Froggy's Demise by EZRA

Adhyâropa Records announces the release of Froggy’s Demise (ÂR00091) by the genre-busting ensemble EZRA. Founded by award-winning composer and multi-instrumentalist Jesse Jones, EZRA is comprised of Jacob Jolliff (mandolin), Max Allard (banjo), Craig Butterfield (double bass) and Jones (guitars). Although EZRA is still young enough to have the adjective “new” put in front of its name, Froggy’s Demise is the the third album released from this prolific ensemble in the last 15 months, closely following their debut album EZRA (March 2024) and Earth to EZRA (September 2024).

EZRA clearly has a lot to say, and they’re getting better and better at saying it. Froggy’s Demise may be their best work yet. They have developed a language and a rhythm as a band, and with each album, they are more and more comfortable challenging each other musically. They also just continue to have a really good time together.

With Froggy’s Demise, EZRA presents ten widely varied compositions in the manner of contemporary chamber music, but each with heavy doses of jazz- and roots-based improvisation. Get ready for some spiky synchronized jabs, some supersonic triplets, some asymmetrical metric turns, some loping rhythms, some poignant sensitivity, and some real-nerdy harmonic shifts, all grounded by a playful, folky tunefulness.

The album opens with a piece by Allard, the title of which most of the band members refer to as ‘Waldy,’ due to its tricky pronunciation. ‘Waldeinsamkeit’ is a German word that roughly translates to “a sublime feeling of being alone in the woods,” and this piece certainly captures that. We leave this scenic walk to break into a run, or at least some warm-up jumping around, with ‘Froggy’s Demise,’ a boisterous fiddle tune written by Jones, bolstered by aggressive bars of 11/8 and quick harmonic changes.

‘McLaughlin’ was co-written by Jones and Butterfield as a tribute to the buoyant, dancing, and joyous music of guitarist John McLaughlin and Shakti. ‘Maya’ is a gentle tune written and named for one of Jones’ youngest fans, Maya Bjerken, daughter of Jones’ mentor Xak Bjerken. It’s a wistful respite before Butterfield’s ‘Too Late’ gets us dancing again. Following that is Jones’ ‘Narny,’ whose opening bars ease us in and out of a lively Celtic flavored tune. Allard’s ‘Sobreandando’ features a percussive technique of tapping on the banjo drumhead to establish the beat, which is a nice little groove of 3+2+3. ‘Sobreandando’ is named after, and partly inspired by, a gait of the Peruvian Paso horse.

Now that we are really warmed up, Jones’ ‘Basically a Blues’ takes the standard chords used in the 12-bar blues and flips them upside down. As Jones explains, “All the well-known dominant harmonies become diminished when doing this, and the results are fairly intriguing, but also somewhat perplexing.” When Jones first introduced this tune to the suitably perplexed band, they took a few moments to absorb the information, and then Jolliff quipped, “so it’s basically a blues?”

‘Golden Hill’ is a duet by Jones and Butterfield, who have performed as a duo since 2013. Butterfield is on double bass, as usual, and Jones is playing an open-backed banjo with a four-finger right hand technique. The album closes with ‘Hannigan’s Hollow,’ a tune Jones wrote well over 20 years ago. “I’ve played it casually in my living room ever since,” says Jones, but it seems the piece has finally found a fully furnished home.

The band has established their album making protocol: they meet for an intense week of rehearsals to work out all the tunes, spending full days together, sharing thoughts about the arrangements – or music or life in general – over meals and drinks. And then they spend a couple of days in the studio to get all the recordings. Because they live in different states, they have found this way of working together to be very effective, even in these early years of being a band. It is also a necessity, as both Jones and Butterfield are full-time faculty at their respective conservatories (Oberlin and University of South Carolina); Allard is a full time student at Oberlin Conservatory (graduating May 2025); and Jolliff is one of the busiest touring musicians in the world, playing with his own band, but also with the likes of Béla Fleck.

EZRA gathered together again in January 2025 to record yet another album of new material. It’s hard to keep up when new albums are recorded before others are even released, but there is a lot of momentum with this ensemble, so hang on tight.

EZRA is a collective of classical, jazz, rock, and bluegrass musicians focussed on the creation of genre-crossing and style-inclusive new music. Though the instrumentation and personnel of the group fluctuates, EZRA's core ensemble consists of mandolinist Jacob Jolliff, banjoist Max Allard, and bassist Craig Butterfield, with Jones on guitar and keyboard-related instruments.