Saxophonist, composer and producer Steve Dyer has been an important presence on the South African scene since returning to the country in the 1990s. He brought influences from time spent in Botswana and then Zimbabwe, where he lived in anti-Apartheid exile for some years, refusing conscription into the white South African Defence Force. Since then, he’s worked on a large range of projects, and this new recording is his latest attempt to explore the breadth of the country’s jazz.
It comes at a time when, as he said in a recent radio interview, “one of the success stories of democratic South Africa is so many young improvising musicians taking the music forward”.
One of those is his son, the pianist Bokani Dyer, and some of the players here – notably alto saxophonist Mthunzi Mvubu, trumpeter Sthembiso Bhengu and drummer Sphelelo Mazibuko – featured on the younger Dyer’s excellent album Radio Sechaba last year. But the new record features a rotating personnel, with Andile Yenana sharing keyboard duties with both Dyers, a brace of bassists, a vocal quartet, and others.
Dyer Senior marshals them to good effect in a set where he tried “to look at each song as a chapter in a book”. That makes it an excellent choice for one of two debut releases on the new AfricArise imprint, a collaboration between Ropeadope records and City of Gold Arts which will offer new recordings from the country, and tour offerings (only in the US for now, alas) to mark the 30th anniversary this year of South African independence.
The composer’s book offers a range of styles. Some are smoother than listeners who still treasure The Blue Notes may associate with South African Jazz, but all have a rolling rhythmic bounce that seems hard to capture anywhere else. Steve Dyer, who contributes on voice, keyboards and guitar as well as saxophones and flute, is adept at working up relatively simple materials into absorbing arrangements that showcase his collaborators to good effect.
The result is a rewarding mix of old and new. The early tracks lead a carefully planned, layered production, mostly at a measured middling tempo, melodically catchy, strong on the gently elegiac, eschewing the ecstatic. The last third of the set feels as if it reaches back a little further than the rest. A couple of tracks featuring Mvubu’s poised and poignant alto are pleasingly reminiscent of Abdullah Ibrahim’s little big band Ekaya. Then Yenana returns for Uyivile, which evokes memories of his work with the late, great Zim Ngqawana, with Dyer rising spiritedly to what would have been Zim’s alto role and a stirring trumpet solo from Bhengu. The album finishes with a simple choral arrangement of the Apartheid-era anthem Senzeni Na? (What have we done?). It’s an affecting look back on a set that also looks forward to a future flourishing of South African jazz.
Jon Turney writes about jazz, and other things, from Bristol.
