Austrian Maria Neckam Crosses and Blends as a New Jazz Voice

Austrian jazzsinger-songwriter Maria Neckam is a busy musician on the Downtown New York jazz scene. She is often associated with 55 Bar-centered Brooklyn musicians like David Binney, Aaron Goldberg, Lars Dietrich, Miles Okazaki and Dan Weiss. On her debut release, Crossing and Blending (Blue Music Group, 2009), she features an all-European band, pianist Franz von Chossy, bassist Valdi Kolli, drummer Uli Genenger and a few guests. The 14-track album gives a promise of Neckam, much like Björk, to develop in a personal direction where her native language and culture serve as a strong undertone for an original vernacular. Neckam has found a natural balance in her singing in English despite her Austrian accent. However, unrelated to the above, her songs are somewhat angular in their melodic approach, repetitive, and thus occasionally unappealing. This suggests a "student exercise" attitude toward composition, but may be a developmental phase from her student years in Amsterdam and the Manhattan School of Music, and will mature over time. Most memorable and exciting of her many directions is the rocking "My Mind" and the opening "Kleine Einsicht", where she executes lyrics at a fast pace, perhaps more as a vocal effect than conveying the core meaning of the words. Her avant-garde vocal stylings and stronger compositions are well-documented on her even more Germanic featured album, Das Wörterbuch (The Dictionary).