Shadowfax - Shadowdance (1983 Japanese Windham Hill WHP-28004 Vinyl LP)

Shadowfax - Shadowdance | Vinyl LP, 1983 Japanese Windham Hill (WHP-28004)

• Third studio album from the Chicago fusion group built around Chuck Greenberg’s lyricon, the first electronic wind controller, which Greenberg co-engineered with inventor Bill Bernardi
• Seven tracks including a cover of Don Cherry’s “Brown Rice/Karmapa Chenno”, with compositions by every member of the core group and a nine-minute closing piece by guitarist G.E. Stinson
• Japanese pressing on Windham Hill Records, recorded and mixed at Group IV Audio in Hollywood by Harry Andronis

Shadowfax formed in Chicago in 1972 (the name comes from Gandalf’s horse in Tolkien) and began as a blues group before moving toward chamber jazz, world music, and electronic textures. Their signature instrument was the lyricon, an analog electronic wind synthesiser that Greenberg helped develop with its inventor, Bill Bernardi, at Computone Inc. in Massachusetts in the early 1970s. The lyricon predated MIDI and could produce sounds no acoustic wind instrument could reach, and it gave Shadowfax a tonal identity that set them apart from other fusion groups of the period. This 1983 album, their second for Windham Hill Records, expanded the lineup from the previous self-titled record: violinist Jamii Szmadzinski (who attended Interlochen, Boston Conservatory, and Berklee) and keyboardist Jared Stewart joined the founding trio of Greenberg, guitarist G.E. Stinson, and bassist Phil Maggini, with Stuart Nevitt on drums and percussion.

The album moves between electric fusion, acoustic chamber textures, and world music influences. Stinson’s “New Electric India” opens with a rhythmic drive that sits closer to jazz-rock than to the acoustic sound Windham Hill was known for. “Brown Rice/Karmapa Chenno” is a medley of two Don Cherry compositions, the title track of Cherry’s 1975 world-fusion album and a Tibetan Buddhist chant from his 1977 Hear & Now, with Stinson providing vocals. “A Song for My Brother,” the album’s longest piece at nine minutes, is where the group’s range is clearest: acoustic and electric textures layered together at length. The album reached number 13 on the Billboard Jazz chart. Recorded and mixed at Group IV Audio in Hollywood by Harry Andronis, with additional recording at Fiddler Studio. Mastered by Jack Hunt. Produced by Chuck Greenberg. Japanese pressing on Windham Hill, catalogue number WHP-28004.