Patricia Brennan's "Breaking Stretch"

It's been two years now since producer David Breskin first dropped Mexican-born vibraphonist-marimbist-composer Patricia Brennan's name in my ear. Since then, she's released an album of solo vibraphone and marimba performances (Maquishti) and another (More Touch) for Pyroclastic that featured Brennan at the helm of a percussion ensemble -- with Kim Cass on bass, Marcus Gilmore on drums, and Mauricio Herrera on hand percussion -- that drew upon jazz, contemporary classical, Afro-Caribbean, and Mexican influences. On September 6, Pyroclastic will release Brennan's latest, Breaking Stretch, and it's a boldly extroverted piece of work. 

On Breaking Stretch, Brennan expands her sonic palette with the addition of a three-horn front line -- Jon Irabagon on alto and sopranino, Mark Shim on tenor, and Adam O'Farrill on trumpet and electronics -- to her quartet. The album's release also marks 20 years since Brennan left her native Veracruz for the United States, and the writing here is marked by a concern with roots, identity, and testing limits -- which is  highlighted by echoes of early salsa, funk, and rock inspirations like the Fania All-Stars, Earth, Wind & Fire, Blood, Sweat & Tears, and Chicago. Brennan uses the extremes of the instruments' ranges to give the impression of a larger group.

Opener "Los Otros Yo (The Other Selves)" works off the tension between parallel melodies that unfold at different rates. The title track begins in a dreamlike space where drifting horn lines first clash, then coalesce into waves of rhythm, setting up solos by the horns, and a final melodic convergence. "Palo de Oros (Suit of Coins)" opens with an extended bass solo, giving way to a swirling array of asynchronous rhythms, the horns' regularity contrasting with Herrera's wildly careening hand drums. In "Suenos de Coral Azul (Blue Coral Dreams)," Brennan depicts her immigrant's journey, fraught with conflicting emotions, the wistful horns and percolating percussion setting the stage for an episode that finds Brennan back in her "early electric Chick and Herbie" bag. 

The turbulent "Five Suns," inspired by an Aztec vision of cyclical creation and destruction, puts me in mind of Leslie Marmon Silko's novel Almanac of the Dead, with its army of Native people marching to reclaim their stolen land. The quietly reflective "Mudanza (States of Change)," inspired by Salvador Diaz Miron's poem of the same name, begins with a pensive marimba solo before the ensemble enters with severe, resonant harmonies. "Manufacturers Trust Company Building" is a delirious slab of salsa, inspired by a multifaceted Harry Bertoia sculpture that resides in front of the eponymous Manhattan structure. (Breaking Stretch producer Breskin's a huge Bertoia fan, who curated a series of concerts in conjunction with the Nasher Sculpture Center's Bertoia retrospective back in 2022.) 

The album closes with "Earendel," a darkly atmospheric piece named for the oldest and most distant star yet discovered, reflecting Brennan's penchant for astronomy. Patricia Brennan's musical universe continues to expand. Breaking Stretch is an intriguing way station on the voyage.