MARIAH PARKER
"SANGRIA"
INTOXICATING UNSQUARE INDO-LATIN DANCE OF MAYA MUSIC

Dancing in all its forms cannot be excluded from the curriculum of all noble education; dancing with the feet, with ideas, with words, and, need I add that one must also be able to dance with the pen?
~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Mind becomes aware of itself, freeing Shiva from passive inertness, and Shakti dances the dance of Maya or illusion, in which the unity embracing self and world becomes endlessly divided and multiplied into the full complexity of all natural manifestations and we each become fragmented into separate conscious selves.
~ From the essay "Sex, Paradox and Existence"

Mariah Parker dances from the keyboard, on the santur, with the pen, and improvising with sensual asymmetry in every bar until the stars come down from the rafters. She celebrates life with sound in cycles of joy and sorrow, taste and joy. This "Sangria" is as sweet as optimism and informed by the deeper waters of experience, sensual honesty, passion, and the comfort of a march and a waltz built into every bar. "I like to improvise," she admitted, "but it always seems to come out in 7/8." She wants to make the audience dance to that time. It's where she finds her home. Once you learn the dance of Sangria, all those marches will just seem like a square dance.

There is a calm surface to this music as simple and open as those ditties by reported "healers" in that blushing bride left at the altar called New Age, without that feeling you have visited the lost incontinent on the edge of Candy Land. Mariah's Latin sounding instrumentals are fueled by such powerful musicians as Anuradha Pal — considered the world's greatest master of the tabla who can wear a sari or a choli without cross-dressing. That tabla is supposed to played by a man, don't ya know. Mariah and Anuradha share that spirit born in the love of music that recognizes boundaries as invitations for a crossing, with the shear love of music as the credential, visa, and license entitling the bearer to explore.

There are two angles to my exploration of this artist: (1) She has a sunny view of the long road and the Big Picture with the depth of darker and deeper wisdom hidden like Easter eggs throughout her pastoral portraiture, or (2) She is a 21st Century composer educated at UC Santa Cruz in world music, Lou Harrison, Arnold Schoenberg, Harry Partch, and Sigur Ros, who has taken that knowledge to the dance floor with Indo-Latin songs to move the listeners from their heads into their bodies long enough to cut the rug and hug each other. I haven't worked out which angle to take, so I guess I'm taking advice from Yogi Berra: "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." This is 21st Century composition, improvisation, dance music and a celebration of sound from Argentina to India smooth as fine silk with flavors of Chick Corea, Gabor Szabo, Ravi Shankar and Gato Barbieri baked in and a creamy frosting of Vince Guaraldi for a smooth and tangy cake fit for a multi-cultural wedding .

Okay, so this music is undeniably beautiful. It's inviting and friendly. But when Mariah takes you gently by the hand through this idyllic landscape, you will find yourself dancing through territory as tactile and sensual as your own damaged heart. There is wisdom flowing in the creek nearby for anyone who needs to find that depth, and the yogic power of the dance of Maya in the groove. Once you learn the salsa of "Sangria," all other such music may feel like a square dance. Whatever we do we are dancing. Since it is an axiom that symmetry is esthetically displeasing, Maya must be dancing to seven. Each musician on this album has a place in the pantheon of players likely to make it to heaven on a music scholarship. This is simple listening to put that easy stuff to shame. Sangria is beautiful, danceable and full of warm, sonic wisdom. There is a taste of mango and lychee nut in this Sangria, and the effect is all the more intoxicating.

Dance, dance for the figure is easy,
The tune is catching and will not stop;
Dance till the stars come down from the rafters;
Dance, dance, dance till you drop.
~ From the poem "Death's Echo" by W.H. Auden


THE SONGS

[The song descriptions below are reprinted here directly from the album.]

1. WATERWHEEL

Mariah Parker (piano), Matthew Monrfort (scalloped fredboard guitar), Mindia Devi Klein (bansuri), Kash Killion (bass), Debropiyo Sarkar (tabla), Duru Demetrius (percussion).

Beginning with a bowed bass solo, the fluid tabla in circular 7/8 time takes us flowing around the wheel.


2. SANGRIA

Mariah Parker (santur), Matthew Montfort (scalloped fredboard and flamenco guitars), Kash Killion (bass, cello and sarangi), Anuradha Pal (tabla).

Inspired by both Indian and flamenco music, a fiery cello solo suggests the plaintiff cry of a flamenco vocal, while the tabla solo ends with a tihai, an East Indian cadential patter which repeats three times and ends on the first beat of the rhythmic cycle.


3. DEBAJO DE LA LLUVIA

Mariah Parker (piano), Matthew Montfort (scalloped fretboard guitar), Mindia Devi Klein (flute), Kash Killion (bass), Duru Demetrius (congas), Brian Rice (percussion).

This piece translates from Spanish as "Beneath the Rain."

4. FIRST FLIGHT
Mariah Parker (piano), Paul McCandless (soprano sax), Matthew Montfort (scalloped fretboard guitar), Kash Killion (bass), Anuradha Pal (tabla).

First Flight takes off with cross-rhythmic melodic patterns on guitar and piano, accompanied by a flurry of tabla in a swift 7/8.

5. BETWEEN THE LINES
Mariah Parker (piano), Matthew Montfort (flamenco guitar), Kash Killion (cello).

This intimate ballad burns with a slow flame reflecting the poignancy of separation.

6. PENTE

Mariah Parker (piano), Matthew Montfort (scalloped fredboard guitar), Mindia Devi Klein (bansuri), Kash Killion (bass), Debropriyo Sarkar (tabla), Duru Demetrius (percussion).

1-1/2 + 1-1/2 + 1 + 1, that's how you count in 5 in Pente time.

7. TENTH JOURNEY

Mariah Parker (santur), Paul McCandless (English horn), Matthew Montfort (scalloped fretboard guitar), Kash Killion (bass), Anuradha Pal (tabla).

The vocal improvisation spicing up Tenth Journey is a Hindustani tabla bol recitation, a vocal "scat" of onomatopoetic syllables that mirror each tabla stroke.

8. MILO'S MOMENT

MARIAH PARKER (piano), Matthew Montfort (scalloped freboard guitar), Mindia Devi Klein (flute), Kash Killion (bass), Duru Demetrius (percussion), Brian Rice (timbales).

This piece features a classic Afro-Cuban style montuno (the repeated synchopated piano vamp beneath percussion and flute solos), but played in a 7/8 meter.


Executive Producer: Mariah Parker
Produced by Matthew Montfort

Live basic tracks recorded by Warren Dennis at Banquet Studio
Mixing and minimal overdubs by Matthew Montfort
Mastered by Paul Stubblebine

Graphic design: Mariah Parker
Cover photo: Elizabeth Kelly
Instrument and group photos: Blake David

For more information:
www.mariahparkermusic.com

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Click the image below to visit Mariah Parker on myspace:



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