Archives for May 29, 2006

It is a truth so commonplace that it has become a cliché: You needn’t be American to be a first-rate jazz musician. The United States of America brought together and mixed the elements that made jazz. But it is not, after all, something in the water, the genes or the sociology of The United States that makes good jazz improvisers. Rather, it is talent, inspiration, hard work and experience–the combination that creates artists in any field. Some black musicians used to say of white ones, “They’re stealing our music.” Some American musicians used to say that of non-Americans. America gave jazz to the world. To borrow Dizzy Gillespie’s wonderful phrase, you can’t steal a gift.
Hardly a week goes by when the mail or the express truck does not bring at least one reminder that the gift is coming back, generously expanded, from all regions of the planet. I have yet to hear a jazz CD from Mongolia or Yemen, but when one shows up, I won’t be greatly surprised. Here is a list of a few recent arrivals that I have liked, with brief comments. Some of these albums will be hard to find. The links may help.
Roberto Magris Europlane, Check In (Soul Note). Forthright modern mainstream music from Magris, an Italian pianist. His quintet includes his countryman Gabriele Centis on drums, saxophonists Tony Lakatos (Hungary) and Michael Erian (Austria) and the impressive Czech bassist Robert Balzar.
Yaron Herman, Variations (Laborie). Herman is a young Israeli living in Paris. I might quibble with his harmonies on “Summertime,” but he takes stimulating solo piano flights on a couple of Fauré pieces, a rarity by Clare Fischer and several originals.
Flip Philipp-Ed Partyka, Something Wrong With You? (FF Records). The Austrian vibraharpist Philipp and American trombonist Partyka, superb players and writers, lead a ten-piece band populated mostly by Germans. Their music draws on the Birth of the Cool tradition, European avant-gardism and humor.
Hiromi, Spiral (Telarc). This tiny Japanese pianist (last name, Euhara) sometimes channels her formidable technique into new-age meandering. Her electronic keyboard manipulations can curl your teeth. But, as in the title track, she is capable of lyrical creativity.
Eldar, Live at the Blue Note (Sony Classical). The piano prodigy from Kyrgystan (last name, Djangirov), now nineteen, has chops to spare, but the surest sign here of his maturity is his restrained, beguiling Latin ballad playing on “Besame Mucho.”
Fay Claassen, Two Portraits of Chet Baker, (Jazz ‘N Pulz). Two CDs. In the first, the Dutch singer wordlessly replicates Baker’s trumpet in a recreation of the Gerry Mulligan Quartet. Baritone saxophonist Jan Menu plays Mulligan’s role, most impressively. In the second CD, Claassen sings, beautifully, songs that Baker sang. Jan Wessels handles the trumpet solos with a Baker orientation. Hein Van de Geyn is the noteworthy bassist.
Enrico Pieranunzi, Live in Paris (Challenge). Van deGeyn is also the bassist on this two-CD set, joining pianist Pieranunzi, the dean of modern Italian jazz pianists, and drummer Andre Ceccarelli. A stimulating couple of hours of trio music that owes much to Bill Evans.
The Dutch Jazz Orchestra, The Lady Who Swings the Band: Rediscovered Music of Mary Lou Williams (Challenge). “File Under Jazz/Historical,” it says on the back of the CD box. Don’t file at all, is my advice; play daily. Nine of these thirteen pieces by the brilliant composer-arranger have never before been recorded. If you’re not familiar with this sterling big band there is no finer introduction than this gem.
You will find further recommendations in the next exhibit.

Here are more recommended CDs by jazz artists not from the United States.
Gilad Atzmon, Musik: Rearranging the 20th Century (Enja). It is unlikely that Atzmon can separate himself from Israeli-Palestinian politics–or that he wishes to–but this CD is more about music and less about ideologies than, say, his Exile. The context of the album is, I suppose, world music, but it has plenty of Atzmon’s fearsome, lovely, sax and clarinet work. I have heard private recordings of his straight-ahead jazz tenor playing. Why isn’t that on CD?
Watch Out! Svensk Jazzhistoria,Vol. 10 (Caprice). The final box set in Caprice’s monumental survey of jazz in Sweden from its beginnings covers 1965-1969. It has Bengt Hallberg, Rolf Ericson, Monica Zetterlund, dozens of other Swedes, and distinguished visitors like Red Mitchell, George Russell and Don Cherry.
Ed Bickert, Out of the Past (Sackville). This comes from 1976, when guitarist Bickert, bassist Don Thompson and drummer Terry Clarke constituted the rhythm section of what Paul Desmond affectionately called his “Canadian Group.” Issued for the first time, this CD by the trio reaffirms the reasons for Desmond’s affection.
Moutin Reunion Quartet, Red Moon (Sunnyside). It opens with an exhilirating duet on “Le Mer” between French bassist Francois Moutin and his drummer brother Louis. When pianist Baptiste Trotignon and saxophonist Rick Margitza join for the title tune, the energy level–improbably–increases.
David Dorůžka, Hidden Paths (Cube Metier). A young Czech who studied at the Berklee School of Music in Boston and is back in Prague, Dorůžka is an abstractionist who often fragments or floats his lines. He can also dig in, as he does on Monk’s “Evidence.” A guitarist to watch.
Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, The Bass in the Background (Storyville). A compilation of the late bassist in support of and soloing with Bud Powell, Coleman Hawkins, Svend Asmussen, Ben Webster, Zoot Sims and others. And what support. NHOP was a marvel.
NHOP is the bassist on Thad Jones and the Danish Radio Big Band Live at the Montmartre (Storyville). Recorded during a residency in 1978, before Jones moved to Copenhagen, this CD is packed with his extraordinary arrangements. The ensemble playing is superior. There are solos to match it by saxophonist Jesper Thilo, pianist Ole Kock Hansen, trombonist Vincent Nilsson, and trumpeters Allan Borschinsky and Idrees Sulieman. Jones’s only cornet solo–on “Old Folks”–is memorable.
ICP Orchestra, Aan & Uit (ICIP). The bizarre and the beautiful. The irrepressible pianist Misha Mengelberg seems to be the guiding spirit in this project of ten musicians, most of them Dutch, who include the avant garde drummer Han Bennink. Just when you think the hi-jinks are getting out of hand, a gorgeous piece of arranging takes over. Their treatment of Hoagy Carmichael’s barely-known “Barbaric” is a highlight. Now zany, now touching, this is music for the open-minded listener with a sense of adventure and a sense of humor.

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