Steve Arnold & Sea Change - ’Wide-Eyed’

CapitalBop’s Spotlight Residency // October 25, 2019 True to the group’s title, a live performance by bassist Steve Arnold’s band, Sea Change, moves in tides and waves — from sunlit and optimistic in one moment to dark and pensive in the next. But wide as that contrast might be, Arnold’s compositions all seem to come from a headspace that’s personal to him: one with a lot of introspection, and just the right amount of vulnerability to let the listener in. Arnold didn’t grow up playing jazz, as he told me in our CB Sessions interview. I think his musical omnivorousness serves him well in contexts like Sea Change: Tunes like “Wide-Eyed“ rely on the format and language of chamber jazz, but also borrow heavily from folk, modern rock, minimalism, and probably a dozen more stylistic playbooks. (If the group reminds me of any particular jazz sound, it’s probably the modern approach offered by musicians from Scandanavia and Isreal: Esbjorn Svensson, Yaron Herman, Av