Louis Sclavis - Les Cadences Du Monde

2022

Initially planned, as usual, for release on ECM but delayed due to a backlog of post-COVID productions on this label, Louis Sclavis' new record appears on JMS (where Frontières was already released in 2017). For the occasion, he presents a new quartet which, in fact, could just as well be called a quartet, as the attention paid to a balanced acoustic sound is as much a part of the world of classical as it is of jazz.
 Even world music, since here the zarb or daf of Keyvan Chemirani (with whom the clarinetist had already collaborated in 2014 on Silk and Salt Melodies) brings just the right amount of extra-Western rhythmic warmth to generate an immediate escape .

In reality, over time, Sclavis has managed to create not only a narrative style that is uniquely his own but also a sound paste that is recognizable from the first notes. Surrounding the deep timbre of his clarinet, two cellos add to the formation a delicate thickness and a dynamic imbued with nobility. Annabelle Luis comes from the baroque (she plays in the Amaryllis ensemble, with which Sclavis developed the Inspiration Baroque repertoire), while Bruno Ducret is more familiar with the music defended here (we were notably able to appreciate him on La Litanie des Cimes by Clément Janinet). In fact, the two are complementary: the first the precision of the bow, the second the incisive pizzicati which allow, together, to cover a wide spectrum of expressiveness (some tensions specific to the contemporary world also nourish the repertoire).

On compositions by Sclavis (and two by Ducret), we find atmospheres of great readability (inspired by the book L'Usure du monde by photographer Frédéric Lecloux, itself inspired by L'Usage du monde by Nicolas Bouvier). Roundness and naturalness guide the flow of the pieces, as does elegance. There is nothing to remove here, nothing to add either. With a sense of restraint and without emphasis, the four musicians construct a sensitive, sometimes complex world, conducive to solo interventions which are the perfect incarnation of this moving music and place it in the living present (even if it was recorded). The listener lets himself be carried along through this new score where Sclavis oscillates, as perhaps never before in his work, between melancholy and light.
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