Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra: Connections

Connections is the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra's eighth album and its third in a collaborative series for the 2020s: Voices - A Musical Heritage, Tidal Currents: East Meets West, and now this second record under the East Meets West moniker. While Tidal Currents brought Christine Jensen alongside Jill Townsend to compose for the WJO, Connections brings together Quebec-based Jean-Nicolas Trottier and our own Fred Stride, meaning that a Vancouver-based composer has contributed to all three of these albums.

The WJO were recently featured on Winnipeg's Classic 107 radio station and its YouTube channel, with Stride and band director Richard Gillis being intereviewed by host Chris Wolf.

Stride talked to Classic 107 about how the collaborative concept drew his suspicion because it could easily jeopardize the freedom that he looks for in a composer's commission. "Normally, when a commission comes in, classical or jazz, it's instrumentation and length," he said in the interview, suggesting that the rest would depend on his sole discretion.

Stride met the younger Trottier in 2011 through a connection made by trumpeter Ron di Lauro. He named compositional reference points for himself and Trottier in the interview: Bill Holman and Wayne Shorter respectively. The two composers agreed that they didn't want to finish each other's work and would instead each complete whole pieces, first long ones and then short ones. The band used an overdubbed recording process in sections at guitarist Larry Roy's home studio.

Trottier's "Sounds of Joy" ringing bass drum easygoing shots around the band in stereo over a swing time. Tenor saxophonist Niall Cade, the album's most prominent soloist, is the first to play a solo.

"Hello Jean-Nicolas", written by Stride, features Trottier himself as the soloist. Other than Trottier's trombone chorale "Echoes from Within", it's the only trombone solo on the album. The short piece has a sudden ending, a device that both composers use here.

"Leave No Stone", Stride's first long piece, is in ballad time but has heft to its groove. Cade and the saxophone section take centre stage again, with Cade's playing in the high register shining through.

Trottier's "The Healing Song" features the rhythm section with piano, bass, and drum solos. Will Bonness, a Juno-winner and one of the top pianists across the country, is undeniable as an exciting soloist for WJO. Karl Kohut plays bass with a well-crafted sound that expands when he gets the spotlight, and the sonorous bass drum of Fabio Ragnelli (a regular drummer for Bonness outside of WJO) is one of the sonic signatures I'll recall from this record. The entire rhythm section, plus Roy on guitar, returns from Voices (well, part of Voices) and Tidal Currents.

Stride's "Halfway Point" refers to WJO's home city and its longitudinal place in Canada, as epitomized by the Portage and Main intersection which Connections' cover art depicts. As Jonathan Challoner's trumpet and Neil Watson's soprano saxophone trade licks, the trumpet finally gets some time in the spotlight on what has been a sax-heavy album. That continues on "Another Look", a ballad, with trumpeter Andrew Littleford's solo.

The last two pieces, "The Jaws of Defeat" and "The Great Return", come from Trottier. The former is an intense swirl of chording and drumset time, featuring Cade again; the latter features Bonness and closes the album at a slow tempo.

BC-based fans of big band will enjoy this project as one of Stride's first major record projects since the Saskatchewan Suite, released in 2021 also on Alberta-based Chronograph Records. The WJO continues to run one of Canada's premier big band operations, bringing nationwide artists together and documenting them on record at a pace that our local big bands descending from the straight-ahead tradition (other than the Daniel Hersog Jazz Orchestra, bien sûr) will have to keep dreaming of.

released February 7, 2025 | Buy digital (Bandcamp) | Buy CD (label) | available on streaming