Metaphora - Altered Laws Jazz Quartet
Miles Black (piano) about this artist
Tom Keenlyside (flutes & saxes) about this artist
Bernie Arai (drums) about this artist
Miles Hill (bass) about this artist

Featuring the Babayaga String Quartet and Melody Diachun

The music of Altered Laws is music of delightful anticipation, for the prudent listener yields to its modernity; modernity in jazz is the synthesis of “what was said before” with “what ought to be said now.” Metaphora explores many sounds - Latin, pop, Brazilian, mainstream and avant-garde jazz, - subtly at times, and others with intense forward-drive. The compositions (originals by Black and Keenlyside) are all melodic, as are the musical phrases and solos of Miles Black, Tom Keenlyside, and Miles Foxx Hill, but melody can be hypnotic, light-hearted, surreal, eager, it can lurk just around the bend - such as in the track “One O’ Clock Slump,” and it can soothe heart and soul as we lay our worries by the wayside - such as in “Back Bacon." Bernie Arai plays with diverse expertise that compliments the manifold album, and he overcomes one of the greatest challenges to a jazz drummer: how to add the colour of percussion disparately to a multitude of jazz styles. Metaphora is a wayfare through jazz in its many forms as played by expert musicians.