Label: Pi Recordings, 2021

Personnel - Hafez Modirzadeh: tenor saxophone; Craig Taborn: piano; Kris Davis: piano; Tyshawn Sorey: piano.

The Iranian-American saxophonist and composer Hafez Modirzadeh is a true visionary and musical conceptualist who often integrates cross-cultural sounds into a very personal line of work. His new album, Facets, consists of achingly lyrical and tonally immersive sax-piano duets and solo piano pieces blessed with the talents of Craig Taborn, Kris Davis and Tyshawn Sorey.

For this specific work, certain notes on the piano had their pitch lowered according to a specified amount, generating a quirky sound. A re-tuning that instills a sort of bittersweetness in the music, like if the emotional cinematic worlds of G.W. Pabst and Fritz Lang had been reinvented with fascinating modernistic abstraction. But, of course, this only happens in my mind, since the inspirations for the record came from the classical spheres of Bach and Satie, the jazz obliquity of Monk, and some traditional folk currents within the Persian and Turkish musical universes.

Taborn’s improvised solo narrative on “Facet Taborn” haunts us into the album’s intriguing awakenings via a similar impression that occurs when, looking into a blurred canvas, we still think we can figure out what’s in there.

“Facet Sorey” is distinct from the latter, being at turns explosive, meditative and then inquisitively cascading. Sorey’s dark pianism and intricate clusters are stronger than ever on pieces like “Dawn Facet” and “Facet 39 Mato Paha”, where the involvement with Modirzadeh’s poetic tenor declamations are noticeable. Both are seen in an unparalleled spiritual communion on “Facet 29 Night”.

If Davis explores smoother than habitual textures on “Facet 27 Light” and stresses tones drawn from the keyboard’s lower and middle registers on “Facet 28 Nora” (allowing the extensive saxophone leaps to stand out), then on the solo effort “Facet 31 Woke” she delves into an avant-garde realm filled with unexpected turns and heavy block juxtapositions.

Based on Monk’s “Pannonica” and “Ask Me Now”, “Facet 34 Defracted” is another Davis solo digression whose finale exhibits a right-hand motif in counterpoint to a pulsating pedal on the left. Both Monk selections have separate, dedicated readings as duets, with Taborn in command of texture and the bandleader expressing an exquisite melodicism. This duo is equally admirable on “Facet 33 Tides”, where Modirzadeh’s Persian allure is in every note he breathes.

Sculpted with brilliancy, Facets is as much mystifying as it is bewitching. It cannot be overlooked and should not to be missed.