The Fourth of the Eight New Goldberg Albums

Cover of the album being discussed (from its Bandcamp Web page)

Once again, I began my morning by listening to the fourth album in clarinetist Ben Goldberg’s 8 Albums on August 8 releases. The title of the album is Trouble Trouble, and it consists of twelve tracks. The last of these is “Troubles,” composed by Steve Lacy; and it basically serves as a postscript for the entire album. All of the preceding tracks were composed by Goldberg, four of which have the title “Trouble” followed by a number. The first of these begins the cycle, and the fourth concludes it. Each of these pieces is structured around the iteration of a theme. For the performances themselves, Goldberg leads a trio with trombonist Danny Lubin-Laden and Myra Melford on piano.

It would be fair to say that there is no shortage of free improvisation; and Goldberg is already off to the races in his richly embellished account of the second track, “Drops Off.” Nevertheless, I came away with the impression that embellished repetition was the skewer through this particular shish kebab. One might almost say that the persistence of repetition over the course of the album might have been a reflection on another reflection on persistence: Salvador Dali’s painting The Persistence of Memory.

That said, I have to confess that I would be eager to encounter Trouble Trouble as a suite given a “live” performance. So much is happening among the three instrumental lines that watching the musicians “do their thing” would be more informative than just listening to them. Nevertheless, I am willing to admit that arranging a recording session is probably both easier and fulfilling than arranging a performance before an audience!