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Jason Kao Hwang/Human Rites Trio  

Jason Kao Hwang – composer, violin, viola  

Andrew Drury – drum set  

Ken Filiano – string bass

Each composition is a progression of gestures, songs, movements and locations that bring participants into a state of discovery and compassion. Within these Human Rites, individual voices are empowered to be fully expressive so that each moment is unpredictable and deeply intentional.  This psychic intensity, both sacred and sacrificial, provokes a heightened awareness that unifies Listeners and Musicians within a spiritual entrainment. As we hear ourselves within music we become Music, which is no longer a performance but an affirmation of justice and celebration of life.  

I wish to thank Andrew Drury and Ken Filiano for their creativity, dedication and friendship.  

This CD was completed during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. The music honors all the heroic doctors, nurses, and frontline workers who are saving so many lives.  The music is also dedicated to the memory of all the people whom we tragically lost to this terrible disease.  

– Jason Kao Hwang 

 

LINER NOTES  

Jason Hwang and his longtime bandmates Ken Filiano (bass) and Andrew Drury (drums) could only have made this recording now, after having persevered – individually and collectively – through life’s trials and errors to get to this point of effortless musical mastery, where they can converse freely and eloquently in a language created together over years of collaboration. Certainly, the intimate experience of engaging with this music as a trio for at least a year, testing it in concert after concert, making revisions and discoveries all along the way, has engendered a truly remarkable depth of shared feeling and common understanding among them.   

Words Asleep Spoken Awake aptly showcases the way Hwang’s compositions channel his trio’s incredible chemistry, as increasingly syncopated chromatic string lines provide a recurring frame of reference for mutually responsive interplay weaving funk, swing, and free sections together with consistent thematic coherence. Even when playing separately, all three keep resonating together; just listen to the seamless flow among their successive individual solos leading into the stately recapitulating coda. Filiano begins the sequence with an arco statement, densely textured with double-stopped multiphonics echoed and elaborated, in a deft segue, by Drury’s solo on floor tom (which he plays by blowing air through a plumbing fixture onto his sliding-bell-tuned drumhead). Hwang’s solo picks up just where Drury’s leaves off, expanding upon the rough-hewn lyricism, while reintroducing the restless chromatic agitation to be foregrounded immediately thereafter in the final ensemble passage.   

It takes three to tango – and shuffle – in Conscious Concave Concrete, whose first part starts out with rhythmically insistent vamps propelling improvisations into the rubato viola solo that serves as a pivot into the powerful blues groove that follows. Throughout, Hwang’s Korean influenced pizzicato viola provides continuity across the two contrasting sections while highlighting cosmopolitan aesthetic affinities.   

Such artful transgression of conventional generic boundaries further manifests itself in 2AM, as the off-beat counterpoint of its opening exposition gets distilled down to Filiano’s loping asymmetrical bass line, which evolves from violin-solo accompaniment into an extemporized lead voice in its own right before giving impetus to Drury’s concluding drum solo over string tremolos.   

From a certain perspective, Battle for the Indelible Truth – in its progression from raw string-shredding expressionism, through hybrid Afro-Asian ecumenicism, to poignantly direct lyricism – might conceivably bear witness to Hwang’s own aesthetic journey, testifying to his deep roots in the Lower East Side avant-garde scene while offering abundant evidence of the transformative revelations he’s experienced since the loft era.   

Last but not least, Defiance finds this trio reaping the rich rewards of sustained musical rapport, so amply demonstrated by the dynamic call and response here between composition and improvisation, with written lines serving as inspirational points of departure for individually conceived, and often contrapuntally interwoven, elaborations of the thematic material at hand.   

Over the fifteen years since they recorded their debut together, Hwang’s artistic synergy with Filiano and Drury has gained such depth and profundity with each successive project – from his Edge quartet through his Spontaneous River string orchestra, his Burning Bridge octet, and his Sing House quintet – that it seems a single gesture can now send all three into a sublime state of sympathetic resonance. As we marvel at the collaborative interplay of their individual voices united here once again in common purpose, we can only look forward to many further shared journeys of musical discovery still ahead. – Scott Currie  

  

CREDITS  

All Compositions by Jason Kao Hwang  ℗ ©2020 Jason Kao Hwang, Flying Panda Music, BMI All Rights Reserved   

Recorded August 5 and 6, 2019 at Park West Studios, Brooklyn, NY   

Producer/Mix Engineer: Jason Kao Hwang   

Recording Engineer: Jim Clouse   

Mastering:  Paul Zinman, SoundByte Productions      

Mix Consultants: Ken Filiano, Andrew Drury   

Design: William Mazza   

Liner Notes: Scott Currie   

Group and Concert Photos:  RI Sutherland-Cohen   

Cover Photo:  Jason Kao Hwang   

True Sound Recording TS03   

Special Thanks: Gennevieve Lam; Patricia and William Parker, Todd Nicholson/Arts for Art; Bobby Hill/Transparent Productions; Layne Garrett, Steve Korn/Rhizome; Deanna Relyea/Edgefest; James Keepnews, Steve Ventura and all the good people at Quinn’s; Stephen Gauci; Bruce Gallanter/Downtown Music Gallery; Stephen Campiglio/Mishi-maya-gat Spoken Word & Music Series; Tony Falco/The Falcon; Randy Thaler, Maurice D. Robertson  

  

BIOGRAPHIES  

The music of Jason Kao Hwang (composer/violin/viola) explores the vibrations and language of his history. His compositions are often narrative landscapes through which sonic beings embark upon extemporaneous, transformational journeys.  His most recent releases, Conjure, his duo with Karl Berger, and Blood, performed by Burning Bridge, his octet of Chinese and Western instruments, have received critical acclaim. In 2019, 2018, 2013 and 2012, the El Intruso International Critics Poll voted him #1 for Violin/Viola.  In 2017 Downbeat Magazine named his quintet Sing House as one of the best of the year. His 2015 CD Voice, which features vocalists Deanna Relyea and Tom Buckner received critical acclaim. Zilzal, his duets with Ayman Fanous, was named one of the Top CDs of 2014 by All About Jazz/ Italy. The 2012 Downbeat Critics’ Poll voted Mr. Hwang as Rising Star for Violin. The first Burning Bridge was one of the top CDs of 2012 by Jazziz and the Jazz Times. In 2011 he released Symphony of Souls performed by his improvising string orchestra, Spontaneous River. In 2010, the New York Jazz Record selected Commitment, The Complete Recordings, 1981-1983 from a collective that was Mr. Hwang’s first band, as one the 2010 Reissued Recordings of the Year. His quartet EDGE released, EDGE (2006), Stories Before Within (2008), and Crossroads Unseen (2011), all of which appeared on many top ten of the year lists. His chamber opera The Floating Box, A Story in Chinatown was one of the Top Ten Opera Recordings of 2005 by Opera News. As composer, Mr. Hwang has received support from Chamber Music America, NEA, Rockefeller Foundation, NY Community Trust, NJSCA, NYSCA, US Artists International and others. As violinist, he has worked with William Parker, Anthony Braxton, Butch Morris, Reggie Workman, Pauline Oliveros, Tomeka Reid, Patrick Brennan, Will Connell, Jr., Zen Matsuura, Oliver Lake, Adam Rudolph, Jerome Cooper and others.  

Andrew Drury is a drummer, composer, and organizer who has performed in 30 countries and on 70 recordings, recently recognized by All About Jazz as “one of the most adventurous drummer/percussionists in creative music today, and a dedicated humanitarian.” A long-time student of the legendary drummer Ed Blackwell, he performs as a soloist and leads ensembles of all sizes—most recently Content Provider featuring Ingrid Laubrock, Briggan Krauss, Brandon Seabrook. In addition to his work with Jason Kao Hwang and Ken Filiano he has worked in the last decade with J. D. Parran, Ku-umba Frank Lacy/1032K, Stephanie Richards, Robert Dick, Kris Davis, Alan Braufman, Cooper-Moore, Satoko Fujii, Thomas Buckner, Joseph Daley, Aruán Ortiz, Tomeka Reid, Roswell Rudd, Jack Wright, Bonita Oliver, and many more. He is a pioneer of extended percussion techniques involving friction and which turn the drum into a wind instrument. Drury is the founding director of Continuum Culture & Arts, a non-profit organization that has presented over 150 Soup & Sound house concerts and events involving film, dance, writing, performance art, and humanities discussions in the US, Europe, and South America. Continuum also facilitates international cultural exchange with artists in 40 countries, provides educational programming in homeless shelters and schools across the US and abroad. He has led over 1,500 workshops and masterclasses in universities, prisons, Indian reservations, schools, Central American villages, and shelters for homeless people and battered women. In 2017 Drury received a Jubilation Foundation Fellowship for “spreading joy through rhythm.”  

Ken Filiano, bass player, composer, improviser, has been performing throughout the world for thirty years, collaborating with leading artists in multiple genres, fusing the rich traditions of the double bass with his own seemingly limitless inventiveness. Ken leads two quartets, Quantum Entanglements, and Baudalino's Dilemma (Vinny Golia, Warren Smith, Michael TA Thompson), and is a co-leader of The Steve Adams/Ken Filiano Duo and TranceFormation (Connie Crothers, Andrea Wolper.) His extensive discography includes a solo bass CD, “subvenire” (NineWinds), and “Dreams From a Clown Car" (Clean Feed), which presents his compositions for his quartet, Quantum Entanglements (Michael Attias, Tony Malaby, Michael TA Thompson). For these and numerous other recordings and performances, critics have called Ken a "creative virtuoso," a "master of technique" . . . "a paradigm of that type of artist. . . who can play anything in any context and make it work, simply because he puts the music first and leaves peripheral considerations behind."* Ken has performed and/or recorded with Karl Berger, Bobby Bradford, Anthony Braxton, Connie Crothers Quartet, Bill Dixon, Ted Dunbar, Giora Feidman Quartet, Vinny Golia ensembles, Taylor Ho Bynum, Jason Kao Hwang, Joseph Jarman, Raul Juarena, Joelle Leandre, Frank London, Tina Marsh, Warne Marsh, Dom Minasi, Barre Phillips, Roswell Rudd, ROVA Saxophone Qt., Paul Smoker, Peeter Uuskyla, Fay Victor Ensemble, Pablo Zielger, and many more. Ken is on the teaching roster at the New School in New York, and has been a guest artist lecturer at School of Visual Arts and Hunter College (New York). He teaches master classes in bass and improvisation, and has a private bass studio in Brooklyn. 

 

REVIEWS

The veteran New York violinist/violist Jason Kao Hwang, who's worked with Anthony Braxton, William Parker and the late Butch Morris, among others, creates work under his own name that resist categorization:  Sometimes it's jazz, sometimes cham,ber music and sometimes entirely uncategorizable ... Which is to say that this is heavy, profound music. - Philip Freeman, Downbeat Magazine  Read Full Review 

...features playing of the high-wire, rough-and-tumble variety, the trio's expressions rooted in the rapport the musicians have developed over time. Such unpredictability makes for exciting and engaging music, and the greatest takeaway has less to do with the compositions and more with the always evolving interplay between them.  Ron Schepper, textura.com  Read Full Review 

Mirroring the onslaught of the pandemic and our attempts to adapt to a new normal, the angular fits and starts of “Words Asleep Spoken Awake, Part 1” give way to a structured groove and anthemic melody, while “Part 2” transitions from bristling frenzy to haunting elegy. The episodic suite incorporates funk, swing, and free-form sections, with seamless transitions between recurring motifs and individual solos that demonstrate the trio’s uncanny chemistry... - Troy Collins, Point of Departure  Read Full Review 

(Google translation) ...the obvious emotionality of the musicians remains, completely at ease in a communicative process that is willingly heard, complex, and at the same time easy to follow for what they express. - Vittorio Lo Conte, musiczoom.it  Read Full Review 

Jason Kao Hwang plays violin and viola as he teams up with bassist Ken Filiano and drummer Andrew Drury for six originals. Hwang’s tone is rich and gorgeous, making the outside and left tunes quite accessible...The interplay between the three is impressive, conversing and contrasting on “Words Asleep Spoken Awake: Part 1” and forming a strong front line on “Defiance”. Free and focused. - George W. Harris, jazz weekly.com  Read Full Review 

The trio jumps into a great groove right from the opening tag, repeating that festive line over & over with Mr. Hwang soon taking an inspired and intense solo. I can tell that this trio has been together for a long while as they soar tightly together and consistently maintain a jubilant, festive spirit.  - Bruce Gallanter, Downtown Music Gallery   Read Full Review

What they actually play conveys great verve and great zeal for life. Hwang and Filiano can pluck and counterpluck, but then they break out bows and the concept goes tilt-a-whirl dizzy... But dry, strategically assembled bits gave way to wild flights of mad-bird fancy. Crucial areas (I’ll leave you to find them) reveal that they’re playing nothing less than the blues, a rubbery swagger at which each of the three men throws himself, to push the other two up that hill. - Andrew Hamlin, jazztimes.com  Read Full Review 

With 15 years of mutual collaboration and musical understanding, Hwang, Filiano and Drury have developed a natural, fascinating language that is fully expressed on Human Rites Trio. - Filipe Freita, jazztrail.net  Read full review 

...this six track blend of inviting melodic passages, deep rolling grooves, tribal percussion, haunting white noise and cacophonous mind-searing energies was completed during the early days of COVID-19 make it the perfect reflection of the complacency shattering, high anxiety era we’re living here in 2020.  - Jonathan Widram, jwvibe.com  Read full review 

Jason Kao Hwang sure is a prolific artist, and thankfully his craft is extremely well executed and always thoughtful. This time, he’s aligned with Andrew Drury behind the drum kit and Ken Filiano handling string bass while Hwang utilizes violin and viola with stunning results...Now having worked together on and off for 15 years, the trio illustrate dynamic chemistry amid a rich and daring climate on this exceptional outing.  - Tom Haugen, Take Effect Read Full Review 

Jason has been working with bassist Ken Filiano and drummer Andrew Drury for a long time: they recorded their first joint album fifteen years ago, and later collaborated in a variety of formats - from Edge Quartet to Sing House Quintet, so the musicians have a great understanding... Battle for the Indelible Truth impress with an unusually expressive game and jewelry interaction of all three artists. - Leonid Auskern, Jazz Quad  Read Full Review  

It's a marriage of complete control and artful abandon that's never short on surprise...Jason Kao Hwang, Ken Filiano and Andrew Drury know themselves well enough to be lost and found in each other's sounds, and that beauty points to what's right with Human Rites Trio's music. - Dan Bilawsky, All About Jazz  Read full review 

Andrew Drury pumps energy and excitement into the pieces.. Although they sometimes direct the vessel of their music into uncharted waters and often express chaos, like in a stormy sea, their musicianship is palpable.  if contemporary Avant-garde is your thing, you’ll put on your life jacket and dive into this project. - Dee Dee McNeil, Musical Memoirs  Read Full Review 

5/5 Stars. An elegant concert for our troubled times. - Grady Harp, Amazon.com  Read Full Review 

The near-12 minute opulence of the pure, thrusting, raw string-shredding expressionism through hybrid Afro-Asian ecumenicism, of the dynamic 'Battle for the Indelible Truth' is a breathtaking work of musical art, in and unto itself, and then the album comes to a close on the fingering-finesse, and drum/percussion, dynamic call and response between composition and improvisation core found within 'Defiance.' - Anne Carlini, Exclusive Magazin   Read full review 

...The bluesy bass line and finger picking of strings gives "Conscious Concave Concrete" a stellar, jamming groove, while "2 AM" has a more elegant touch to the main structure of the song. Jason Kao Hwang finishes his new album with the quiet build up of "Defiance" which closes with a stellar drum solo. - JP's Music Blog  Read full review 

The three virtuoso musicians are recognized for their exploration of the potential offered by the respective instruments. Individual voices intertwine in such a way that at every moment our senses are impacted in an unpredictable and deeply intentional way, creating firm bonds that unite musicians and listeners. - António Branco, Jazz.pt   Read full review 

If “jazz violin” evokes for you the uptempo swing, orchestral blues, and virtuosic bebop of the great Regina Carter, it needn’t; Hwang’s style, equally moving, is marked by wide-open texture, harmonic expansion, and rhythmic looseness, not conventional idioms, but it’s still tethered to melody and beats.  Daniel King, motherjones.com   Read full article 

…when it comes to improvised music, I consider Jason’s violin/viola work to be right up there at the TOP! … I give Jason and his bandmates a MOST HIGHLY RECOMMENDED rating, with an “EQ” (energy quotient) score of 4.99 for this highly engaging sonic experience.   - Rotcod Zzaj, Contemporary Fusion  Read full review 

 

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Jason Kao Hwang/Human Rites Trio at the Vision Festival 2019 at Roulette, Brooklyn, NY