For those not in the know, on its own merits, the music on Seven Days (available October 11th, 2024), Mauricio Morales’ latest album, speaks with a strong, persuasive creative voice.

The respected bassist-composer-bandleader’s fourth album presents seven distinctive compositions for sextet, with sophisticated shifts in mood and musical structure. The music teems with intelligence as well as infectious melodic qualities, with deft, lushly harmonized lines for the front line of trombone, saxophone and guitar.

In a mode of decidedly modern jazz which also manages to be easy on the ear and heart, the music also benefits from bold, integrated playing and soloing by his young allies from both the east and west coasts–connections made when the Mexican Morales lived and studied in Boston before settling in his current adopted hometown of Los Angeles.

But beyond the gleam and energy of Seven Days are working process elements adding to the dramatic and conceptual back story. Morales composed this body of work — the result of a self-driven challenge to write seven tunes in as many days – while literally stuck in his native Mexico due to a mysterious Visa renewal snafu.

Channeling his sense of alienation into the cathartic process of crafting the varied moods and cohesive suite of pieces led to a live performance in Los Angeles, and following the urging of his band mates to create a recorded version of the work resulted in the document that is Seven Days, the engaging and dynamic album document, recorded entirely live over two days in the studio.

It would be a mistake, however, to view the album as a characteristic Mauricio Morales album. Creative restlessness is one of his character traits.

As he himself comments, Seven Days is “... definitely a piece of work that is very close to me, in a way that’s different to the work that I’ve released before, because of how it came to be. I’m excited about everything that I’m working on, and I will probably forget about it the moment I release it,” he laughs. Not likely.

1. Monday: Wishful Thinking
2. Tuesday: Under The Magic Tree
3. Wednesday: The Wanderer
4. Thursday: Solitude
5. Friday: A Ghostly Vision
6. Saturday: A self Made Prison
7. Sunday: The Paradox

With each track a conceptual work that explores a compositional journal, this magnificently elegant new recording opens on the spirited Monday: Wishful Thinking and then proceeds to bring us a sweeping Tuesday: Under The Magic Tree and the pensively-sculpted Wednesday: The Wanderer.

Up next from the acoustic and electric bass player, composer and arranger Morales, is a drifting beauty within Thursday: Solitude and the frenetically-charged Friday: A Ghostly Vision, the album rounding out on the languishing Saturday: A self Made Prison, closing on the all-embracing Sunday: The Paradox.

Musicians:
Mauricio Morales (basses)
Ido Meshulam (trombone)
Horace Bray (guitar)
Luca Mendoza (piano)
Noam Israeli (drums)

As a multi-tasking instrumentalist, composer, bandleader and general-purpose idea generator behind his projects, Morales views Seven Days and his albums in a highly personal way. He asserts that “... a very specific moment in my life is printed in this music because it’s really, truly uncompromised. It is my voice in all of it, in wherever you see it.”

Mauricio Morales @ YouTube

Mauricio Morales @ Facebook