The best practioners of sport and of music have much in common. They stretch time. Ricky Ponting has more time to get into position to play a shot against 150kmh bowling than ordinary batsmen. Improvised music can be similarly fraught: the music rushing past and a thousand aesthetic and technical decisions to make, while ears, limbs and imagination are all working overtime. But some musicians seem to be completely unhurried; to have extra time to get it right. Matt McMahon is among them.
The Sydney pianist, best known as Vince Jones’s musical director and co-songwriter, became a professional musician by accident when the casual gigs he took while studying literature became regular enough to live off. He swiftly developed his trademarks: elegance stripped of ornamentation and lyricism braced with rigour.
Whereas some of his peers have documented their work on CD more often than they have birthdays, McMahon waited. And waited. Yes, there were countless sideman recordings and albums by Band of Five Names, the magical improvising trio he jointly leads with trumpeter Phil Slater and drummer Simon Barker, but nothing under his own name. After about 15 years on the scene he released his first solo album, Paths and Streams, a collection of pieces by Australian composers performed by jazz quintet and string quartet. It was one of the half-dozen best releases of 2006.
Rad the full review in The Sydney Morning Herald
