quartet configuration: a wind instrument, a harmonic instrument, a double bass, and drums. Pieces like “Dance Notation” and “Melpomene” deliberately subvert expectations, turning the saxophone into a rhythmic part within a larger ensemble while offering greater textural freedom to the rhythm section. One admires the talent of these artists, especially the musical chemistry between pianist Saul and drummer Honor, who grew up playing music together in Plattsburgh, NY. The ensemble, for its part, delivers a resolutely live, almost unrestrained sound, particularly in pieces like “Far East Western,” inspired by Akira Kurosawa films such as *Yojimbo* and *Seven Samurai*, and the intense swing of “Storied History,” which nods to Jerome Kern’s “All the Things You Are.”
Orchestral form is somewhat of a fountain pen for this artist, so in 2023, Sun decided to form a new group after feeling he had hit a musical wall. “I had been playing my own music every week at Lowlands for almost two years, and I felt like I was at a dead end,” Sun explains. “I thought it was time to change the group and try to involve other musical perspectives that might push me in different directions.” His new quartet, featuring Christian Li on piano, Stinson on double bass, and Kayvon Gordon on drums, explores a complementary side of Sun’s music, favoring a more melodic and relaxed approach in contrast to the more structured direction of his previous quartet. This sound is heard on the second side, which includes modern jazz pieces like “Rudderless Blues” and “tbh,” as well as covers like a light and danceable version of “On the Street Where You Live” from *My Fair Lady*, Bruno Martino’s hit “Estate,” and a surprising 12/8 version of “Yellow Magic (Tong Poo)” by Ryuichi Sakamoto, associated with the iconic 80s Japanese synth-pop group Yellow Magic Orchestra.
The forms between CD 1 and CD 2 are totally different. Of course, the poetic element is always present, but everything is decidedly more restrained, as if the artist found, in this second formula, an inner peace that allows him to settle without needing to pursue the absolute. I remain impressed by the quality of the compositions, which seem to require no musical arrangement to stand tall. Here, the precision of the composer and the imagination he conveys from his inner world can touch anything, even known titles, adding his vision. Despite the variation in members, some elements of Sun’s musical and creative DNA connect the second side to his previous music: “Homage Kondo” is a laid-back rock song that pays tribute to the composer of the *The Legend of Zelda* music, Koji Kondo, and “That Lights a Star” nods to another part of “All the Things You Are” (this time, the introduction made famous by beboppers). “Outlawry” is the oldest piece on the album, dating back to 2013, revisiting a song Sun first developed with Great On Paper, a co-led quartet during his music studies.
For fans of evolving contemporary jazz, this album is “Indispensable.” Kevin Sun shifts the lines and then returns to more classic forms. It’s impossible to compare his style—he stands entirely on his own.