Today, Tomin — the Brooklyn born and based brass- and reed-centered multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, bioinformatician, and Standing on the Corner alumnus — releases the ecstatic and elegiac new album A Willed and Conscious Balance via International Anthem. Alongside today’s release, focus track “Untitled Dirge” arrives as an enigmatic and determined orchestral jazz march into the mysterious. As his second album this year (following Flores para Verene / Cantos para Caramina), it’s Tomin’s debut record as a large ensemble leader, which includes members of Irreversible Entanglements and jaimie branch’s FLY or DIE. Stream “Untitled Dirge” here and purchase A Willed and Conscious Balance here.

On November 11, Tomin and the entire ensemble will be playing a record release show at The Brooklyn Music School in NYC, where he first performed as a child. Find more info below and tickets here. On November 26, another record release show will take place at Chicago’s The Whistler, with ensemble member Teiana Davis and special guest E. Spinoza joining Tomin, and DJ sets by King Hippo. Find more info below.

Within A Willed and Conscious Balance (the bulk of which was recorded in one day at The Bunker in Brooklyn, NY), the potential for comparisons is both endless and unsatisfying. Though imagine the density of a JJ Johnson arrangement being rhythmically stretched and pulled à la Thembi-era Pharoah Sanders, or the Dolphy-infused bop squawk elegance of Booker Little’s Out Front sent through the sonic washing machine of Bennie Maupin’s The Jewel in the Lotus.

While there were certainly hints of these directions on Tomin’s collection of solo recordings, Flores para Verene / Cantos para Caramina — entrancing chord progressions that favor the dirge and the repetitive — the sounds heard on A Willed and Conscious Balance go somewhere new; fresh yet familiar. It’s a group exploration of simplicity that yields something complicated, just like life itself.

Tomin’s discerning, emotionally weighty perspective is among his artistic superpowers, and it’s a primary reason A Willed and Conscious Balance is played by an all-star team of collaborators gathered from throughout his life. Trumpeter Linton Smith II and cellist #1 Clérida Eltimé are long-time compadres — Tomin describes the former as a “brother/mentor” and the latter as “section leader” with “sister vibes.” Bassist Luke Stewart and drummer Tcheser Holmes are the rhythm section in Irreversible Entanglements, and alongside Lester St. Louis, cellist #2 here and a key member of jaimie branch’s Fly or Die, are all central figures of that Brooklyn community. Tomin first played with Chicago-based keyboardist Teiana Davis (who also records as Anaiet Soul) at a July 2021 show, “Angel Bat Dawid + jaimie branch and Friends.” That show is also where he first met Lester, Luke and Tcheser, making the spiritual influence those two great female bandleaders hold over the proceedings hard to deny. (Particularly branch, to whom Tomin co-dedicates a poem in the album’s sleeve notes.)

Yet as good as the band is, it’s the remarkable way these musicians approach these pieces — how the sound in Tomin’s head blossoms in their mutual hands — that makes A Willed and Conscious Balance a triumph. Each plays on and off the page, less engaged in soloing than in the interaction of the collective. The building of a band sound and how that informs the building of society is the album’s foundational point.

Read the full project bio by Piotr Orlov here.

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