Voracity by James Paul Nadien / Alex Ward

“This session is a first-time musical dialogue between two generations of improvisers. Both are my direct peers, sometime band mates, and people I consider friends. Their individual creative sensitivities are reflected in the clarity and integrity of the music on this recording. Contained here are five invigorating instrumental displays of momentum, invention, and interplay.

Each showed remarkable musical intelligence and facility as children – Alex Ward (b. 1974) as a young clarinetist performing with iconoclastic guitarist Derek Bailey in the late ‘80s, and James Paul Nadien (b. 2000) as a voracious polymath and multi-instrumentalist, now beginning to emerge as omnipresent in New York City circles. Although Alex is twice the age of James, they share many similar sonic outlooks and influences, resulting in this fiery, explosive set.

Both are voracious fans of music. They are veritable walking encyclopedias of trivia and fact, equally educated on the histories of modern idioms, certainly with one big toe each in the ways of Jazz and yet another in Rock. As such, there is a visceral bloody-mindedness here – equal parts technique and bombast. As they settle in over time, the tone shifts from wanton skirmishes of sustained, boisterous anarchy to more vulnerable, but fast-paced conversational modes.

Part of free improvisation concerns the necessity of reading the other player(s) and instantly deciding what the best options are for the sake of the music. Chances get taken, challenges are met, and form is created and/or destroyed. It’s safe to say, all of these parameters are dealt with in rapid succession during these takes. These people play like they have nothing to lose. The flow is fast and furious, while unforced and good-natured. When James impishly slides into a few moments of bona fide, legit swing, and Alex responds with strands of serpentine elegance, the easy-going mood of the session is quite obvious to my ears.

Alex and James begin with a fusillade of blistering guitar aggression and percussion massiveness - a sort of calling of the storms, a way to generate a baseline of pure energy. Both find digressions within this field of density and speed, tossing motifs at each other which are audibly heard and acknowledged before moving to the next. The duo picks up and drops various fragments of ideas with restless glee in a spree of rowdy audial vandalism. Noise making is one thing, but the precision with which the duo cycles through coherent ideas and parameters reveals the compositional logic underneath the bluster.

By the time Alex switches to Bb clarinet, the music necessarily settles into a more austere dialogue, and his particularly juicy reed tone maneuvers deftly through the ornate, propulsive webs created byJames’ stick work. The final piece finally moves beyond the previous volcanic torrents of intensity, arriving at places of unhurried sonic experimentation and loose timbral exploration. With the itch scratched, Voracity by Alex Ward and James Paul Nadien arrives at a satisfying closure. It is not a resolution generated by exhaustion, but rather, a sign of progression within the duo’s journey of musical communication and openness on that day in time.”

- Weasel Walter, December 14, 2025

Alex Ward is a clarinettist, guitarist and composer based in London. He plays guitar, sings and co-writes the material in the duo Dead Days Beyond Help with drummer Jem Doulton, leads the bands Forebrace, Items 4 & 10 and the Alex Ward Quintet/Sextet. and co-runs the label Copepod Records with Luke Barlow.

alexward.org.uk
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