SLAMCD503 Horacio Straijer & Horacio Hurtado – Straijer – Hurtado: Marimba and Double Bass in Jazz, Ethnic & Improvised Music

Duo recording by Argentine musicians, marimba player Horacio Straijer and bassist Mono Hurtado, playing a mixture of standards, original compositions and improvisations, with guests that include baritone saxophonist George Haslam.

Horacio Straijer: marimba, percussion, drums
Mono Hurtado: double bass, keyboards
with guests:
Quique Sinesi: guitar (tracks 1 & 7)
Eduardo Avila: charango (track 8)
Fernando Barragan: sikus, rondadores (track 9)
George Haslam: baritone saxophone (track 11)

“Blending Argentinian folkloric music with a dollop of lilting, Latin jazz, and a dash of Miles and Monk, this is a pleasant release featuring the spare sound of resonant bass and ringing marimba in a set of warm laconic improvisations. The clear, even recording captures each of the players equally in the mix, complementing their collective approach to the music. They deliver credible performances on both the jazz standards and their originals, with Hurtado nailing the pulse of the music while sharing the melodic duties with Straijer’s fleet mallet work. The bass player has a dark, full arco tone, featured to good effect on “Pueblo Sin Nombre”, a brooding improvisation that spins off from a simple vamp into hovering atmospheric harmonics. The addition of charango, a small Andean double-stringed guitar, on the lilting “Little Hay Road” and panpipes on “Un Salto al Vacio” add textural spice to the music, particularly the latter piece with its staggering, flowing melodies passed between bass, marimba and pipes…The final cut offers an interesting contrast, adding bari player George Haslam for a short collective improvisation. Baritone and bass hint and prod at fragments of folk-like melodies, while Straijer peppers the interplay with shakers and rattles.” – Michael Rosenstein, Cadence

Recorded at Plaza Studios Buenos Aires 1995.
Engineering by Horacio Hurtado.
Mastering by Menzel Siperman.

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