Stackpole


Active sporadically from 1998–2001, Stackpole was an incendiary free-jazz quartet featuring guitarist Dennis Rea, alto saxophonist Wally Shoup, acoustic bassist Geoff Harper, and Northwest drum legend Gregg Keplinger. Stackpole's totally improvised music ranged from eerie, hovering sonorities to hurtling freebop to hurricane-force sonic gales, as heard on the group's eponymous CD on the First World Music label. Stackpole was the winner of Earshot Jazz's Golden Ear Award for best Northwest "Outside Jazz" group of 2001.
 


PRESS

"...a completely assured amalgam of idioms in a pulsing nonce-music, a free-improv-supercharged free jazz that roars, keens, and soars, and yet can just as convincingly dissolve into moody quiescence ... the selections from real-time Stackpole improvisations heard on this disc descend, then slip or duck away, then reemerge. Whether Stackpole storms or lulls, its music is startling and distinctive ... A truly remarkable document of the fruition of post-free jazz in Seattle."—Earshot Jazz
 
"You can't really get further outside than where Stackpole are planted, on a jazz-ragged landscape strewn with scattered shrapnel, clouds of smoke, eerie shrieks after dark. The first, self-titled disc from this quartet of much-feared Seattle improvisers shows a band in full control of their chaos. Stackpole come on with an aggressive energy that keeps its musical direction even as it busts through every reasonable boundary."—Seattle Weekly

“Stackpole proves that when the right musicians commune together regularly, utter invention can also be grounded by an overall coherence not defined in any textbook. From the start, there is a sense of noir mystery here, deepened by an eerie nostalgia for the realm of forms left behind. There are spells of absolute caterwaul, yes, though generally that is too easy for this band. At times the instruments converse, in seemingly Martian call and response. But during other stretches they fall into super-advanced swing, with an almost-tune somehow plucked out of the ether. For those jaded souls who have relished a lifetime of music and are now searching for something both different and exciting, this might be the place to land.”—Andrew Freund, Jazz Steps










Cover art by 
Anne Joiner




 

Press

"...a completely assured amalgam of idioms in a pulsing nonce-music, a free-improv-supercharged free jazz that roars, keens, and soars, and yet can just as convincingly dissolve into moody quiescence ... the selections from real-time Stackpole improvisations heard on this disc descend, then slip or duck away, then reemerge. Whether Stackpole storms or lulls, its music is startling and distinctive ... A truly remarkable document of the fruition of post-free jazz in Seattle."—Earshot Jazz
 
"You can't really get further outside than where Stackpole are planted, on a jazz-ragged landscape strewn with scattered shrapnel, clouds of smoke, eerie shrieks after dark. The first, self-titled disc from this quartet of much-feared Seattle improvisers shows a band in full control of their chaos. Stackpole come on with an aggressive energy that keeps its musical direction even as it busts through every reasonable boundary."—Seattle Weekly

“Stackpole proves that when the right musicians commune together regularly, utter invention can also be grounded by an overall coherence not defined in any textbook. From the start, there is a sense of noir mystery here, deepened by an eerie nostalgia for the realm of forms left behind. There are spells of absolute caterwaul, yes, though generally that is too easy for this band. At times the instruments converse, in seemingly Martian call and response. But during other stretches they fall into super-advanced swing, with an almost-tune somehow plucked out of the ether. For those jaded souls who have relished a lifetime of music and are now searching for something both different and exciting, this might be the place to land.”—Andrew Freund, Jazz Steps

Active sporadically from 1998–2001, Stackpole was an incendiary free-jazz quartet featuring guitarist Dennis Rea, alto saxophonist Wally Shoup, acoustic bassist Geoff Harper, and Northwest drum legend Gregg Keplinger. Stackpole's totally improvised music ranged from eerie, hovering sonorities to hurtling freebop to hurricane-force sonic gales, as heard on the group's eponymous CD on the First World Music label. Stackpole was the winner of Earshot Jazz's Golden Ear Award for best Northwest "Outside Jazz" group of 2000. 

Stackpole

Stackpole (Seattle)

Stackpole was a turn-of-the-millennium free-jazz quartet made up of prominent Seattle improvisers Dennis Rea, Wally Shoup, Geoff Harper, and Gregg Keplinger. Their album was named the Pacific Northwest's "Best Outside Jazz" release of 2000 by Earshot Jazz.
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