For three musicians there’s a remarkable amount going on, the dynamics always shifting, the music sounding at times like a larger group than it is.
SongAh Chae Music
SongAh Chae – piano, organ, composition; Manos Stratis – double bass; Joshua Wheatley – drums
South Korean pianist SongAh Chae closes out her trio’s three-album cycle with All Day Long, and from the first notes there’s something unmistakably spiritual about it. Chae drew her inspiration from the Psalms. The music has that quality of private devotion made communal, of one person’s searching thought becoming something everyone in the room can feel.
What’s immediately striking is how equal everyone sounds. Chae’s piano leads, but Stratis and Wheatley are never simply accompanying her — they’re recorded with a weight and presence that makes the music feel collectively built. On “Vindication,” Stratis bows the bass so the music rocks like a ship rolling through rough seas, while Chae’s piano lines roll dramatically over top. Then the organ enters, layering itself overhead like sunlight breaking through dark storm clouds — there’s something heavenly in it, those high organ notes hanging up near the roof of the cathedral. On “In Time of Trouble,” the organ swells louder than anywhere else, and for a moment the trio feels like a congregation finding its voice.
The title track circles back to the organ as well, but differently — a repeating organ phrase anchors everything while the bass bounces notes off it and the piano adds notes into the revolving pattern. It’s hypnotic, the drums pulling steadily underneath, the organ holding a chord until it vibrates and swells, then the whole cycle beginning again.
“My Fortress” feels like something held under pressure. Melancholy piano notes ring out before the bass steps into a shuffle beat with the drums. Nothing here is lighthearted. The music feels like walls built to keep something in rather than let out. The higher notes in Chae’s right hand keep pushing against those walls, searching for a way out.
“Mere Breath” finally lets that escape happen. It begins gently, Chae’s right hand picking out single notes over left-hand chords, the bass light beneath her — but cymbals and stately drumming gradually build the floor underneath, and the bass grows louder and quickens, as if urging her to do more. She answers by taking flight, lighter and freer than anywhere else on the record, with the bass matching her élan step for step.
Wheatley’s drumming deserves particular mention. There are moments where he’s barely there: cymbal washes, soft brushwork, the ghost of a shuffle beat. But take him away and something essential goes with him. “Come and See” shows what he brings — tight stick work and insistent drum fills pushing the piano forward, the bass thumping heavily underneath, until the organ drifts in overhead and the whole thing lifts into something that wouldn’t sound out of place in a gospel choir.
“Answer Me” closes the record with Chae striking deep in the low register, heavy, deliberate notes, while the bass mirrors her, repeating a phrase that drops down low before climbing back up. Then a pause, and it all begins again — shimmering cymbals, brushed shuffle beat, that searching quality pulling you back in. For three musicians there’s a remarkable amount going on, the dynamics always shifting, the music sounding at times like a larger group than it is. They’re equals, and you hear it in every track.
