John O'Gallagher - Beast

John O’Gallagher has carved out a formidable reputation as a musician and composer who seeks to expand beyond the frontiers of jazz and into new territories of improvisational concepts. His list of collaborators is a who’s-who of adventurous improvised music. Recently he’s extended into an actual new territory, moving to Lisbon, Portugal in 2021.

This new record Beast captures him playing in front of a live audience with a new multi-generational ensemble of musicians from the fertile European improv scene. Rhythm section duties are handled by the Portuguese team of Zé Almeida on bass and drummer João Lencastre. Joining the band on piano is the German musical polymath Samuel Gapp, so that this recording marks the first time in John’s prodigious and storied career that he has recorded as a leader with the classic piano quartet line-up. “I guess it’s about time, I love piano. I did a session with Zé when I first moved here, and he sounded incredible. Then shortly after, tenor saxophonist Noah Preminger introduced me to João Lencastre, who it turns out lives in my neighborhood. And João introduced me to Samuel, who has just finished a Masters Degree here in classical composition. When we first played together, the band felt so great right from the get-go. These guys are super bad - there’s a great scene here in Portugal.”

The album presents four extended improvisational settings, with half of these drawing upon John’s compositional ideas as inspiration for exploring unknown territory, manipulating timbre and density as well as pitch and rhythm. “My compositions are used as frameworks, with the caveat that they are only to be used to provide cohesion when we sense the need. Otherwise, everything’s wide open.”