Pauline Frechette and Stanley Clarke Meet At THE EDGE OF EVERYTHING
“...in its purity, freedom, and timeless charm; this album is an essential and profoundly rewarding experience.”
—Rebecca Cullen
There’s something wonderfully hard to categorize about Pauline Frechette’s At The Edge Of Everything. Across seven tracks, the composer, pianist and vocalist moves between alternative jazz, neo-classical music and traditional pop, creating a record that can be intimate one moment and beautifully expansive the next. Legendary bassist Stanley Clarke is featured throughout Frechette’s album, and their interplay gives the project much of its personality. Produced and arranged by David Campbell, the record also brings percussionist M.B. Gordy, violinist Charlie Bisharat and uilleann piper Eric Rigler into its richly textured musical world. But for all of the accomplished players involved, the arrangements never feel crowded. There’s plenty of space here, allowing Frechette’s piano, Clarke’s bass and the melodies themselves to remain at the center.
“The Warrior Returns to Forever: Remembering Chick Corea” immediately establishes the album’s adventurous spirit, paying tribute to Corea while allowing Frechette and Clarke to engage in the kind of musical conversation that feels spontaneous and deeply connected. From there, At The Edge Of Everything keeps changing shape. “We Can Fly” brings Frechette’s vocal side forward, while titles like “The Wonder of Stars,” “The Mariner and the Sky,” “Unveiled,” “Moonlight Magic Show” and “Constellation Jewel Box” hint at the cinematic quality running through the record. Instrumental passages give way to vocal moments, piano-and-bass intimacy opens into fuller orchestration, and jazz and classical influences comfortably share the same space. Clarke may have summed it up best when he described Frechette’s musical universe as “totally unique—totally ‘her.’” At The Edge Of Everything is the sound of an artist comfortable enough to let all of her musical influences meet in the same place.
Pauline Frechette is a composer, pianist and vocalist whose career has moved easily between the classical, jazz and popular music worlds. Her compositions have been performed by the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, New West Symphony and National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center, while her work as a musician has brought her together with artists including Paul McCartney, Beck, Cher, Willie Nelson, Neil Diamond, Muse and Leonard Cohen. That unusually broad musical background helps explain why At The Edge Of Everything feels so natural moving between genres. With Stanley Clarke beside her and David Campbell shaping the album’s arrangements, Frechette has created a project that doesn’t ask to be placed neatly into one musical category. Instead, it invites you into a musical world that is distinctly her own.
For more information on Pauline Frechette, visit her website at PaulineFrechette.com and her FYC page here.
REVIEWS
"Pauline's music is truthful, otherworldly, compassionate, and brave. She is not trying to be like anyone else. There is a purity about her music. It is the living definition of 'less is more.' Her compositions tell stories. The chords are at times abstract, the rhythms different, but that's the beauty of the composer... this is music! Pauline's musical universe is totally unique—totally her own."
—Stanley Clarke
"Stunning."
—Greg Wells, producer
"It stopped me in my tracks ... unique, impressive"
—James Newton Howard, film composer
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