Matthew Putman and Michael Sarian
Improvisations Vol. II
Michael Sarian: Trumpet
Matthew Putman: Keyboard
Recorded by Michael Sarian in Brooklyn, NY
on July 11, 2020
Album design by Mark Smith
TRACKS
1 - Part I (Nature Boy) 6:32
2 - Part II 5:59
3 - Part III 4:53
Release August 21, 2020
Listen & buy from Bandcamp
ABOUT THE ALBUM
Quiet is far from silent, a certainty that Michael Sarian and Matthew Putman affirm in their meditative ode to the silence that overcame New York City during quarantine. Without opportunities to perform, they sought new ways to collaborate and found each other, turning their apartments into venues and recording this debut shared album at Studio Hicks in Brooklyn. The composition is simple, dancing between Putman’s keyboard and Sarian’s trumpet, offering a study in dichotomy as the performers depart from and rejoin each other through confrontational harmonies and graceful duet. Reflecting the times, the instruments search for intense connections, winding around each other through gleaming brass and cascading keys—and momentarily finding balance. Matthew Putman is a longtime member of 577 Records, regularly performing with The Telepathic Band that includes Daniel Carter, Patrick Holmes, Hilliard Greene, and Federico Ughi. This marks Michael Sarian's first release with the label, a new connection made during an isolated time, and evidence that the quiet is blossoming with sound.
”I think many of us never heard a bird sing in Brooklyn until there were no more concerts. I think we never heard our own music ringing in our heads in harmony until we had no one to play with. I think many of us never saw our apartments as venues until there were no more gigs. This was until we remembered our neighbors were also song makers. We waited to collide at the local bar, where masks rather than trumpets covered our chops, and our hands stayed by our sides rather than on the keys. In June we realized that we could again create together, in free expression, not from a place of pain from absence of sound and community, but with the joy that comes when tonal waves crash against the no-longer lonely walls of the studio. In our case, that studio was Michael’s Brooklyn home, a former school from years past, that if it were still a school would have been empty since March. By July when this free improv was recorded it was our recess from solitude. This recording was not the first time we had played together, but it was also something that was a long time in the making. Nearly a year ago Michael arrived with his flugelhorn at a gig at Pioneer Works in Red Hook, Brooklyn, where I was playing with longtime collaborators in discovery, The Telepathic Band, for the release of our latest album. Michael and several others sat in that day, and before we walked away from that almost magical firework of free-flowing, undefinable sound, Daniel Carter had taken Michael's contact information and we started planning a recording date. That session has sadly not happened yet, as we all took to our homes, but what came from that Brooklyn apartment is the first part of a journey. It is two friends exploring new ideas. Its lack of structure is not just a reflection of the times, it is a reflection of an aspiration. We want to speak, to listen, to scream, and at times to laugh in ways that only two kids on the block do when they play. We both look forward to the day when we can make music with others, but until then we will keep the air ringing with the notes written from a moment that will never come again.”
Matthew Putman