Cassie Kinoshi'S Seed. - Gratitude Cassie Kinoshi'S Seed.

Released: 22/03/24

Featuring Cassie Kinoshi's flagship large ensemble Seed, turntablist NikNak, and the London Contemporary Orchestra, the beguiling Gratitude from the Mercury Prize-nominated British composer, alto saxophonist and former Kokoroko member is some of the very finest contemporary jazz you will hear this or any year. Premiered and recorded live at London's Southbank Centre, with additional sounds added later by members of Seed in a London studio (it was also mixed at the International Anthem Studios in Chicago), the albumis an intoxicatingly rich work that follows in the tradition of legendary jazz arrangers like Mary Lou Williams and Carla Bley, the aim of the LP being, in Kinoshi's words, to capture the soul of contemporary Black London. That depth of experience is on full display here, with the textural and dynamic flexibility of her large ensemble covering musical ground from iterative modal melancholia to anthemic brass and string themes, all combining to create a work that should very soon have the accolade of instant classic' thrust upon it.