{"id":16964,"date":"2025-09-28T15:37:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-28T20:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/?p=16964"},"modified":"2025-09-28T15:37:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T20:37:12","slug":"heirlooms-debut-album-initiates-a-legacy-of-lyricism-hard-swing-and-probing-form","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/?p=16964","title":{"rendered":"Heirloom’s debut album initiates a legacy of lyricism, hard swing, and probing form"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Album cover for Heirloom’s debut album “Familar Beginnings.” Courtesy Shifting Paradigm Records<\/em><\/p>\n

With a jazz band’s name so lyrically titled, Milwaukee’s Heirloom shouldn’t have surprised us that their first recorded artifact is a musical\u202fobjet de art<\/em>. Of course, many musicians strive for art, but Familar Beginnings<\/em> is the real thing. Chops-laden bandleader-guitarist Ben Dameron’s classical\u202ftraining helps underscore that a potent\u00a0 lyricism deeply informs his calling.<\/p>\n

The\u202flyrical bent\u202fblooms in titles like \u201cEucalyptus Breeze\u201d and the rustic \u201cIndigo Tears,\u201d a deep-dish slice of Bill Frisell-ish Americana. If the latter title also suggests a famous Ellington \u201cmood,\u201d it’s no coincidence as Heirloom digs elsewhere into the Strayhorn bounty chest with \u201cIsfahan.\u201d This interpretation gives a jaunty boost to saxophonist Johnny Hodges’ languid classic. Dameron’s melodic sense is fully woven into his structural form.<\/p>\n

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Heirloom (l-r: Ben Dameron, Tim Ipsen, Sam Taylor, Hannah Johnson) performs at an album release event recently at the Jazz Estate. Photo by Kevin Lynch<\/em><\/p>\n

As for form, \u201cMessage from the Deep\u201d appears almost \u201cthrough composed\u201d\u202fbut probes depths that bring light to one’s fire. So,\u202fdon’t worry about the album’s backbone. The penultimate tune drives the band around the final curve with full-throttle swinging. The piece, \u201cFake Block\u201d” cagily suggests football, to me. Here drummer Hannah Johnson absolutely crackles spitfire, astride her apparent quest to become one of the upper Midwest’s best jazz drummers. Hardly undone, tenor saxophonist Sam Taylor doesn’t spare the horses he reins masterfully elsewhere.<\/p>\n

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This review was orignally published in The Shepherd Express:<\/em> https:\/\/shepherdexpress.com\/music\/album-reviews\/familiar-beginnings-by-heirloom\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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Album cover for Heirloom’s debut album “Familar Beginnings.” Courtesy Shifting Paradigm Records With a jazz band’s name so lyrically titled, Milwaukee’s Heirloom shouldn’t have surprised us that their first recorded artifact is a musical\u202fobjet de art. Of course, many musicians … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2152,1434,2530,404,2153,2151,2720,2719],"class_list":["post-16964","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-www-kevernacular-com","tag-ben-dameron","tag-bill-frisell","tag-billy-strayhorn","tag-duke-ellington","tag-hannah-johnson","tag-heirloom","tag-johnny-hodges","tag-sam-taylor"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hJWE-4pC","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16964"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16964\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16974,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16964\/revisions\/16974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}