BLINK

Review by Ken Waxman in Jazzword, April 13, 2026.

Although defined as a session dedicated to microtonal tuning and echoes of gamelan, high life and Delta Blues the references here seems more attuned to Ornette Coleman’s harmolodic bands. Not that it’s a detriment, for it places the quintet firmly in role of sound explorers. The Boston-area group is led by Dutch-born alto saxophonist Jorrit Dijkstra, who has played with musicians ranging from  Taylor Ho Bynum to John Hollenbeck. It includes percussionist Eric Rosenthal, bass guitarist Nate McBride and the dual guitarists of Eric Hofbauer and Gabe Boyarin, who among them have been associated with Curt Newton, Damon Smith and Pandelis Karayorgis.

That said a straight compositional line advances from “Rub”, the first track, all the way to the final and seventh “Trans”, with the latter arguably expressing the group’s ethos at its most defined. On that tune consistent drum beats and cymbal slaps mated with bass guitar pulses maintains a sprawling backbeat as intensified guitar frails and string scratches isolate Blues inflections along with passionate trills and rugged split tones from the saxophonist.

Other than that the band is at its best when dealing with swift expositions mixing reed braying, tremolo stabs from the guitars and in the case of “Shape” patterns projecting harder and more stinging string work each time. Another instance of this is the allegro treatment of the extended and appropriately titled “Hop”, where Dijkstra’s jittery and spiky reed squeezes are echoed by frenetic string picking as the guitarists scramble to keep up with reed undulating and Rosenthal’s drum whaps and cymbal splashes. As the saxophonist worries the same note over and over, string lead moves from one guitarist to the other , leading to a group tutti climax.

Slowing and more atmospheric sequences aren’t as notable, since this is often where a combination of contrapuntal string plinks and frails plus linear reed patterns seem to lack energy.

Overall though BLINK creates animated sounds that can’t be blinked at whether defined as microtonal, harmolodic or improv Jazz.

Ken Waxman

Review by Bill Meyer in Dusted, Jan 30, 2026.

This Boston-based quintet is an outgrowth of the freely improvising Porch Trio, which comprises drummer Eric Rosenthal, bassist Nate McBride, and reeds/electronics player Jorrit Dijkstra. The trio has previously adventured into augmentation and composition as PorchBone, which added a three-piece trombone section and an Ellingtonian orchestral concept to the mix. Blink swaps the horns for electric guitars and refocuses the compositional thrust to engage with the natural world, bandleader Dijkstra’s listening habits and his academic activities at the Berklee School of Music and the New England Conservatory. He had the flocking of birds, the swarming of insects, the bright patterns of gamelan and the chiming propulsion of highlife music and the intentional use of alternate tunings in mind when he put this band together. But the decision to focus exclusively on alto saxophone (in other settings, Dijkstra also plays soprano sax, lyricon, and modular synthesizer) brings another comparison to the fore. The combination of Dijkstra’s pungent, singsong melodies, the glint and graininess of two amplified guitars, and a rhythm section equally comfortable with rumbling, scattering, and grooving ensures that this music sounds more like Ornette Coleman’s Prime Time than anything else has since Ornette pulled that band’s plug. May their own fuses never blow.

Bill Meyer

Review by Jon Garelick in The Arts Fuse, Nov 6, 2025:

Blink (Driff). As I’ve said elsewhere in The Arts Fuse, generalizations about the music of saxophonist and composer Jorrit Dijkstra tend to fall short. In his eloquent liner notes to Blink, Dijkstra cites African highlife, Indonesian gamelan, Delta blues guitar, and African balafon to account for the music’s “organic swells in dynamics and density.” But the quick takeaway comparison here is Ornette Coleman’s Prime Time, with two guitars (Eric Hofbauer and Gabe Boyarin), electric bass guitar (Nate McBride), drums (Eric Rosenthal), and Dijkstra’s alto. There are all manner of layered rhythms and tempos here, and the guitars are tuned a quarter note sharp, for that extra bit of Ornette-like frisson of off-balance ensemble ecstasy. The result is free, but also highly ordered. Dijkstra favors keening folk-like alto melodies in the Coleman manner, and Hofbauer often joins him in loose unison amid the surrounding ruckus. Some pieces, like “Yet,” are slow and contemplative, while “Pulse” rides on the solid funk of what I think of as African 6/8. “Hop” shows Dijkstra’s affection for Steve Lacy, with a nearly uncountable ADHD-like staccato repetition of short modular phrases. Throughout, Nate McBride’s electric bass often acts like a third guitar line, further enhancing the web of sound.

Dijkstra compares these structured improvisations to other “group behavioral patterns such as insect swarms and bird flocks.” But for the most part, you can enjoy a colorful, elastic groove. And even in a collective ensemble approach like this, which favors group effect rather than solos, you can savor the embedded details, such as Rosenthal’s quiet, sustained passage in “Yet,” where he matches continuous light snare hits with the snip-snip-snip-snip of his hi-hat, or Dijkstra’s ardent alto cries on “Trans.”