Ant Law & Brigitte Beraha: Ensconced
Author: Andy Robson
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Musicians: |
Ant Law (g) |
Label: |
Ubuntu |
Magazine Review Date: |
August/2024 |
Media Format: |
CD, LP, DL |
Catalogue Number: |
UBU0169 |
RecordDate: |
Rec. date not stated |
Law’s musical palette grows ever wider: Ensconced finds him principally playing steel string acoustic, most rare for him, and collaborating with a vocalist for the first time on a fully realised album. And what a vocalist. Beraha does of course sing standards, she’s done delightful work with Frank Harrison for example, and here two American songbook studies, ‘A Kiss to Build a Dream On’ and ‘Some Other Time’ frame half a dozen other songs, co-created between the singer and guitarist.
The unadorned standards are a joy, especially from two artists occasionally thought of as complex and challenging. By contrast, ‘Harvest’ shines with Beraha’s wordless vocal skills as she twins Law’s lines. Equally anomalous is the stand-out ‘Above Water’, a re-working of Law’s cut from his Zero Sum World, replete with spectral piano (Neame) from the original recording. It’s all beribboned in Luthert’s electronic wizardry and deliciously iced with a new Beraha poem.
There’s a resonance here with Beraha’s Lucid Dreamers, but the originality of Ensconced lies in the acoustic duets, whether on the wry charm of ‘Clever Hans’, with guitar stylings that John Renbourn would have appreciated, or the quiet disquiet of the title track. Rich in bejewelled detail, Ensconced’s subtleties grow deeper with each listen. A project we hope will develop further.
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