Christine Jensen

Day Moon

Justin Time

Saxophonist, composer, and conductor Christine Jensen steps in with a brilliant album, Day Moon. Her sister, Ingrid, of course, is a renowned trumpeter and original member of the female supergroup Artemis. Christine is usually very busy leading her own fabled jazz orchestra in Canada, but the pandemic gave her (or forced her) to work on a much smaller scale, mostly collaborating with her longtime friend, pianist Steve Amirault. Once the two had worked out several of Jensen’s compositions and other material, they formed a quartet consisting of bassist Adrian Vedady and drummer Jim Doxas for this effort, which also presents the saxophonist and pianist in duo settings as well. Jensen’s playing on alto and soprano covers a wide swath from comforting to aggressive as she displays remarkable versatility and deep emotion through these ten tracks, all originals except the standard “Here’s That Rainy Day,” “Balcony Rules” co-written with Amirault, and “Like In Love” by Amirault.

The title track, written pre-pandemic, was originally penned for her chordless collective CODE Quartet that included trumpeter Lex French, heard on the 2021 Justin Time Genealogy. Here, of course, there is no trumpet but piano instead. The quartet does a terrific job of painting a haunting soundscape to reflect the odd feeling Jensen had when seeing a perfect moon with the sun behind it during the daytime. Perhaps her otherworldly reaction was a harbinger of the pandemic itself, which comes across in the music, that begins somberly but evolves into spirited, soaring alto in the mid-section, an explorative piano excursion, and resolution in the haunting tones of her opening alto lines.

The four-song suite Quiessence features Jensen on soprano introducing “Lines” which also features bassist Vedady, after which Jensen ventures into the stratosphere before parachuting into a graceful landing.  The second movement, “Twenty Twenty Blues” gears up into hard bop mode, with Jensen setting a swinging pace on alto and giving Amirault and Doxas each a turn before the final two movements take us away to Brazil with her richly toned soprano and on “Tolos D’April” and her fluid alto and Amirault’s vibrantly dancing piano evoking a breezy, blue sky day by the ocean on  “Etude de Mars,” soaring joyously through the final few choruses on soprano.

As mentioned, there are a couple of duet pieces with Amirault – the ever tender “Here’s That Rainy Day” played with dripping heartfelt emotion on the alto and the playful co-write with Amirault, “Balcony Rules” which is based on “What Is This Called Love,” rendered again on alto where she unleashes a series of cascading, spiraling lines. Her alto carries the gleeful melody on Amirault’s “Like In Love” with Doxas giving it a crisp swing with his kit work. The quartet renders “Wind Up” with the bass-drum tandem setting up a swaying, almost singable riff for Jensen’s alto, from which she launches a signature, cluster rich improvised turn, inspiring one from Amirault as well, capped out with a flourish by Doxas. As if with a sly grin, they go out in fun-loving style with “Girls Can Play the Blues,” easing into with a slow, sultry groove as Jensen weaves in those chilling vibrato lines throughout.

Jensen has several other projects in the works – perhaps more duets like heard here, another CODE Quartet album, a big band album and some performances with her sister too. In the meantime, she’s shines in this quartet setting both with her compositions and musicianship.

• Jim Hynes

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