Welcome to Jazz.com

Steve Allee: Bus to Belmopan

One of the most gifted and versatile keyboard artists in jazz today, Indianapolis-based Steve Allee was just 19 when he joined Buddy Rich's band in the late '60s. Unfortunately, since 19 was also the magic age for Selective Service, the Vietnam War intervened and he found himself in the U.S. Army. I first encountered this amazing keyboard artist in 1970, at a tiny hole-in-the-wall jazz pub in Raleigh, North Carolina, called the Frog and Nightgown, where he and an L.A. bass player named Don Felix were doing a house gig. Not believing my ears, I had to ask: what was a guy whose playing sounded like an amalgam of Herbie, Oscar and Chick doing in Andy Griffith Land? The answer, of course, is that he and Don were stationed at Fort Bragg, 45 minutes southeast of "the Big R." It is indeed fortuitous that during the tragic days of the Vietnam War, the U.S. military saw fit to issue Steve Allee a piano instead of an M16.

Decades and many musical accomplishments later, Steve Allee may not be a household name, but there are few pianists who can match his depth and vision. Equally at home with an intimate trio, big band or full symphonic orchestra, he is much in demand for his evocative film scores, and has written themes for several major television shows, including NYPD Blue and Chicago Hope.

Steve Allee's compositions tend to be vivid musical landscapes. On "Bus to Belmopan," we are packed into a colorful jitney bounding across Belize en route to a lighthearted, Afro-Cuban feast peppered with McCoy-isms and the rich-textured seasoning of Rich Perry's tenor. This is an enticing recording with warmth and clarity. One can almost taste the plantains and feel the wind through the swaying trees.

June 30, 2008 · 2 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · piano

John Tchicai: One Way Ticket

In the 1970s, John Tchicai was still playing the alto sax and living in his native Denmark. Here, with two of his compatriots, he plays a type of jazz that is both very melodic and very free – a personal folklore, perhaps, that can hardly be related to anything except Ornette Coleman's melodic conceptions and Don Cherry's approach to interplay. Each instrument plays its own line, melodically and rhythmically, sometimes evolving in parallel, sometimes intertwining in a soft and unpredictable manner. Besides Tchicai's sound, which wasn't heavily documented in those years, the most interesting performance here is that of NHØP, who was more often heard with less modern musicians such as Oscar Peterson than with such open improvisers as Tchicai and Dørge.

June 30, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1970s jazz · alto sax · denmark

Mário Laginha: Fado

Notwithstanding its title, this song is not a "fado," the most popular type of Portuguese music. Still, it does have the nostalgic quality of such songs, plus a beautiful melody that Laginha improvises upon after its exposition. His piano's singing quality is fitting, for Laginha is the usual accompanist for one of Portugal's greatest singers, Maria Joao, and thus has a deep knowledge of voices. Here the pianist combines a great sense of structure and rhythm in the left hand, with a wonderful mastery of melody and touch in the right. Its quality allows this performance to stand on its own, halfway between the formal perfection of classical music and the carefree musings of jazz improvisation.

June 30, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · portugal · solo piano

Gordon Beck: Sagittarius

For about 1½ minutes, the fiery tenor of Stan Sulzmann, supported only by bass and drums, tackles this fast post-bop tune in a way that shows us how much wider recognition this remarkable British saxophonist deserves. Then Gordon Beck's piano joins in, lending a strong harmonic dimension to his composition. Beck also displays his unconventional comping and soloing talents to great effect, reminding us of the pianist's tenure with Phil Woods's European Rhythm Machine some 40 years ago. Beck hasn't lost a bit of either his punch or his musicality, but outside the UK how many people are aware of it?

June 30, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · britain

David Binney: Out Beyond Ideas

David Binney was among the initiators of a sound that has more or less become attached to Brooklyn- produced recordings. It is both soft and dense, partly due to a tight bass-and-drums team playing rhythm in a loose, relaxed way. Combining several instruments in simple melodic unisons or in canon, each retaining a distinct sound, creates a thick but not heavy carpet. When a solo instrument emerges, it seems a natural outgrowth of the organic whole. This collective approach, exemplified by "Out Beyond Ideas," brought a whiff of fresh air to modern jazz. But it has by now been so imitated (mostly by students of jazz schools) that we could use a new whiff of fresh air. From Brooklyn or elsewhere.

June 30, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz

Kate McGarry: Let's Face the Music and Dance

Vocalist Kate McGarry just gets better and better with each CD. And ever more daring! Fred Astaire would hardly recognize this version of one of his trademark themes. This is more film noir-ish than all-singing-all-dancing, full of a late-night moodiness that is deeply affecting. McGarry is absolutely heartrending - she puts her whole soul into this performance. But this is more than just an emotional lament; her melodic lines are brilliantly conceived and executed. Yet even without the vocal, this track would be worth hearing just for Donny McCaslin's sax solo, where every phrase sounds spontaneous and loose and free. The whole band shines here, floating effortlessly yet also raising the intensity level at just the right junctures. McGarry moves into the big leagues with this impressive release.

June 30, 2008 · 1 comment

Tags: irving berlin covers · let's face the music and dance

Too Blue Lou and the Groove: Blue in Green

According to the April 19, 2033 newspaper article located inside the CD case, this album represented the first instance of a new form of music that would become known as Hip Bop. Soon-to-be-famous music writer Gregory George Aston calls it a "unique blend of groove-oriented improvisations, scat vocals and rap, played over heavy beats and a traditional walking bass." He goes on to claim that this music would help spawn a whole new jazz dance movement. Indeed, as I write these words, my young daughter is dancing to the music unprovoked.

I am not particularly a fan of hip hop or rap. It seems the best music from those genres is made only when infectious music samples or popular hit song melodies are used in the mix. That mix occurs in the opposite way on The Birth of Hip Bop. The beats of rap, hip hop, scat singing and rap vocals are heard here. But they are still mainly seasoning. The main ingredient is some very fine jazz playing with interesting compositions and arrangements.

I prefer the album's pure instrumentals. The best of the bunch is an absolutely inspired take on "Blue in Green." Too Blue Lou and the Groove have turned this classic ballad into a true progressive jazz anthem. As far as I know, "Blue In Green" has never been approached from this aggressive angle. We usually want to hear how beautiful the piece is played, rather than thinking of the tune as a great power showcase. This performance has propulsive rhythmic force and melodic imagination. Though the whole band is in the groove, saxophonist Huff is especially impressive. This is a performance worthy of hitting the repeat button.

Since 2033 is still a few decades off, Too Blue Lou and the Groove have plenty of time to prove the words in that newspaper article are true. I am not so sure, though, that there will be newspapers in 2033.

June 30, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · blue in green · fusion · miles davis covers

Lennie Tristano: Ghost of a Chance

The day before this Halloween concert in Copenhagen, Tristano shared the stage in Berlin with Bill Evans, John Lewis, Teddy Wilson, Earl Hines and Jaki Byard. He griped afterwards about the constraints and short solo space allocated to him in this all-star setting, branding the event as a "commercial performance." For this follow-up solo recital, Tristano was in a cerebral, noncommercial mood, and works through "Ghost of a Chance" with dense, dissonant chords played at a languorous tempo. One can almost see the overtones lingering over the Steinway, like wisps of smoke from a smoldering cigarette. Midway through the bridge, Tristano seems ready to modulate into something completely different, and it is actually something of a surprise when he returns to the chords of "Ghost of a Chance." In moments such as this, Tristano is out in his own unique galaxy, freed from the gravitational pull of Tatum and Powell and the other keyboard legends who captured so many others in their orbit. This is his sound, his style, his personal conception, set forth in architectonic structures of imposing grandeur. Moreover, he achieves all this while staying loyal to the sentimental pop tunes of yesteryear (this one was introduced by Bing Crosby back in 1933) that always formed the core of his repertoire.

June 30, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: ghost of a chance · solo piano

Lennie Tristano: Expressions

The mid-1960s was a period of ferment and experimentation in the jazz world, and Lennie Tristano continued to develop and expand his keyboard conception. Of course, fans would hardly have been aware of this. At the time of this concert, Tristano could look back at the previous decade and count only one session that had shown up on LP. He had no manager and told an interviewer during this European visit that playing jazz was only possible if one were "making a living some other way."

But the fire still burnt inside Tristano, and he takes total command of the piano on this dense, percussive performance. This artist had been publicly critical of the Free Jazz movement, but he partakes here of its guiding spirit (as he had, indeed, even before Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor made their mark, as demonstrated on his 1953 "Descent Into the Maelstrom"). "Expressions" finds him again pushing the limits of tonal improvisation. Bristly and brilliant, this is one of the finest solo piano recordings of the decade. One wonders what Tristano might have accomplished as part of the Blue Note or Impulse stable of artists during this period, collaborating in combo settings with the cutting-edge artists of the mid-1960s. Certainly Tristano, circa 1965, was playing at the peak of his career.

But who knew? . . . since record labels had bypassed this artist. Even today this little known track, from one of Tristano's last recorded performances, is a hard-to-find collector's item. Yet those who go to the trouble of hunting down the scattered relics of late-vintage Tristano are unlikely to be disappointed.

June 29, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · solo piano

Wadada Leo Smith: Rosa Parks

Smith joined the AACM back in 1967, and has witnessed the whole life cycle of the avant-garde from its origins on the fringes to its second career in academia. The outsiders somehow managed to become insiders -- and I'm not just talkin' chord changes! Smith himself is now Director of the African American Improvisational Music Program at Cal Arts. But this music doesn't belong in the ivory tower . . . not a bit. Smith lingers at the meeting point between free and modal on this track. "Rosa Parks" begins and ends with extended solo trumpet sections, understated and haunting. But in between, the listener is tossed into a cauldron of grooving sound. The trumpeter, for his part, feeds off the energy of a world-class rhythm section. Smith's so-called "Golden Quartet" has changed its personnel over the years, but this lineup of Iyer, Jackson and Lindberg keeps things edgy and full of surprises. Old jazz revolutionaries never die . . . they just take another chorus!

June 29, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · aacm · trumpet

Narcotango: Mejor Asi

Tango continues to evolve in the new millennium, as demonstrated by Carlos Libedinsky's Narcotango, which draws on the rich traditions of the genre while mixing in loops and samples and other digital paraphernalia. Yet the effects are never an end in themselves, and Libedinsky succeeds through an artful combination of diverse elements into a fresh hybrid that both respects the music's heritage while taking it in new directions. He has built a global audience for this music -- half of his CD sales now come outside of Argentina, and Narcotango makes regular overseas tours. Here chill-out ambient sounds cross paths with music for a sensual dance in one of the most intriguing world fusion projects of recent years.

June 29, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: argentina · tango · world fusion

Steve Reich (featuring Pat Metheny): Electric Counterpoint

A certain ineffable jazziness can often be discerned in the music of composer Steve Reich, but it comes to the fore in this 3-movement piece performed by Pat Metheny. The work makes use of Reich's longstanding interest in overdubbing and tape manipulation. Here the soloist prerecords as many as 10 electric guitar parts and 2 electric bass parts, and then performs an 11th guitar part "live" against the composite. As always with Reich, the surface simplicity hides deeper currents of intricacy. This is a multilayered work that draws the listener into its sonic landscape. And jazz fans will enjoy a pronounced Metheny flavor to the proceedings. In his notes, Reich thanks Pat for his guidance in making the guitar parts more "idiomatic." I'm not sure what this amounted to, but certainly the end results bear the personal stamp of this seminal guitarist.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: guitar · minimalism

Philip Glass: Koyaanisqatsi

Minimalism, when it succeeds, captures that elusive moment when the repetitive and predictable create a virtuous circle, self-reinforcing and building inwardly on its own energy. Yet this transcendence comes at a risk: a thin line separates the mesmerizing from the boring. Alas, too often, I find Philip Glass lingers in the realm of ennui. But here, in the opening track to his breakthrough score for the film Koyaanisqatsi, Glass hits a rich musical vein. To achieve the full effect, you should see the movie. Yet the CD is not to be scorned. The vocal by Albert de Ruiter is so far down in the bass clef, you would need to send down divers in pressure suits to ascertain which notes he is hitting. But the organist bravely volunteers to make the plunge, and sends out a passacaglia, full of gravitas, to explore the dangers of the deep in tandem with the singer. This is Philip Glass at his most austere -- no migraine-pounding patterns, no chords hammered at ad infinitum -- and the results are impressive.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: minimalism · soundtrack

Tony Scott: The Murmuring of the Mountain Stream

This recording from 1964 comes with a lot of baggage. It is the father of New Age music, some suggest, or maybe a cheesy type of bland background music. But we urge the listener to adopt the zen mind and LET GO OF THE BAGGAGE!

Put aside the dogma. Forget the liner notes by Alan Watts. Just listen to this track as a duet between clarinet and koto. Appreciate the give-and-take, the graceful interaction, the sensitivity to sound and space. This is breathtaking music, and very deep. Ten months after Scott recorded this LP, John Coltrane entered the studio to make A Love Supreme, and one would not be remiss in finding a connection between these two projects, despite their much different sonic textures. Scott, like 'Trane, was probing a spiritually-charged approach to improvisation, one that went beyond traditional definitions of the jazz vocabulary.

'Tis pity that the jazz critical establishment has forgotten this recording, or at times actually disowned it. Don't you make the same mistake. This is fresh, experimental music that still retains its pristine power more than four decades after its initial release.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: clarinet · japan · world music

Tony Scott: Is Not All One?

Some people will tell you that this album represents the birth of New Age music, back in 1964. Or is it a pioneering World Music collaboration between East and West? Or, as I prefer to see it, a forerunner of "Ambient Music" before Brian Eno coined the term? Alas, the jazz world has never taken much interest in this release, even though it represents collective improvisation of a very high order. Of course, the jazz folks have never really come to grips with Tony Scott in any shape or form. Here was a guy who thwarted all their expectations, spending time in all the wrong places to build a jazz career . . . from his early training at Juilliard to his time overseas immersing himself in Asian musical and mystical traditions; from his trips to South American and Africa to his final move to Italy. Another mark against Mr. Scott: he played the clarinet, championing it when almost every other reed player signed up in the camp of Adolphe Sax. Someday the jazz world will achieve blissful Zen enlightenment and figure out that someone this creative and daring should be championed as a hero of the art form. But you don't need to wait for that to happen. You can check out Scott's oeuvre, and this fresh, beautiful recording, right now. Happy satori!

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · clarinet · verve · world music

Diana Krall: How Insensitive

It's not easy to sing bossa nova. Diana Krall just makes it seem easy. Krall has tackled bossa before, demonstrating a preternatural knack for this style. Krall manages to find just the right balance between relaxed languor and bittersweet emotion. She does it again on this exceptional track. Very few non-Brazilian jazz singers can match her on this terrain. Others will over-sing or clumsily impose jazz phrasing on the Brazilian idiom. In Rio de Janeiro, they describe something indigenous to the city as Carioca, which comes from the Tupi word Karaioca. Well, let me coin a new word . . Krall-i-oca, to signify that rare U.S. singer who can capture the ambiance of this music with such intimacy and assurance.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: how insensitive · jobim covers

Diana Krall: It Could Happen to You

This is retro-Krall, with an Eisenhower-era flavor. Don't get me wrong, the 1950s were a great time for pop-vocal-plus-big-band recordings. But a singer with this much talent should aspire to more than just reproducing jazz styles from ancient history. Krall, for her part, slides effortlessly over the vocal the first time through . . . then she delivers the words all over again, with jazzier phrasing and moving farther and farther away from the Jimmy Van Heusen melody. In neither case does she bring out the sly humor in the lyrics, which are intended to amuse with their lowdown on what could happen to you. In all fairness, Krall never makes a bad recording, and this track declares its slick competency from the outset. Even so, those who haven't experienced her artistry may want to start elsewhere -- for example, with her remarkable version of "How Insensitive" from this same CD.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: it could happen to you · jazz vocals

Wes Montgomery: West Coast Blues

Probably the greatest jazz solo ever played on the guitar, Wes Montgomery's legendary 9-chorus improvisation on "West Coast Blues" (from his 1960 landmark recording on Riverside) is also the perfect summary of his style. All the elements that make up his unique musical universe are showcased here more brilliantly and succinctly than ever. His three main improvisational devices – single notes, octaves, and chords – are given 4, 3, and 2 choruses respectively. But above all Wes's astonishing melodic inventiveness, i.e. his ability to improvise marvelously beautiful and strikingly original melodies (an ability that arguably only a handful of musicians in the history of jazz possessed to a comparable degree), is displayed in every single phrase of his solo. This is followed by an equally melodic solo by piano giant Tommy Flanagan, who by the way did some of the most brilliant and lyrical playing of his career on this recording. Essential.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · guitar

Stephane Wrembel: Eternal Cycle 2: A Child's Dream

Growing up near the final resting place of Django Reinhardt could be both a blessing and a curse for any aspiring young guitarist attempting to walk in his celebrated footsteps; few have been up to the challenge. But Stephane Wrembel has proven to be one artist who could not only tread in Django's footsteps with remarkable fidelity, but cut a fresh new path for Gypsy jazz guitar as well. Born in Paris and raised in Fountainbleu, Wrembel studied with Sinti guitar master Angelo DeBarre, among others, and mastered the Django technique fairly early. While few contemporary guitar players sound stronger or more convincing in the jazz Manouche style, Stephane Wrembel has taken this legacy in a new direction with his Brooklyn- based trio. While remaining faithful to the dynamics of the Selmer-style acoustic guitar favored by the Romani guitar legend, he has revamped the format to include drums and other percussion instruments – even a washboard, on occasion.

"A Child's Dream" could almost be pigeonholed as a traditional-style Gypsy jazz valse; but Wrembel's improvisation reflects influences from Eastern Europe, Latin America, India and the Middle East, resulting in a fresh, world beat sound. Without words the gifted 34-year-old guitarist draws from his Buddhist-Taoist philosophy to convey his concern for the stewardship of this planet. Part of a common theme throughout the album, the subliminal message of peace and global unity speaks gently through this music with the clarity of still water – and, as they say, still waters run deep.

June 28, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · france · guitar

The Tango Project: Por Una Cabeza

Okay, they aren't Argentinean . . . but then again, neither was Uruguayan Carlos Gardel, the tango legend who composed and popularized this song. Yet this group is one of the most widely heard tango ensembles of recent decades. This is the band and song that Al Pacino dances to in a famous scene in Scent of a Woman. And the future governor of California strutted his stuff with Jamie Lee Curtis to this same version of "Por Una Cabeza" in True Lies. In short, here is elegant parlor-room tango with just the right touch of sensuality.

But don't get too caught up in the romantic mood. If you hear the words to this song (not included in this instrumental version), you will find that it is about a horse race lost by a head (hence the title). Yes, a woman does show up too -- but I put my money on the horse. Tango fans are encouraged to find and compare the great Gardel recording.

June 27, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: tango

Carlos Gardel: Volver

Three quarters of a century after his death in a plane crash, Carlos Gardel still inspires passion and fanatical devotion among his legions of fans. At the dawn of the recording age, Gardel defined tango as commercial music and was a megastar throughout Latin America. Had he lived longer, he would no doubt have become a household name in the United States, and probably a major Hollywood draw. But this hit-maker was much more than a pop music act -- he was also an artist of the highest rank, a consummate vocalist who counted the great Caruso among his admirers.

"Volver" comes from a historic recording session that produced a half-dozen tango classics, and shows off Gardel's forceful baritone and emotional fervor. What an amazing voice! Yet Gardel delivers more than just belt-it-to-the-back-rows power. He is also the consummate storyteller, drawing the listener into the high drama of his music. Even today, folks in Buenos Aires will say Veinte años no es nada ("Twenty years is nothing"), drawing on a well-known phrase in this song. Ah, when it comes to the enduring fame of Gardel, "The King of Tango," the fourscore years since his death are nothing. His legacy remains a defining element of tango even in the new millennium.

June 27, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: argentina · tango

Hilde Hefte: Quiet Now

There has been a longstanding belief among medical professionals that, if you can get through med school and survive a residency, you are capable of doing anything – fly an airplane, write a bestselling novel or even play jazz. Of course, any bona fide jazz musician who has ever been invited to sit in with a "doctors' band" will attest to the fallacy of that notion. One rare exception is critically acclaimed jazz pianist, composer and, yes, psychiatrist Denny Zeitlin, who penned the haunting ballad, "Quiet Now."

Hilde Hefte, one of Norway's national treasures, has teamed with her longtime pianist and arranger Egil Kapstad and the Prague Philharmonic to offer a dreamy, luxurious treatment of what is arguably Dr. Zeitlin's finest composition. As always, Ms. Hefte's relaxed interpretation reveals a musician's sensibility and the wisdom to let the melody speak for itself. Dare I say this could be precisely what the doctor ordered?

June 27, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · jazz vocals · norway

Sonny Rollins: Change Partners

Sonny Rollins takes a quartet through a pleasant rendering of this Irving Berlin classic written for the 1938 film Carefree. Fred Astaire introduced the song for that feature, and the giant of the tenor makes his way through this performance with dancer's finesse. That robust creamy tone is in evidence here as the leader pushes the edges of the harmony, all the while keeping the original melody close to your ear. Pianist Scott plays a particularly warm solo completely apropos to the melancholic yet joyful feeling of this recording.

June 27, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · change partners · irving berlin covers · tenor sax

Eric Dolphy: Straight Up and Down

In his liner notes, the composer states that this performance reminded him of a drunk walking. Listening to the head that frames this wide-ranging free piece, one hears the analogy is apt. Dolphy's use of angular melodies incorporating intervallic leaps and rhythmic irregularities always catches my ear, and his passionate improvisational skills simply mesmerize. The rest of the cast gets plenty of space to expand on the leader's blueprint at a relaxed and leisurely pace. The interaction of vibes, bass and drums in particular makes for amazing shifting textures under Dolphy and Hubbard. It's still remarkable to recall that Williams had just turned 19 and Hutcherson 23 when this recording was made.

June 27, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz

Jimmy Hamilton: Blues in My Music Room

The leader is primarily known for his long association with the Duke Ellington Orchestra. He took over the clarinet/tenor chair from Barney Bigard in 1943, and remained until 1968. With Ellington's busy schedule, Hamilton didn't get many opportunities to record on his own, and these tracks (originally recorded for the Urania label in 1954) have a unique sound. The two-guitar lineup in the rhythm section, instead of the usual piano, is especially noteworthy. Galbraith stands out in his solo turn, and his ensemble riffing almost lends an R&B feel to this track, which is not strictly a blues.

June 27, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · clarinet

Yannick Robert: Driving in Cairo

One of the more interesting fusion artists coming out of Europe in recent years, French guitarist and composer Yannick Robert truly conveys a world vision, mixing a wide spectrum on his sonic palette, from "Celtic jazz" to funk. Equally at home on fretless guitar, archtop or solid body rocker model, he stretches out with an assured independence in an electric trio setting. In Yannick's solos you can hear the Metheny influence; in his compositions, there are harmonic similarities to Swiss guitarist/trumpeter Thomas Moeckel – and that's not a bad thing.

Vaci Utca is the perfect soundtrack to pop in you car's CD player, whether traversing the boroughs of New York City or the boulevards of Budapest. On this track Robert takes us to the bustling streets of Cairo, where he lays rich harmonic textures over a spirited, free-wheeling shuffle. Vanerstraeten's solid bass pulse and Agulhon's tasty contra-rhythms provide atmospheric setting for Robert's lucid improvisation. "Driving in Cairo" is a modal day-trip sure to beckon even the most world-weary. Maestro, a little traveling music, please!

June 26, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · france · fusion · guitar

Bill Evans: Very Early

This recording was not released until 11 years after Evans's death. Featuring one of his last trio lineups, it was recorded outdoors on a chilly Canadian late-summer night. Evans had to have a space heater nearby to help keep his hands warm. After the show Evan's expressed frustration that the conditions didn't allow his fingers to quite keep up with his brain. No one in the audience would have noticed.

"Very Early" is perhaps the prettiest jazz song ever composed. The tune is written in waltz time. The opening chord structure is nothing short of brilliant. Brief and subtle low-register runs and lush block chords dominate. The opening strains of this tune, no matter who plays it, remind us of the hopeful innocence of childhood. But to hear the great Bill Evans perform his own composition in his strangely confident yet fragile way is even beyond any hopes and dreams of youth. His playing creates a sentiment so evocative that it seems to encompass your past lives as well. The body of this version is a bit sped-up. Certainly that was an approach Evans, and others who have covered the tune, sometimes took. Still, despite the wonderful improvisational forays, this slightly disturbs the euphoric trance the introduction had put you in. At midpoint Eddie Gomez, Evans's famous sideman for more than a decade, takes bow to bass, playing beautifully. Marty Morell makes extensive use of his brushes for texture's sake. The tempo slows as the gorgeous theme returns. "Very Early" ends very well.

The rating base point of this performance is 100. Ten points are deducted because of the decision to up the tempo. Seven points are returned because of the very real possibility the band played faster to keep warm.

June 26, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1970s jazz · piano trio

John Coltrane: Body and Soul

Coltrane recorded only a few standards when he was with Atlantic Records, and "Body and Soul"—a warhorse for tenor players—had to be among them. But paradoxically it's featured on a record that was only released four years after being recorded, at a time when Coltrane had gone way beyond his style of 1960. In fact, Coltrane doesn't sound too interested by this tune. In his intro, Tyner drags it towards the modal mood his leader increasingly preferred, instead of tackling the complex harmonies. And indeed the only real solo is played by the pianist in the middle of the track. Coltrane merely contents himself with toying around the melody at the beginning and end, in a strangely unconcerned way.

June 26, 2008 · 1 comment

Tags: body and soul

John Coltrane: The Night Has a Thousand Eyes

Lifting this song from a 1948 Edward G. Robinson film noir outing, Coltrane makes it his own with no small help from the powerhouse that is Elvin Jones. The drummer drives the tune, seamlessly jockeying between Latin and swing feels with complete finesse and the right weight of authority. Trane’s mastery of his instrument and his art are displayed through the distinctive, confident tone and the unfolding development in his insightful improvisation. Tyner steps inside the changes with his usual fearless aplomb while Davis is rock solid throughout.

June 26, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags:

Mitchel Forman: Hand Made

The man just never fails to offer consistently affecting music no matter his role. Whether as a standout sideman for Wayne Shorter or John McLaughlin or as composer or leader of his own projects, Mitchel Forman has excelled at every turn. He can always be counted on to produce music of great quality. To me, Forman is one of the most important jazz pianists of the last 25 years. Many musicians agree with me. Yet he is still woefully underappreciated.

"Hand Made" is yet another example of Forman's wonderful writing skills. It is a languorous ballad full of ingratiating hooks. Forman spends the majority of his time eschewing single-note runs in order to present the deeper meanings of his beautiful chord shadings. Saxophonist Drewes becomes the tune's lead voice. He plays the uplifting melody with the confidence needed when every single breath-filled note is heard in slow motion. The tension of the layered melody builds to minor anthem status before the band gently settles in for a soft landing. Soft is not smooth.

More people need to hear Forman. Can somebody in the movies finally discover him and hire him to write a soundtrack?

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · fusion

Danny Gatton & Joey DeFrancesco: Well You Needn't

Danny Gatton never achieved a modicum of the fame he deserved. He was a true phenomenon. His guitar style was a crosspollination of jazz, blues and rockabilly music, all picked at astonishingly high speeds. As is sadly often the case, it was not until after his tragic death that his legendary musical prowess was more acknowledged.

Ever since childhood Joey DeFrancesco was on track to become the rightful heir to Jimmy Smith's B-3 throne. His dad, "Papa John" DeFrancesco, was an accomplished organist. So DeFrancesco grew up with an appreciation of jazz history and took advantage of every opportunity to capitalize on his situation, including tutelage supplied by his dad.

In February 1994, just 8 months before Gatton's death, these two monster players recorded Relentless. It is an apt name for this CD.

Gatton and DeFrancesco tackle Thelonious Monk's "Well You Needn't" with a fervor almost beyond description. Gatton "chicken picks" the familiar melody to start. With the fine support of bassist Previti and drummer Biery, Gatton and DeFrancesco turn into whirling dervishes. During a freakishly quick-tempo call-and-response section, Gatton's retorts to DeFrancesco's rapid-fire exultations with his own riffs played at the speed of light. These blurs of sound are made all the more remarkable by the clarity and ring of each individual note. It would be really scary if someone convinced me these guys were not pushing each other to the limits. A contagious high energy is maintained throughout this performance. Good thing it's the CD's last tune. I cannot imagine wanting to hear anything else right after this.

Gatton has entered the esoteric postmortem realm along with guitarist Lenny Breau as two of the greatest players that ever lived without the knowledge of the masses. DeFrancesco continues to be the king of the B-3 Hammond jazz movement. His performance on "Well You Needn't" is just one example of why that crown fits so well.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · guitar · monk covers · well you needn't

Mario Pavone: Hello Again

Forty years ago, Mario Pavone joined forces with pianist Paul Bley and drummer Barry Altschul in one of the great piano trios of the era. In this new release, Pavone reunites with Bley, and also brings along fine drummer Matt Wilson. The resulting trio creates vibrant, interactive improvisations that can stand comparison with that great late-'60s Bley group. The conversational give-and-take between the three players is fresh and exciting. This is "free" jazz in the best sense of the word, free of agenda or ideology, and totally committed to collective creativity without preconceptions or limits.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · piano trio

Miles Davis (with John Coltrane): Ah-Leu-Chah

It was Miles’ group, someone has to be the leader, to organize things, but it’s really the community of players that make the music. Each one of my ensembles has been inspired by that particular realization about what is happening on the scene, creating situations for the community I live in. My nonet has a certain repertoire, a certain community of players. We’ve been playing together for years. Now, I’m the leader. I’ve organized and developed my career to a point to be able to put it together. But it’s the community of players that is making music, too. In 1956, Miles and these guys were living this music together, and you can feel how much they loved to play together. Round About Midnight was one of the first records that totally captured me and gave me a lot of ideas, and I wore it out two or three times.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · charlie parker covers

John Coltrane: Impressions

While I was on tour with McCoy Tyner in April 2008, I found this in a record shop in Basel, Switzerland. I’d never seen it before. This version of “Impressions” starts the concert. It’s at a slower tempo, almost like the tempo at which they played “So What” with Miles. It’s an amazing, short version of this tune with no solo by McCoy. I love the way they play the theme together and the way Eric answers and plays in the spaces of the melody. Coltrane plays around nine beautiful choruses, then Eric comes in and plays nine or ten choruses himself—some of the most beautiful Eric Dolphy with Coltrane on record. After Dolphy, Coltrane comes back in, and plays another two or three choruses before they take the theme out. You can feel that Coltrane was inspired just by having Dolphy on the scene. He hands it over to him in a way where he’s saying, “Okay, man, what have you got to say?” Then when Dolphy ends his chorus, Coltrane has to come in and play again because it’s at this beautiful place in the whole structure of the piece.

Coltrane came up in an era where you played in bands with other saxophone players a lot, and he recorded with a lot of different saxophone players. Some of it was documented—there was a great record with Johnny Griffin and Hank Mobley; he recorded with Al Cohn and Zoot Sims and Hank Mobley as a quartet; did a record on alto with Paul Quinichette, Pepper Adams, and Gene Ammons; and of course the sextet with Miles and Cannonball and the quintet with Cannonball—but I’m sure through the years he was in tons of bands, and many jam sessions and situations where you shape the music together spontaneously right at the moment with other saxophone players. Later, his collaborations with Pharaoh Sanders, Archie Shepp, and others really stand out as some really beautiful collaborative group explorations. Throughout his career, I think he enjoyed, as I do, feeding off other people, especially if they have a strong personality and ideas and have their own statement. So it was great to hear him with Dolphy and have Eric’s voice, not only on alto, but bass clarinet and flute.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · bass clarinet · impressions · tenor sax

John Coltrane: Expression

This is from Coltrane’s last session meant to be released. We just recorded it with the Saxophone Summit on our latest release, Seraphic Light. It’s a continuous melodic flow. When you’re playing that theme over and over, alone on the saxophone, implying some of the harmonies and roots, it’s like the most beautiful prayer.

I don’t think Coltrane ever explored this tune much in concert. This date was near the end of his life, and he might have brought it in for the first time at the recording session for the whole group. Now, of course, he and Alice might have been playing it as a duet, which I would love to have heard. Alice came into the band after McCoy and played with a harp-like approach, playing the full piano in her accompaniment, which seemed to relax Coltrane—he played off of more of the spectrum in the harmonies. He was playing a harp-like approach also at that point. They always talk about sheets of sound. When you slow that down, it becomes very harp-like, very open. Now, on the duets, Interstellar Space, which was done in the same month or week of 1967, he was playing through things very quick, with flurries of notes throughout the harmony, whereas he stretched them out a little bit on “Expression.” I think we would have heard another side to Coltrane had he lived and been able to develop during the ensuing years.

"Expression" was one of the songs that inspired me to find a way to play through harmonies in a free-flowing manner, without a quarter-note or metronome-type beat—an open beat, but still moving through a sequence of chords. I learned a lot about trying to approach improvising with that aspect of meter. I’m scratching the surface on that now.

June 25, 2008 · 1 comment

Tags: 1960s jazz · impulse · tenor sax

John Coltrane: Dear Old Stockholm

I love this version of “Dear Old Stockholm” with Roy Haynes on drums, and I listen to it a lot. A certain freshness and different feeling happens when Coltrane plays with Roy Haynes. His ideas take different shapes rhythmically and melodically. His recordings with Roy Haynes inspired me to realize that the music within the music comes from the people that you’re playing with at the time. Through the years developing with the people that I’ve played with, especially drummers, like Ed Blackwell, Billy Higgins, Mel Lewis, Paul Motian, and Elvin Jones, I’ve realized that you can play the same tune, but when you have a different feeling in the rhythm section, you should play with a different feeling as a soloist. On this version of “Dear Old Stockholm,” I love the ending, the way they play over the form, the way they explore. They could have played that all day and night.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · dear old stockholm · impulse · tenor sax

John Coltrane: The Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost

If you break down that melody and just play it like a scale, it’s a simple, beautiful meditation on those intervals and themes, played through all the keys. That’s another record that my dad really loved, and he went down to the basement to put it on a lot, so I heard it often without actually listening to it myself. At the time, I was trying to learn how to play the saxophone, so I was more into Bird and Diz, earlier Coltrane, and Sonny with Max, but subliminally, from hearing this piece in particular, “The Father, Son and the Holy Ghost,” all of a sudden I found myself practicing a different way without even thinking about it—just simple little things on the horn that I was working on, but playing them in different keys, practicing them in a more peaceful way instead of just running through them technically on the horn. There were some things in that approach that have stayed with me, that I’m trying to develop to this day.

June 25, 2008 · -1 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · impulse · tenor sax

John McLaughlin and The Heart of Things: Mother Tongues

John McLaughlin's Heart of Things was a hot band. But you would really have to hear the group live to buy into that proposition. The band's earlier studio album The Heart of Things never quite caught fire. McLaughlin went the umpteenth mile to create an ensemble feel, and may have overdone things a bit. When he did play, McLaughlin's guitar tone didn't help either. In a carryover from his Free Spirits band, his warm guitar tone would often get lost in the mix. Live in Paris was a totally different experience. McLaughlin took a lead playing role on this tour. And thank God you could hear him. His tone had been tweaked just enough so you didn't have to strain your ears. He also employed a good amount of distortion to get his points across.

"Mother Tongues" first appeared on McLaughlin's album Live at Royal Festival Hall a decade earlier. In that instance, the song was a showcase for the remarkable Indian percussionist Trilok Gurtu. That was an acoustic performance. "Mother Tongues" in Paris was pure electricity. McLaughlin starts the piece with some rhythmic grunge chords before the awesome Dennis Chambers kicks in. The head arrangement is a pulsating blob. Saxophonist Gary Thomas inserts a long, middling solo that seems to serve more as a jumping-off point for what is to come rather than a showcase for his musical scope. At solo's end the tempo picks up appreciably, and we hear the main event. McLaughlin and keyboardist Otmaro Ruiz engage in a phenomenally entertaining call and response. This duel ranks right up there with any I have heard McLaughlin partake in. That is a strong statement, considering McLaughlin's musical partners over the years. Tension is built on each turn as the tempo picks up speed a millisecond at a time until about the 30th turn, when everyone is ready to burst. This section includes fun, tension, ridiculous speed and virtuosity. The crowd wildly cheers the split-second this frantic call and response gets hit by a bus. The main theme, for all its complicated syncopation and twists and turns, is played as if the band members were one organism. "Mother Tongues" speaks loud and clear.

Live in Paris indicated to McLaughlin fans that he was once again ready to claim leadership of the best jazz-fusion band around. But within a year, he was back playing Indo-jazz with a newly reformed Shakti. You can never trust McLaughlin to stick with anything for very long. It is frustrating and invigorating at the same time.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · fusion · guitar

John Coltrane: Chim Chim Cheree

This is an amazing version of “Chim Chim Cheree” on soprano saxophone—the groove, the interplay, the flow of the quartet. To come off having such success with “My Favorite Things,” and then to play an interpretation of “Chim Chim Cheree” that was so wide open and exploratory, and just, like, SERIOUS. He wasn’t playing it just to play it. You could feel that he was into exploring what could happen off of that theme, and the way they put it together is a beautiful, joyous journey. This was in 1965, and one of his later studio recordings on soprano. His sound and approach and focus on that horn on this recording was instrumental in giving me confidence to try to play other instruments and explore the possibilities of tonal energy that comes off of the different horns you play. During that period, when I was a teenager, 16 or 17, I’d heard James Moody live and Sonny Stitt live and Rahsaan Roland Kirk live. Sonny Stitt played alto, and then put it down and played tenor. Moody picked up the flute. Rahsaan played all these horns, not only at the same time, but to play each one as his voice for the moment. The focus of sound and energy from the instrument came through. I really felt Coltrane’s focus and sound on “Chim Chim Cheree,” the energy that the instrument gave him, how he executed ideas off that inspiration.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · impulse · soprano sax · soundtrack covers

John Coltrane: Venus

This is a duet with Rashied Ali on drums, playing brushes. It’s a ballad-like, lyrical, rubato piece, and the way they improvise together is so captivating and beautiful, you want to keep listening to it over and over again. Interstellar Space was a recording of four duets, four planets— "Mars," "Jupiter," "Saturn," and "Venus." I brought this recording home and played it for my Dad, and he really dug it. After I moved to New York in the mid ‘70s, one of the first places I went was Rashied Ali’s club, Ali’s Alley. I’d been playing a little with [pianist] Albert Dailey, and he told me he was playing a gig there with ‘Shied and that I should come, which I did. I sat in with him that night. It was one of the thrills of my life at that point, calling home and telling my dad I sat in and played with Rashied Ali!

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · impulse · tenor sax

John Coltrane: Vigil

My dad had Kulu Se Mama, which this track is from, so I didn’t have to buy it. He listened to this all the time. I was very lucky that my dad had a hip record collection, and had these records from the different periods of Coltrane. He met Coltrane in the early ‘50s and played a jam session with him in Cleveland. Coltrane was playing alto; he was in town with a blues band led by a guy named Gay Crosse, who was a Cleveland cat. During that time, you might stay somewhere for a month or two and play every night. Anyway, they were one year apart—my dad was born in 1925, and Coltrane in 1926. So they came up in the same generation, the same music. My dad played at this session with Coltrane, and he never forgot that, man. So through the years, he had all his records. But Kulu Se Mama was one that my dad loved to listen to.

This piece, “Vigil,” is a duet with Elvin Jones. It was incredibly well recorded. My dad had a nice stereo with speakers all over the basement, so wherever you were down in our basement it was great sound! So when you listened to this in our basement, at forte, it was like they were in the room with you. The sound of the drums and the way they played together was so beautiful and organic. It might have been one of the first times I really heard a saxophone-and-drums duet on a recording.

In 1965, when this recording was made, he seemed to fill the room with his tone in a different way. In the early ‘60s, he was playing through his horn and flying around his horn—his sound attacked you, it came at you. As he developed more towards the end of his life, his tone was more majestic, and had a much more spiritual and open feeling to it—to me. Even though he was still playing some ferocious, incredible things around his instrument, his sound was even more beautiful and deep than it had been. That’s what captured me on this duet as well.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · impulse · tenor sax

John Coltrane: Body and Soul

Later on, Dexter Gordon used them. Dexter gave Coltrane a mouthpiece early on. It might have been the mouthpiece that he was using during a certain early period with Miles. Coltrane was one of Dexter’s disciples, along with Bird and others. You could hear Dexter in Coltrane’s playing at a certain point, and later you hear Coltrane in Dexter’s playing. That mix teaches you a lot about what an amazing, multigenerational, multicultural music this is. We all influence each other in different ways at different times in our careers and personalities.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · body and soul · tenor sax

John Coltrane: The Night Has a Thousand Eyes

“The Night Has a Thousand Eyes” feels like a totally integrated quartet—the form of it, the feelings, the way the rhythm shifted, Coltrane’s ideas throughout the sequence of the harmonies, the different inflections that Elvin Jones was playing, the way McCoy comped, little pedal points in the bass. It wasn’t just Coltrane soloing over that tune or with a rhythm section. This track was instrumental in my discovering the approach to playing within the group you’re in, whether you’re soloing or not. As a young player, I played a lot of drums, and practiced saxophone and drums at the same time. Playing along with Elvin and McCoy and Coltrane on that recording on drums taught me everything about form and following the line and the soloist. Doing that taught me a lot about everything.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · tenor sax · the night has a thousand eyes

John Coltrane: Chasin' the Trane (master take)

All the different versions of “Chasin’ the Trane” through the years from Coltrane’s live recordings hit that same incredible level of creativity on the blues. It was a whole side of the Impulse record, Live at the Village Vanguard, and Coltrane plays from start to finish—Eric Dolphy comes in at the very end. Later, they released other takes where Dolphy plays and McCoy plays. The first time I heard this, I listened to it all day. I kept putting the needle back at the beginning of the recording. After a while, I realized it was a blues. I was a teenager, and the energy, the focus, and the swinging, beautiful exploration of Coltrane’s choruses was really some magic. Moving to New York, playing at the Village Vanguard with the Mel Lewis Jazz Orchestra, presenting my own groups there, recording live there, feeling the spirits in that room—it goes back to that first time, checking THAT piece out.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1960s jazz · impulse · tenor sax

John Coltrane: Three Little Words

It’s incredible to hear Coltrane play on standard songs with this rhythm section. Hank is very free in the harmonic sequence, and is feeding him harmonies and voicings; Coltrane is taking him places that give him ideas and open up what he’s playing harmonically as well. Also, Milt Jackson is one of the great lyrical improvisers in jazz music, and to hear them balance and play off of each other on a tune like “Three Little Words,” playing a few choruses each, sustaining the mood, was a beautiful journey on their part. Digging Coltrane playing standards showed me the depth of repertoire that he knew, how much ballads and the blues were in everything he played, and how it all came through in his solos. No matter what he played, his focus on the material and the people he played with drove him and fed him ideas. It wasn’t just what he was practicing on his horn, even though that was a big part of the way he played.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: tenor sax · three little words

John Coltrane: Good Bait

This is from Soultrane, one of the first significant Coltrane records that I lived with as a real young player and listener. "Good Bait" was written by Tadd Dameron, who’s from Cleveland, where I’m originally from. My dad played with him. Hearing Coltrane’s incredible, lengthy exploration on “Good Bait” inspired me, and taught me a lot about how I would have to deal with this music, and learn to play the saxophone. It’s a timeless recording that sounds as fresh today as when I was a kid.

As a saxophonist myself, understanding all the things you have to deal with to execute your ideas, I realize that every stage of the way is a different development period, and Coltrane’s experience and journey to that moment in 1958 was intense. He had come up playing Tadd Dameron’s music, playing with Johnny Hodges’s band, Dizzy’s band, Miles’s band, Monk’s band, and he was just starting to form a conception about who he was and how he wanted to present himself in the music. Playing with Thelonious Monk got him to be even more articulate than he was doing on his own. His execution, articulation, rhythm, phrasing and ideas were all one, and his tone was crystallizing—he was fusing together all of the elements of playing music and playing the saxophone. He was a virtuoso on his instrument, and he was able to communicate his ideas in lengthy open solos. “Good Bait” is a prime example of him really stretching out and playing through that piece of music with his own approach.

June 25, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · good bait · tenor sax

Deborah Henson-Conant: On The Rise

I am a huge fan of Elements, the experimental jazz group formed over 20 years ago by bassist Mark Egan and drummer Danny Gottlieb. Every few years they come out with some new music. There have been some albums of uneven material. But the band, which uses revolving musicians to play with Egan and Gottlieb, has for the most part produced wonderful music. Why all the talk about Elements when I am reviewing a cut from the fine harpist Deborah Henson-Conant? The answer is simple. "On The Rise" is basically an Elements song with Henson-Conant's harp sitting in for the guitar of Stan Samole or Steve Khan. Café and Clifford Carter were also frequent Elements collaborators. "On the Rise" is even co-written with Egan. Henson-Conant acquits herself well on this involving sound exploration. The harp isn't exactly the type of instrument that allows you to cut glass. But Henson-Conant knows how to use its timbres to fill out a lush fusion piece.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1980s jazz · fusion · harp

Franco Ambrosetti: Frasi

Born and still living in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland, Franco Ambrosetti is a veteran of European jazz and a master trumpeter, though he is not strictly speaking a professional musician because he's always had a day job in business. In the course of his career, he's had occasions to hire both European and American partners to record with him, ranging from Miroslav Vitous and Daniel Humair to Michael Brecker and Kenny Barron. Here, the first class rhythm section led by Uri Caine is perfectly at ease with Ambrosetti's beautiful ballad, and the trumpeter himself displays a lyrical sound showing that, besides his abilities in the hard-bop and fusion fields, he has never forgotten his Mediterranean roots.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · switzerland · trumpet

Brian Blade: If You See Lurah

Besides being among the most in-demand drummers of the last ten years in both the jazz and pop fields, Brian Blade has formed a group that doesn't sound like most drummers' bands. In fact it doesn't sound like any other band, and there are reasons for this. First, Blade is at least as much a musical drummer as a rhythmic one. Second, he also plays the guitar and often composes on this instrument, which gives his songs a totally different harmonic tinge than those composed on the piano. Third, the lineup of his band, where guitars (among them the pedal steel) and reeds dominate, provides a thick and mellow sound unheard in jazz before the end of the 1990s. This track is an excellent example of how Blade's Fellowship blew a whiff of fresh air into jazz: gorgeous multi-instrumental voicings, frank melodies, long notes instead of breathless solos, and soft yet firm drumming to knit everything together.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · drums

Christian Scott: Litany Against Fear

The atmosphere is dark and poignant: we are in Hurricane Katrina's wake, and Christian Scott has very efficiently rendered the feeling of sadness and agony attached to the ordeal that his native city underwent. A modal piano romp, a heavy, almost ominous drum beat, a guitar ostinato, and above all the slow moan of a muted cornet establish the frame. And when the melody appears and the song starts modulating, it all sounds like a lament with Hispanic undertones, with the sober interaction of the five instruments beautifully arranged around the trumpet's poised main voice.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · hurricane katrina · trumpet

Chick Corea & Gary Burton: Señor Mouse

We live in an age of remakes, in music no less than in movies and fashion. But why should master musicians Corea and Burton tackle the same repertoire all over again almost a quarter century after the original? Sure it makes sense to play it live in front of new audiences. But recording a new version of "Señor Mouse," which opened the first Crystal Silence album (on ECM) with a magic of its own, doesn't really seem appropriate. There is virtuosity in this remake, of course: "virtuosity" could be Corea's and Burton's middle name. But where is the freshness and where are the nuances in this new 9-minute version?

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz

André Previn: I Feel Pretty

André Previn was among the first to record a jazz version of West Side Story songs, and his adaptation has a very West Coast tinge. No wonder, with such sidemen as Red Mitchell and Shelly Manne. The trio takes "I Feel Pretty" at a brisk tempo, exposing its melody in a fugue-like manner. The improv part has a more abstract aspect, with Previn in a percussive mood, shifting tempos, alternating chords and single lines. This creative approach reflects Previn's ability as an organizer of soundscapes, a talent that led to a long career as one of the world's premier symphony orchestra conductors. Indeed, the main goal here is not to play pretty but to build a whole new tune around the melody, harmonies and rhythm of Bernstein's tune.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · i feel pretty · leonard bernstein covers · piano trio

Johnny Griffin: The Way You Look Tonight

During the 1950s, Johnny Griffin built a reputation as "fastest horn in the West," and his rendition of this standard on his first album as a leader exemplifies that aspect of his playing. On the theme, the "Little Giant" sets a pace that's not much faster than average for this tune, but when it comes to improvising he dashes through the chord changes with supernatural speed. And this doesn't hinder the utter relevance with which his imagination produces bop and blues patterns one after another. Of course the Kern & Fields love song doesn't retain much of its original meaning during this vigorous treatment. But if one accepts the idea, one can only be impressed by the tenor stampede that charges through Kern's chordal corral with such youthful exuberance.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · jerome kern covers · tenor sax · the way you look tonight

Joe Henderson: Ask Me Now

Joe Henderson came late to the tenor trio (at least on records), and acquired an immediate reputation in this format thanks to the mastery he had developed in other contexts. On this Monk standard, and with this rhythm pair, Henderson develops a soft-toned yet adventurous way of winding through the repetitive ballad harmonies. The bass is the tenor's main partner, while the drummer's brushes maintain a steady tempo and Henderson's blowing soars in a succession of bluesy choruses punctuated by occasional — and all the more expressive — honks and squeals.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1980s jazz · ask me now · monk covers · tenor sax

Steve Grossman: Over The Rainbow

This is exactly the kind of song that suits Steve Grossman's deep, lyrical tenor sound. He tackles it in a basically old-fashioned way while playing the theme, but when it's time to improvise he shows that his inspiration is rooted in the art of such modern elders as Sonny Rollins. When he's in top form, as he is here, Grossman delivers some of the most satisfying interpretations you can hear on standards in the mainstream to hard-bop styles. His reputation as a former alumnus of the "electric" Miles Davis shouldn't fool anybody about that aspect of his playing. Surrounded as he is on this track, Grossman sounds like one of the '50s masters who didn't matriculate from jazz schools, but had their own style that attracted countless followers and admirers.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1990s jazz · harold arlen covers · over the rainbow · tenor sax

Dave Brubeck (with Paul Desmond): Blue Moon

At the start of this 1953 track, Brubeck actually plays "Blue Moon" straight, sticking to the original chords and not engaging in any of his usual games. Ah, but we know this won't last for long. Brubeck and Desmond always had some tricks up their sleeves, especially during this early period, when no standard was given the standard treatment. Midway through Desmond's solo, the band moves from major to minor, and the altoist starts playing unexpected variations on "Lullaby of the Leaves," which another famous West Coast quartet had recorded five months earlier. Brubeck is not to be outdone, and kicks off his solo with some off-the-wall counterpoint, before showing that he can also play the major-to-minor switcheroo. Before they have called it a night, this band has played "Blue Moon" and "Red Moon" and "Tangerine Mood" and every other shade they could muster on the fly. These early Brubeck-Desmond sides are always a delight, and sound very spontaneous. You can hear the fun these two creative minds had in playing off each other's wildest flights. A winning moment from a historic band.

June 24, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · blue moon · richard rodgers covers · west coast jazz

Orchestra Baobab: Pape Ndiaye

Fans unfamiliar with the odd twists and turns in the history of Afro-pop might be surprised by the Cuban flavor in this Senegalese band. But there is a long history of Latin idioms permeating African music styles, much of it stemming from the popularity of Franco and other Congolese musicians who developed a pseudo-rumba sound that swept the continent. Orchestra Baobab has long been renowned for its mastery of this style, which manages to combine a rhythmic fervor with a languid sensuality. This music, a modern reworking of an old griot song, is like a drowsier salsa, mesmerizing yet also relaxing. This ensemble has enjoyed a wide following since the 1970s, but disbanded for a period. Yet on this opening track from their new Nonesuch release, they reassert their mastery of a style that has lost none of its appeal with the passing decades.

June 23, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: africa · world music

Bireli Lagrène: Hips

While "Hips" is not one of Bireli Lagrène's best compositions, it did mark a stylistic change for the guitarist. By this time he had moved past his Gypsy and Django roots to play some distinctive electric fusion music, some of which can be found on this album. However, "Hips" and several other cuts (most notably "Action") could easily fit into the smoother trend that players such as Larry Carlton were developing at this time. This was not quite Smooth Jazz (pardon me while I gag), but was dangerously approaching that cliff from which many listeners would be forced to jump. This willingness to change his style showed that Lagrène was quite capable of playing music that might prove more palatable to the commercial market. This may have pleased his bank account and record label, but was generally a bad sign for those of us who really care about the music.

"Hips" is a bit '80s jazz-rock formulaic in the sense it has a strong backbeat that at times seems almost robotic and trends toward the funky. The staccato synthesizer sounds used by Carter were dated even back then. The synthesized horns in particular are a bit annoying. That is not his fault. He was just going with the flow of the times. Underneath the simplification and warning signs, "Hips" was still a rocking jazz-blues number played by fine musicians. It did make you want to swing your hips. Looking back, we can now see where this music led. My guess is that Lagrène was a little too close to the forest. Perhaps he was pushed there. In any case, Lagrène never really forced his fans off that cliff. Close call. In recent years he has revisited his Gypsy heritage and toured with Larry Coryell and Billy Cobham, playing good old fusion music and showing he is still one of the world's greatest guitar players.

June 23, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1980s jazz · fusion · guitar

Mahavishnu Orchestra: Lotus Feet

"Lotus Feet" is noteworthy for several reasons. First, its overt Indian character indicates the tune was clearly written with the future in mind. That future would be McLaughlin's Indo-jazz band Shakti, already in the forming stages during the recording of this album. Mahavishnu always had an Indian element to its music. But it was understated compared to the vibe that permeates "Lotus Feet." Second, it was arguably the first time McLaughlin successfully employed an early guitar synthesizer. While other tunes on the album used the synthesizer, they did so in conjunction with electric guitar or to create sound effects. Here it is the primary instrument. Third, "Lotus Feet" would become perhaps McLaughlin's most enduring composition. Over the years he has also performed it with Shakti and Remember Shakti, and employed its melody as the thematic linchpin in the movie Molom, for which he and Trilok Gurtu provided the soundtrack. The tune has even been popularly covered by others such as pianist George Winston.

On an album full of surprises (some welcome, some not), "Lotus Feet" provides a respite. Meditative in nature, the tune is built around a simple Indo rhythm played by Walden on congas and sleigh bells placed over the top of a drone box. McLaughlin plays his guitar through a patch that makes it sound almost like a wooden flute. It takes about three seconds to fall in love with the melody. It is that beautiful. This is McLaughlin, both as composer and player, in restrained mode. Stu Goldberg also plays synthesizer in the form of the mini-moog. At times it becomes a bit difficult to tell the two apart, which is a problem that has always been intrinsic to the nature of the technology. Unless you're writing a review and trying to distinguish who is playing what, this quirk is of little significance.

I would not mind at all if the strains of this wonderfully executed piece followed me around as my own personal soundtrack. There is no doubt my stress level would be appreciably lower.

June 23, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1970s jazz · fusion · guitar

Oscar Peterson: Nigerian Marketplace

What began as Oscar Peterson's single-song tribute to then-imprisoned South African anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela culminated in a major composition entitled Africa Suite. Peterson performed "Nigerian Marketplace," the suite's first-ever recorded movement, at 1981's Montreux Jazz Festival. The ambitious piece, building on Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen's serpentine but resonant basslines, features several intriguing rhythmic changes, and is distinguished throughout for its haunting melody and driving power. The audience was clearly enthralled, and understandably so.

June 23, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1980s jazz · piano trio

Oscar Peterson: Tenderly

Oscar Peterson's legendary debut at Carnegie Hall in September 1949 with bassist Ray Brown led impresario Norman Granz to feature the pianist on several albums for his Clef label (later Verve). The young Canadian also joined Granz's Jazz at the Philharmonic troupe, accompanying the likes of Roy Eldridge, Charlie Shavers, Benny Carter, Flip Phillips, Lester Young and Ella Fitzgerald. When that edition of JATP performed at Carnegie Hall three years after Peterson's debut at the fabled venue, Oscar not only accompanied the headliners but was spotlighted in a set with his own newly formed trio. The finest track of their 5-tune program is "Tenderly." It has a delicate introduction but soon bursts into a joyous breakneck met by enthusiastic audience reaction. For years this was Oscar's signature tune, and while he recorded it many times, this remains the classic version.

June 23, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1950s jazz · piano · tenderly

Anthony Davis: Wayang No. 5

The history of jazz piano and composition has always been maximalist, almost as a core principle. Jelly Roll Morton started borrowing and incorporating everything he could find into his music a hundred years ago, and the expansionary policy hasn't been renounced by any of his successors. Somehow Davis manages to stay true to this tradition, while using hypnotically repeated rhythms with a quasi-minimalist flavor as the foundation for this composition. But Davis also finds sustenance in many other places, from gamelan music to atonality. At times, it is hard to pin down this artist's true allegiances, and fans have been as likely to hear his work in an opera house or Broadway theater as in a jazz club or symphony hall. There are moments on Wayang No. 5 where he sounds like Philip Glass on acid. But then Davis will shift gears entirely, putting on a Cecil Taylor attitude or dipping into a Muhal Richard Abrams bag. But his music is entirely free from the conventional or trite, and his best work can be riveting.

June 22, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1980s jazz · classical jazz · piano

György Ligeti: Lux Aeterna

Minimalism was a new fragrance in the air when Ligeti composed this densely compacted work. In 1966, however, the Romanian-born Hungarian émigré was unfamiliar with the work of Steve Reich and Terry Riley. Yet you can tell that Ligeti was a kindred spirit, another visionary looking for an escape hatch from the maximalist spiral of Western musical thinking. The harmonic movement in this work for voices moves at about the same pace as a sunset. Each individual modification in the sound tapestry is so delicate that one can barely perceive it at the time, only looking back later and seeing how the whole horizon has changed color and dimension. Ligeti embraces a big "M" word to describe his procedure. No, not Minimalism, but rather "Micropolyphony," which he defines a "polyphonic texture so thickly woven that the individual voices become indistinguishable, and only the resulting harmonies, blending seamlessly, one into another, can be clearly perceived." This music is timeless in the deepest sense of the word, looking back to the past in its references to the Latin requiem, yet so futuristic that Stanley Kubrick included this unconventional piece in the score to 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). Decades later, the composition still sounds fresh and impenetrable.

June 22, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags:

Lennie Tristano: Yesterdays [Glad I Am]

Here is one CD that you can't judge by its cover. The song is listed as "Glad I Am," but is actually "Yesterdays." Tristano is credited as composer, when Jerome Kern should get the nod. The cover of the CD promises a quintet live at Birdland in 1949, but this track is a solo piano selection from Chicago in 1945.

Ah, these are quibbles. Don't let the phony factoids stop you from checking out the music. This track is an inspired exercise in harmonic reconstruction, unlike anything else in jazz, circa 1945. Tristano takes the song at a leisurely pace, and the chords move slowly enough for us to savor the wry dissonances and the curious progressions, unexpected changes sometimes unfolding with four-surprises-to-the-bar. I have heard Tristano's protégés play standards in a similar manner, without ever resolving into a tonic key -- an odd and unsettling philosophy when applied to a sentimental old ballad. Lennie stops short of such in-your-face atonality here . . . but just barely. Everything fits together, and resolves, but the games he plays in the process are fascinating to observe.

Yet pick up another Tristano CD and you will probably hear him play in a completely different manner. It's to this pianist's credit that he was able to forge such an identifiable sound, while making so many changes in his approach. I wish he had recorded more music in this vein -- heck, I wish he had recorded more music in any vein -- or perhaps had attempted to translate this approach into a combo or big band concept. As it stands, the 1945 solo piano tracks are just more outliers on the elongated Tristano bell curve, idiosyncratic performances that give little sense of where this artist would be a few years later, but still stand out as essential listening for anyone with a deep interest in piano jazz.

June 22, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: jerome kern covers · solo piano · yesterdays

John McLaughlin: Do You Hear The Voices You Left Behind?

Somehow over the years the original and correct name of this album has been changed. This is irritating and bothersome. But I guess we just can't beat The Man.

Johnny McLaughlin – Electric Guitarist, the actual name of the album based on the first business card McLaughlin used, was an all-star affair celebrating McLaughlin's return to the electric guitar after a two-year hiatus playing acoustic music with his Indo-jazz band Shakti. McLaughlin gathered past collaborators and a few new ones to run through some challenging new fusion material. The band for "Do You Hear The Voices You Left Behind" was comprised of four giants from the jazz and jazz-rock world.

"Do You Hear The Voices You Left Behind" is dedicated to John Coltrane, upon whose "Giant Steps" its changes are predominantly based. McLaughlin uses a new electric guitar that features a scalloped fretboard. This design, based upon the Indian stringed instrument the vina, allowed McLaughlin more room between frets to push down on the strings. This created note bends that you needed a decompression chamber just to fathom. At breakneck speed, each player skitters above the quickly paced chord changes. Chick Corea gets two solo turns – one on piano, the other on mini-moog. Despite the electric nature of the tune, Clarke plays acoustic bass. The quartet is killing on this number, and you can bet that Coltrane knows it and appreciates it.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1970s jazz · fusion · guitar

Steve Reich: Piano Phase (1967)

In 1967, when Steve Reich composed Piano Phase, he was working primarily with minimalist sound collages created by means of tape loops and splices. Often no music, in the traditional sense, was employed in these works, with the manipulation of taped spoken language creating the building blocks of his throbbing, repetitive soundscapes.

Piano Phase is a meeting point between these early efforts and the composer's later instrumental works. The piece was conceived originally as a juxtaposition of two piano parts, which start by playing repetitive phrases in synch but gradually fall out of phase. Eventually the parts come back into alignment, and the performers are again playing in unison.

Reich found that it was possible for musicians to perform this work live, perhaps lacking the exact precision that tape manipulation allowed, but with a close enough approximation. From the perspective of the musicians, the process was surprisingly similar to jazz performance. True, the music was built on notation rather than improvisation; but the notated music was quite simple, while the challenge of performance was to listen intensely to the other musician and adapt rhythmically to create the intended displacement of the two parts. Few classical compositions put a higher premium on total absorption into playing off the "rest of the band" (so to speak). The work also conveys a modal flavor that invariably reminds us of the turbulent non-classical musical scene, circa 1967. No, my dear jazz cats, it's not A Love Supreme . . . but this music is a reaction to many of the same stimuli that fed into the work of Coltrane, Miles and others during this era.

Reich's greatest music was still ahead of him. Even so, Piano Phase reveals the composer's early preoccupation with the interaction between repetition and gradual changes in texture that would inform his Music for 18 Musicians and other mature works. Even more important, Reich showed that experimentation in composition could be sound-driven rather than ideology-driven. In time, a lot of theoretical baggage would be dragged into the debates over minimalism. But these early works captivate because of a child-like sense of playfulness that was a much needed tonic during a period in which the composition of classical music was gradually becoming the pursuit of academics holding (or seeking) tenured positions in elite institutions.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: minimalism · piano

Sean O'Bryan Smith: Tapestry

Some music comes perilously close to crossing the Smooth Jazz line (pardon me while I gag). My first quick impressions of this CD were leading me toward that awful boundary. This reviewer would rather cut off his foot than step into that listening territory. But a few seconds of patience proved quite rewarding. This is not Smooth Jazz (pardon me while I gag) in any way, shape or form. It is full of risk and virtuosity. Smith is a top-notch composer and an even better bassist.

"Tapestry" is an ambitious amalgam of African nature sounds, Arabian scales and fusion rave-ups. Outside the Arabic nature of the main theme, the music sounds very much like what Béla Fleck and the Flecktones might without Béla Fleck. Smith's bass talents are instantly evidenced. He does sound like the Flecktones' Victor Wooten at times. The textured keyboards throughout are also very impressive. Guitarist Rich Eckhardt submits a fusion solo in keeping with the genre's promise.

Smith's composing and playing also remind me of bassist Mark Egan and his work with the under-praised fusion band Elements – though Smith throws in many more ethnic elements. "Tapestry," both title tune and album, contains strong melodies and is expertly performed. When you open the jar the top surface may be smooth. But as soon as you take a spoonful, you realize it is chunky style.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · fusion

Pascal Bokar: When Lights Are Low

For over 20 years, Senegalese (now USA-transplanted) guitarist Pascal Bokar has been melding African traditional dance music with jazz. Along the way he has played with such jazz titans as Dizzy Gillespie, Roy Haynes and Donald Byrd. He has been releasing records of his own for over a decade.

Bokar's interesting and pleasing interpretation of the Benny Carter-penned "When Lights Are Low" is an exception among the bebop-inflected standards, permeated with an abundance of African rhythms and occasional vocalese, that comprise Savanna Jazz Club. Bokar is a fine jazz guitarist more than capable of sustaining absorbing straight-ahead or bebop lines that stand up against the quality of the best players. But while the "African-ness" is at a lower ebb than on most of the other cuts, this track retains a distinct and unusual African character thanks to Bokar's unique style of occasionally striking muted strings in a melodic yet percussive manner. It almost sounds as if he is playing the kalimba, an African percussion instrument. He uses this style to great success in establishing the tune's opening theme. According to the liner notes, Bokar calls this style "balafonics." Whatever it is called, it is cool to listen to.

Bailey, Greensill and Williams ably assist Bokar in taking this sing-songy number into an impressive blues realm before returning to the uplifting kalimba-sounding introduction for its coda. A fun time has been had by all.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz · guitar · senegal · when lights are low

Reptet: Danger Notes

What are they putting in the coffee up in Seattle? Chicken or Beef? is one of the craziest jazz albums I've ever heard. In 2006, Earshot Jazz gave the Reptet its award for "Best Outside Jazz Group," and this 2008 release is certainly "outside jazz." Half of the tunes are outside any genre I am familiar with. They are part jazz, part classical, part serious, part parody, part free jazz, part virtuosity – and wholly entertaining. Think Frank Zappa at his wackiest getting together with Stan Kenton to beat up Spike Jones. The album's first half is actually the band playing as straight ahead as you will get from this aggregation. After that, the vocals and craziness begin. The album's title tune and most unusual cut doesn’t come close to jazz, so I cannot review it here. But it's impressively bizarre stuff.

Chicken or Beef? opens with the horn-heavy, tightly played chaos of "Danger Notes." The rhythm is jam-band in nature. The solos tend to lean toward the free school. What little texture exists is reserved for the bassist and other string players. But no sooner have I written those words than the band is off on another exploration, and the open spaces are gone. The tune's midsection is more thoughtful. It soon gives way to a heavily syncopated…and then…next… I give up! There are too many stylistic changes to keep track of. But, whoa! It ends just like that. Cool.

Like the other first-half tunes, "Danger Notes" is a well-played trick to totally unprepare you for the lovable nonsense that will be slapping you across the face in a few minutes. I doubt that even my warning will soften the blow. Need a little wakeup in life? Put this disc in your player.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 2000s jazz

Billy Cobham: Total Eclipse

After the original Mahavishnu Orchestra disbanded, Billy Cobham seemed undecided as to which direction his music was going to take. Spectrum, recorded while still in Mahavishnu, was a balls-out electric fusion set. The follow-up album, Crosswinds, was a tasty collection of more refined numbers dominated by the jazzier sounds of horns. Luckily for Cobham's fans, both directions were pleasing. The first half of "Total Eclipse" definitely fits the mold created by Crosswinds. Conversely, the second half could have been lifted right off Spectrum. A relaxed and enjoyable melody is established by keyboardist Leviev, the Brecker brothers, and trombonist Ferris. The Breckers and Ferris skillfully play off each other as leader Cobham pounds away in the background. A Michael Brecker sax solo leads to a quiet midsection dominated by a low-key Leviev. John Abercrombie's appearance marks an increase in tension. The tune builds into a screeching electric exclamation point. If the first half of the tune was the sun, the second half was the moon.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1970s jazz · drums · fusion

Alphonse Mouzon: Nitroglycerin

It is not surprising that Alphonse Mouzon's "Nitroglycerin" sounds like Larry Coryell's Eleventh House unit, Billy Cobham's Spectrum band and the Mahavishnu Orchestra all rolled into one. Mouzon was Eleventh House's drummer. Tommy Bolin was the wunderkind guitarist for Cobham and a great admirer of Coryell and John McLaughlin. Bolin almost mimics his Spectrum performance in the introductory section, weird special effects and all. He makes his guitar-player admiration clear in his first solo by playing a section à la Coryell and by virtually lifting, in tribute, several of McLaughlin's riffs later in the piece. Bolin could play! So could Mouzon. If there were any challengers to Billy Cobham's power fusion drumming crown in those days, it would have been Mouzon, who was just as "heavy" though not as dynamic. "Nitroglycerin" may be somewhat derivative, but it is still a first-class fusion rave-up. Even forgeries can be great works of art and complementary in some ways.

June 21, 2008 · 0 comments

Tags: 1970s jazz · drums · fusion

<