Matthew Shipp: Shipp Shifts
Article on All About Jazz by Chris Rich

"Erie discovered Shipp and his drummer Whit Dickey and bassist Michael Bisio at a memorable concert in April 2012 at the Erie Art Museum. The trio played without a break for nearly 90 minutes, a remarkable interval given the ferocious concentration and commitment of the music making. Shipp is a boxing fan, and that concert was an old-school championship bout, 15 rounds." - John Chacona, Go Erie

"And yet the most intense moments of this performance are the ones in which apparently paradoxical forces cohere beyond any programmed contrivance."  Kevin Le Gendre, Jazzwise

˝Elsewhere, the great American free-jazz pianist Matthew Shipp – a more uncompromising and improv-oriented artist than Glasper – played ideas-packed acoustic-trio music on Saturday at the Vortex, aided by superb double-bassist Mike Bisio, ...˝   John Fordham, The Guardian

"On Saturday, Matthew Shipp’s trio played at The Vortex. Shipp opened unaccompanied, head stooped over his keyboard, rippling quietly up scales of his own invention. Soon there were snippets and clusters and spiralling lines. Bass strolled in, shifted gear, a swish of brushes firmed the pulse and Shipp was up and running. Shipp juxtaposes brittle, spider-and-spike runs with sustained vamps that change key, alter shape and explode into dense, closely-textured chords. There were snappy riffs and tub-thumping themes – one such, an almost straight “Johnny Comes Marching Home” – dancey beats, rhapsodies and hints of tradition. The interplay was uncanny with bassist Michael Bisio fine-tuned to every move, and delivering the first-set highlight, a resonant and thumping solo that ended as a bowed bass elegy themed on Coltrane’s “Naima”. "  Mike Hobart, Financial Times

"Three unique individuals in Matthew Shipp's trio, himself along with Michael Bisio (b) and Whit Dickey (dr), provided both a physical and metaphysical journey throughout the night.  An organic blend of familiar and unfamiliar themes pulling from Classical, Jazz, Rock, and Folklore.  I know I use the phrase Controlled Chaos a lot on this blog, but this was the perfect example of that concept. The music was free and continued to lift higher and higher.  Yet it was all weighted by a sense of connectivity these three had with one another."   Matthew Ditullo,  this Shape of Jazz

"Art of the improviser" made this jazz starter kit of 50 cds for international jazz day.  Culture Catch

"Within the Matthew Shipp Trio, there was almost no distinction between soloist and accompanist. In fact, it would seem that the focus of the performance was centered on moving flawlessly from one composition to the next and improvising within each tune's framework. Forms were somewhat disregarded, or treated so liberally that their architecture remained intriguingly beguiling. As a whole, the performance almost felt more like an hour-long tone poem than a largely improvised free jazz set. The Trio did not employ the often harsh instrumental techniques of many other free jazz artists, instead relying on controlled and surprisingly cohesive musical conversation." RJ Johnson, All About Jazz

"Art of the improviser" made the All Music list of most notable jazz CDs since 1992, the year All Music started--it's the only CD from 2011 and is last
on list because it is in chronological order. All Music

"...it's the way he [Matthew Shipp] sprints, cuts, and spins that demands rapt attention. Blocking out heavy chords, rippling through insanely complex but cleanly articulated runs and arpeggios, and plucking strings inside the piano, his hands move both independently and in complete synchronicity. Similarly he and Bisio and Dickey offer up unique takes on the harmonies and rhythms while linking their imaginations into one vision."     DR Absolute Sound

"Art of the Improviser is just the kind of album capable of informing listeners what jazz is meant to be in this day and age." MOG

"Shipp's trio walloped the packed Vortex with two richly rewarding, high energy sets which wove obliquely in and out of the standards repertoire." Geoff Winston, London Jazz

"Stellar interplay characterizes the trio program, with Bisio's cleanly articulated arco a muscular thrum, maintaining a constant counterpoint to Shipp's idiosyncratic mix of sunshine and thunder. Dickey adds a further layer of complexity, with his intricate cymbal patterns overlaying his pulsing polyrhythms."    John Sharpe, All About Jazz

"The trio simply works so consistently and tightly that its impact as one organism defies criticism and invites only praises." Lyn Horton, Lyn Horton

Attached is a stellar review from DownBeat

"What the members of this trio do remarkably well is play on their own in such a way as to be a strong unit." "It is also truly moving music, full of emotion, passion, spirituality, and tenderness."   William Carey, All About Jazz

"The brilliant relationship of these three musicians to his own instrument and to each other is an incredible harmonious feat."  KFJC 89.7 FM

"The musicians' attunement to Shipp's structural and relational concerns renders his ideas with immaculate clarity"   Bill Meyer, DownBeat (****)

"The combination of the intellectual and the emotional is seamless and creates a transcendent whole that goes beyond jazz to evoke a universe of distinctive musical possibility."    Tim, Jazz and Blues Blogspot

"His fourth recording with his trio, this group including Michael Bisio on bass and Whit Dickey on drums, Elastic Aspects demonstrates clarity of motion that goes unquestionably forward but never deviates from an intensity, even in its quiet moments, that denotes universal embrace." Lyn Horton

" - and yet Shipp, Bisio and Dickey will continue to refine their art long after Elastic Aspects has left the CD player." Clifford Allen, The New York City Jazz Record, February 2012

Attached is a review of Elastic Aspects from The New York City Jazz Record and one from the Wire