When Sébastien Charlier gave me his first pro album earlier this summer, I felt somewhat apprehensive. Mostly because I really like him as a person, but his music, despite (or perhaps because of) his dazzling technique, never moved me until now. The title of the album, Diatonic Revelation, did little to reassure me. I was, in short, expecting an inaccessible record of technically mind boggling but not very musical harmonica playing.
I am glad to say that I was pleasantly surprised. It took me several listens to form an opinion about it, but dazzling yet pointless technique it ain’t. Past a short and oddly uninteresting first track, the record enters full-blown into jazz territory, in a way that, to my knowledge, no record featuring diatonic harmonica ever has. Despite its title, Diatonic Revelation is not harmonica record. It’s a jazz record with a drums, double-bass, piano and diatonic harmonica line-up.
The second track, Gordonnerie, opens on a dreamy double-bass sub-theme with sparse piano accompaniment, which lays the way for the harmonica to pick up the main theme when the drums join in. As soon as Sébastien plays the first few notes, it becomes apparent that the approach to the diatonic displayed on this record is very unusual. None of the commonly used trappings of diatonic playing (throat vibrato, warbles, chording, etc.) are present. Sébastien approaches the instrument like a pure single-note instrument and his playing is carefully controlled and homogeneous.
For those who want it to be spelled out, Sébastien is a fluent overblower who can play both fast and furious or slow and romantic as the music requires. He has gone way beyond the concept of positions since that seriously limits one's ability to follow chord changes in jazz. Compared to the demos of his I heard six years ago, his rhythmic fluidity has become near perfect, and the overblowing is practically impossible to pick by ear. In short, he's as accomplished a diatonic player as can be found. On his first solo on Gordonneries, Sébastien shows that he can match the fluidity and speed of a saxophone and pack a mean punch too. Rhythmically and harmonically, it’s impeccable, another thing that is more than rare in diatonic “jazz” records.
That being said, another reason this isn’t a harmonica album is the way that the band interacts. The excellent André Charlier on drums (no relation), Benoît Sourisse on piano and Marc-Michel Le Bevillon on double-bass are not there just to showcase Sébastien’s playing, they are an integral part of a whole, with long solo space and a crucial rhythmic and harmonic role.
The jazz styles tackled are varied, from the samba groove of Une Binchoise Entre Nous to the melancholy ballad Pluie d’Octobre and the bluesy La Bastide. As such, Diatonic Revelation offers a great variety while staying true to jazz tradition. As with records of somewhat complex music, it takes a while to penetrate, especially because the harmonic structures are mostly intricate.
That isn't to say that it's so odd that it can’t be simply enjoyed for it’s own sake. The writing isn’t deliberately obtuse or weird, and it’s not intellectual, there’s a lot of energy floating around. The themes in particular are, for the most part, easy on the ears and memorable.
Diatonic Revelation has turned out to be a very nice surprise for me, and repeated listening has been a very enjoyable experience. It’s certainly as musical a diatonic featuring jazz album as I’ve ever heard, but that’s not to say it’s perfect...
For a start, Sébastien’s deliberate avoidance of the specific features that make the diatonic what it is, while commendable and fruitful also tend to neuter the instrument in a way. I think that the constant control, the restraint that he displays at all times tends to stifle the kind of spontaneity that I like in jazz. That makes some of his solos oddly cold at times.
Another thing is that while Sébastien’s harmonic inventiveness is superb, his tone is run of the mill. I wasn’t expecting the kind of Waltery depth that too many diatonic enthusiasts consider the be all and end all of tone. It would’ve been completely out of place in such a record. Still, the texture of Sébastien’s sound is non-descript. It doesn’t catch your ear. In fact, the record closes on a solo piece called Fantaisie Nocturne which just doesn’t cut it simply because the lack of accompaniment reinforces this blandness of the sound.
That being said, and despite the fact that I still consider it’s title to be needlessly pretentious and wholly inappropriate considering the contents of the record, I have to admit that it is, at least, a revelation of sorts. It's an astonishing first record and, more importantly, it’s a great record, both by the standards of jazz (at least as far as I’m able to interpret them) and simply in terms of musicality.
If you're interested in hearing the diatonic harmonica used in an advanced musical context, or simply if you're a fan of modern jazz, then this record is for you. In fact, I suspect that one has to like jazz to enjoy this record which was obviously not recorded to please harmonica enthusiasts first and foremost. And it's probably much better that way...
