There is perhaps no other collective of musicians with such significant, longstanding ties to so many musical communities, including modern jazz, contemporary classical music, underground hip-hop and electronica, and musics from outside the west.
As a collective of three widely celebrated young composer-performers (Vijay Iyer – piano, Steve Lehman – saxophone, Tyshawn Sorey – drums), Fieldwork’s music reflects each member’s ties to the American jazz tradition, modern composition, African and South Asian musics, underground hip-hop and electronica, and the influential music of Chicago’s A.A.C.M.. Fieldwork’s intensely collaborative rehearsal process resembles that of a rock band: they use group improvisation to develop and expand their intricate compositions into something larger than the sum of its parts. The result is a dense yet visceral musical world — tightly unified ensemble playing, extroverted and high-impact, but with a mysterious inner logic.
“A jazz power trio for the new century.”
— NPR’s Fresh Air
photo by: Lynne Harty
photo by: Lynne Harty
FIELDWORK Thereupon
Thereupon is the long-anticipated return of the all-star collaborative trio Fieldwork, which has been described by NPR as a “power trio for the new century.” This long-standing collective comprises three internationally revered innovators of contemporary music: alto saxophonist-composer Steve Lehman, pianist-composer Vijay Iyer, and drummer-composer Tyshawn Sorey. In the seventeen years since their last recording, Door (Pi), all three musicians have climbed to the pinnacle of the creative music scene and received universal acclaim for their work, each one significantly reshaping the language of creative music in his own way. Remarkably, as Fieldwork, the whole is even greater than the sum of its parts, as the group continues to redefine the possibilities for ensemble music-making.
The individual accomplishments of these three musicians are truly impressive. There is perhaps no other collective of musicians with such significant, longstanding ties to so many musical communities, including modern jazz, contemporary classical music, underground hip-hop and electronica, and musics from outside the west. Steve Lehman is a Guggenheim Fellow and a Doris Duke Performing Artist, whose last three releases demonstrate the expansive range of his artistry: Xaybu: The Unseen, features his international avant-rap group Selebeyone; Ex Machina is a major work for jazz orchestra and interactive electronics, commissioned by IRCAM and the Orchestre National de Jazz in France, and his most recent release The Music of Anthony Braxton features his long-standing trio with guest saxophonist Mark Turner. Vijay Iyer is a MacArthur Fellow, a United States Artist Fellow, and a three- time GRAMMY nominee. His most recent releases include Defiant Life, a suite of duets with trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith; Compassion, the second album from his celebrated trio with Sorey and bassist Linda May Han Oh; Love In Exile, a collaboration with vocalist Arooj Aftab and bassist Shahzad Ismaily; and the composer portrait album Vijay Iyer: Trouble, by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project. Tyshawn Sorey received the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in Music for his composition “Adagio (for Wadada Leo Smith)” after being recognized in 2023 as a Finalist for his “Monochromatic Light (Afterlife).” He was named a 2017 MacArthur Fellow and a 2018 United States Artists Fellow, and his works have been commissioned, premiered, and recorded by preeminent ensembles and soloists worldwide. His four most recent releases – including his latest, The Susceptible Now – feature his acclaimed trio with pianist Aaron Diehl. Simply put, these are three state-of-the-art musicians of staggering breadth and depth.
As Fieldwork, Lehman, Iyer, and Sorey take their music to an electrifying new level, setting the bar ever higher with rigor, daring, wisdom, and a unique aesthetic palette. There is an unmistakable debt to the exploratory, all- embracing nature of the celebrated AACM collective: all three members of
Fieldwork have enjoyed long relationships performing in bands led by Muhal Richard Abrams, Anthony Braxton, Henry Threadgill, Roscoe Mitchell, Wadada Leo Smith, and George Lewis. Reflecting on Fieldwork’s incredible reach, Iyer notes that “long ago we settled on an approach that simply makes the most of the creativity of each player. I think that with this group, the broad scope of each of our individual studies and interests means that the collective musical imagination can range pretty far.”
After a period of shifting personnel that included drummer Elliot Humberto Kavee and saxophonist Aaron Stewart, Fieldwork truly hit its stride in 2005 when the current iteration came together. Reflecting on their profound musical bond, Lehman notes that “there is an overwhelming feeling of joy every time we reunite. We’ve developed a musical language together over the years so that we never need to explain anything to each other or contextualize any of it, or to have to water it down so we can all play it. We just immediately build off of our history together and start to move things forward.” The band employs a communal rehearsal process in which extended group improvisations are used to develop and transform intricate compositions into elaborate ensemble performances. This new recording features compositions by Iyer and Lehman, all collectively arranged by the band. Regardless of the composer, each piece is marked by Fieldwork’s signature sound: dense, visceral, tightly unified and high-impact, with a mysterious inner logic.
The performances on Thereupon capture the band’s unparalleled interplay. The group functions as a single entity without hierarchy; they listen deeply and respond to one another with a rare focus, intensity, and creativity, highlighting a network of musical bonds forged over decades. Lehman’s serpentine lines explore the extreme registers of his instrument and make frequent use of extended technique and microtonal fingerings. Iyer’s playing on piano and Rhodes is elemental, rhythmically propulsive, and kaleidoscopic in its harmonic and timbral variety. Sorey is in a quintessential virtuosic mode, supplying endlessly inventive thrust and orchestrating the music at all times with subtlety and nuance. On tracks like “Propaganda” and “Embracing Difference,” the rhythmic tension of their high wire act is palpable. Every time it feels like each instrument is going off on its own teetering tangent and the structure can’t hold, the group is still somehow able to miraculously snap back to form. The rhythms and forms are complex at times, but the groove remains irrepressible. Iyer explains that the title piece draws inspiration from “a moment near the beginning of the Vimalakirti Sutra, when the world is shown to be much more than it appears: ‘Thereupon the Buddha touched the ground of this billion-world-galactic universe with his big toe, and suddenly it was transformed into a huge mass of precious jewels, a magnificent array of many hundreds of thousands of clusters of precious gems….’ I used a telescoping form that reveals more detail as you zoom in.” Pieces like “Astral” and “The Night Before” are more gestural, moments of calm in the maelstrom. With the band’s unique sonic template expertly shaped by renowned mixing engineer Scotty Hard, the album shimmers with color and packs a strong punch.
With this new chapter, Fieldwork reaffirms its status as one of the era’s most transformative and influential experimental units. Thereupon is a bold new statement that captures the band at its best: challenging, expansive, and vital.
photo by: Lynne Harty
PRAISE FOR FIELDWORK
- “A stunningly poised prog-jazz collective.”
– Hank Shteamer, Rolling Stone
- “Heady potential resides in an ever more advanced articulation of harmony and rhythm, the stuff of complex metrics and intricate maneuvers. The members of Fieldwork all helped set the bar for this ascendant strain of experimentation in the music.”
– Nate Chinen, Playing Changes
- “Fieldwork is engaged in a furious exploration of the edges of jazz with both rock energy and classical exactitude. It’s hard to call the result easy-on-the-ears, but man is it impressive: complex, powerful, brash, and involving.”
– Will Layman, Popmatters
- “As exponents of jazz that subscribes to an idea of economy, summoning the brawn of electronica while avoiding its rigidity to maintain an energising, if not wholly liberating dynamic, Fieldwork, both band and idea is a unique, provocative proposition.”
– Kevin LeGendre, Jazzwise
- “Tension and suspense are two key qualities…. An engaging and important release with new discoveries arriving with each listen.”
– Mike Shanley, JazzTimes
- “True innovation never comes without a price, as the group moves well beyond its comfort zone, exploring previously untapped sound worlds…. A truly singular post-modern hybrid that draws equally from M-Base rhythms, Braxtonian structural theory and stark minimalism, Door is the formidable trio’s most expansive and challenging recording to date.”
– Troy Collins, All About Jazz
photo by: Lynne Harty
DOOR
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Praised on NPR’s Fresh Air as “a jazz power trio for the new century,” FIELDWORK makes its most powerful and fiercely imagined statement to date with Door, their third album for Pi Recordings. An important marker in this New York collective’s ongoing evolution, Door documents three years of intense collaboration since Simulated Progress (2005), and is their first Fieldwork recording to feature the jaw-dropping contributions of Tyshawn Sorey, drummer/composer/co-leader of Fieldwork since 2005. Rounded out by saxophonist/composer Steve Lehman and pianist/composer Vijay Iyer, Fieldwork reflects and refracts the American jazz tradition, modern composition, African and South Asian musics, underground hip-hop and electronica, and the influential music of Chicago’s A.A.C.M. The resulting blend is “rich in paradox: dark yet uplifting, intellectually demanding yet effortlessly funky.” – JazzTimes. Released April 22, 2008.
“BEST ALBUMS OF 2008 – Philadelphia City Paper, others.”
“There’s a profound sense of trust, shared values, and — above all — the art of communication… A phenomenal concept brought fully to fruition by these incredible, challenging, forward-thinking musicians.” – Michael Nastos, All Music Guide
“staggeringly good” – Charles Farrell, emusic.com
SIMULATED PROGRESS
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The groundbreaking second album by the collective trio Fieldwork, featuring Vijay Iyer, Steve Lehman, and Elliot Kavee. Released July 19, 2005.
“A JAZZ POWER TRIO FOR THE NEW CENTURY.” – NPR’s Fresh Air
“a dazzling, intrepid sort of new jazz that’s as deeply interactive as anything you’re likely to hear this year… an unwavering unity of sonic purpose and attack… there is nothing else out there that sounds like it… In its risk-taking, fragility, and fearlessness, it’s also very thrilling.” – All About Jazz
“dazzling dialogues that aim equally for listeners’ feet and minds. Together, they create intensely rhythmic music that combines jazz ingenuity, rock velocity and World Music savvy. Their visceral compositions constantly blur the lines between improvised flights of fancy and expertly calibrated arrangements… The result is a heady, punchy outing that could serve as a template for daring, forward-looking musicians everywhere.” – San Diego Union-Tribune
“Fieldwork is the sound of jazz exploding and raining down shards of glass upon our heads.” – Prefix Magazine
YOUR LIFE FLASHES
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Debut of the collaborative trio project Fieldwork, featuring Iyer, saxophonist Aaron Stewart, and drummer Elliot Kavee
“a terrific disc, filled with vibrant playing and wondrous ideas” – The Boston Globe
“terse, spellbinding miniatures that never stand still” – The Village Voice
“Fieldwork is doing an excellent job of immersing itself in the music’s most primal and essential elements…the exploration of rhythm in an intimate and intensely purposeful dialogue.” – Billboard