Jan Garbarek & Marilyn Mazur
Elixir

With this "Elixir" (2008), the result of the collaboration between Jan Garbarek and the all-around drummer Marilyn Mazur, the listening is anything but simple; in fact, I would describe it as a tad eccentric and experimental - at least that's how it was for my inexperienced ears.

The album in question is the result of a particular combination of faint touches of jazz (in fact, the presence of Garbarek's sax is quite limited) and bizarre sounds, bordering on tribal, of which Mazur is the author; the result is a carpet of crackling rhythms and scattered sounds across 21 tracks, all very short and extremely essential, perhaps at times slightly challenging.

The atmosphere is mostly the main flaw of "Elixir": where Jan Garbarek intervenes to embellish and color the generally somewhat static and watered-down background, the music comes to life and becomes more enveloping, but in the tracks where everything depends on Mazur's creativity, things change, or rather, wobble.

Not that Marilyn is incapable of engaging or intriguing the listener, heaven forbid, but if the considerable number of songs had been reduced and presented in a less heterogeneous manner without affecting the ambient spirit, and giving a greater sense of coherence and homogeneity, it certainly wouldn't have hurt. On the other hand, the situation is what it is: briskly presented tracks supported by convincing tight rhythms, brief instrumental interludes that, to be completely honest, go nowhere, small and imperceptible sprinkles of new age whistled by light flutes, and finally, the (few?) tracks enlivened by Garbarek.

These last ones save the album from being panned. The vivid notes of the sax are sometimes cheerful and carefree, catchy and determined (as in "Dunun Song," "Joy Chant," and "Orientales"), other times more smooth and enveloping (for example "Winter Wish" and "Clear Recycle") but rarely melancholic; in fact, they merely maintain a certain emotional tension in the air without really leading to true sentimental confessions.

In short, this album lacks in form, being too dispersed, and in atmosphere, because it is saved in extremis by the good old sax of Jan, who made me dream so much in other works but here plays only a mere (and ungrateful) role of filler. For the rest: ding dong, tum tam, cric croc, parapumzazzum. Get this album if you like minimalism seasoned with the most diverse sounds.