We have been meaning to call to your attention to an instance in which–unlike, say, the trade talks between the US and China–international cooperation works beautifully. The  trumpeter featured on this album is Randy Brecker, one of the leading American players of the Instrument for more than fifty years. He performs with Finland’s UMO Jazz Orchestra, led by the distinguished arranger and composer Mats Holmquist, who is Swedish. The CD presents three well-known pieces composed by the American pianist Chick Corea. They are “Windows,” “Crystal Silence” and “Humpty Dumpty,” all arranged by Holmquist. The Finnish composer’s own works include “One Million Circumstances,” in which he creates sections that reflect influences reaching from modern classical music back to counterpoint that suggests J.S. Bach. Brecker comes out blazing in his “Circumstances” solo and maintains his initial  energy in every piece on the album, and achieves dramatic depth in his flugelhorn feature on Ray Evans’ and Jay Livingston’s 1950s ballad “Never Let Me Go.” Holmquist’s “My Stella” celebrates the birth of his daughter and based on-what else?-“Stella By Starlight.” In his notes, Holmquist refers to “All My Things” as a conceptual piece, meaning that its harmonic structure will remind you of Jerome Kern’s “All The Things You Are,” one of the most honored songs of the twentieth century, if borrowing chord progressions can be considered an honor. In this case, it certainly can be.

Randy Brecker is at the top of his game on this album, impressively supported and complemented by Mats Holmquist and the UMO Orchestra.

 

We continue our survey of albums, mostly recent, all part of the unceasing Rifftides effort to make you aware of music that the RT staff deems worth hearing. As I write, I glance down occasionally at the four stacks of new releases dropped off over the past couple of weeks by the mailman, FedEx, UPS and, once in a while, delivery services based in exotic places like Sweden, Brazil and Japan. Paying concentrated attention to all of the new arrivals is out of the question. Some, however, simply cannot be passed over. Here is one of those.

Ralph Peterson & The Messenger Legacy: Legacy Alive (Onyx)

Peterson’s two-disc album is a tribute to Art Blakey, the drummer who inspired him when he was a New Jersey teenager about to turn professional. In his liner notes, Russ Musto calls the Jazz Messengers, “arguably the greatest small group in the history of jazz.”  Those who would argue with Musto’s argument might invoke Louis Armstrong’s Hot Five, The Benny Goodman Trio, Charlie Parker with Dizzy Gillespie, and the Art Tatum Trio, among other major groups of previous decades. Assessing degrees of greatness is always a chancy business.

While still in college, Peterson worked with Sonny Stitt, Curtis Fuller, Nat Adderley and other major artists of the post-bop era.  He has long followed Blakey’s dedication to seeking out the most promising younger players available. Those who join him in this collection are youngish but among the most experienced of their generation. They are saxophonists Bill Pierce and Bobby Watson, trumpeter Brian Lynch, bassist Essiet Essiet and pianist Geoffrey Keezer. At one time or another, all worked with Blakey in the Messengers. Peterson has the added distinction of having been chosen by Blakey to be the second drummer in a Blakey big band, working on several occasions with the maestro during Blakey’s final years. His playing here reminds this listener that, in addition to the power he sometimes takes to thunderous levels, Peterson makes exquisite use of quietness and, now and then, the eloquence of silence. Essiet, Keezer and the horn players all have splendid solos, with Lynch’s trumpet frequently soaring above the ensemble, his tone remarkably full even while it penetrates the atmosphere. The music was handsomely recorded during two evenings at the Side Door Jazz Club in Old Lyme, Connecticut.

Sometimes, with all of that Incoming album traffic, things get lost or misplaced. Here is one that should not have. It is a joy
to become reaquainted with this treasure. Even better news; a bit of research discloses that it is still available. The artist is Guido Basso, a great Canadian trumpeter and flugelhorn player. You may know of him through his extensive work over many years with Rob McConnell’s Boss Brass. Prolific as a musician in Montreal, then Toronto, Basso was in demand as a quick study in studio work and, more important, for his tonal qualities and creativity, which are beautifully represented in Lost In The Stars, an album from 2003. In addition to Basso’s flugelhorn playing, there is splendid work by pianist Lorraine Desmarais, bassist Michel Donato and drummer Paul Brochu, with an orchestra conducted by yet another gifted Canadian, saxophonist Phil Dwyer. To hear the Kurt Weill title tune from Basso’s Lost In The Stars…

 

Stephans, Liebman, Copland, Gress: Quartette Oblique (Sunnyside)

Attempting the impossible, Rifftides once again tries to catch up. We all know that is impossible because record companies refuse to accept that jazz is dead; they keep releasing new music. It took too long for me to mention this superb quartet album, which has been out for a year or so. From Dave Liebman’s falling-away tenor saxophone insinuations that introduce Wayne Shorter’s “Nardis” through the concluding exploration of Miles Davis’s “So What” and “All Blues.” Liebman, drummer Michael Stephans, pianist Marc Copland and bassist Drew Gress meld in intriguing versions not only of the two modern classics by Shorter and Davis but also the Schwartz & Deitz Standard “You And The Night And The Music,” Duke Ellington’s “In A Sentimental Mood,” and bassist Gress’s composition “Vesper.” Copland’s harmonic sensivity and keyboard touch are superb in the Gress piece. Liebman’s capacious tenor sax sound and conception match the relaxation and assurance in Gress’s writing and soloing. Liebman maintains the high standard he has set for himself over the past year or two as he excels not only in his own projects but in a series of guest appearances on other artists’ albums. Quartette Oblique was recorded before a responsive audience at the venerable Deers Head Inn in the Pennsylvania Mountains. It wears well, and is likely to through many hearings.

Recent Listening: Jason Palmer, Rhyme and Reason (GiantStepArts)

In his early work with saxophonists Noah Preminger and Grace Kelly and many others, trumpeter Jason Palmer made it clear with his substantial tone, wide range and flexibility that he had the potential to become one of the new century’s outstanding trumpeters. His debut on producer and photographer Jimmy Katz’s GiantStepArts label, is the latest proof that Palmer has attained that distinction—and then some. Joined by the veteran tenor saxophonist Mark Turner and supported by bassist Matt Brewer and drummer Kendrick Scott, Palmer further establishes that he is also a composer of originality and imagination. So effective are Turner, Palmer and Brewer in the chords department, it is possible a listener will take a few minutes to realize that there is no instrument providing harmonic support. That function is in the interaction among the horns and the bassist, with plenty of rhythmic encouragement from Scott’s urgencies at the drums.

Beautifully engineered and mixed, the album’s sound places Brewer where a bass belongs in this kind of band, in the middle providing stability and a home port for the ear. In the liner notes, Palmer’s track-by-track references to his compositions are occasionally nearly obliterated by white lettering on light backgrounds, but held under a strong lamp they can be read, and they give the listener information about inspirations and relationships. It is valuable, for example, to learn that Palmer’s “Waltz For Diana” has connections to Bill Evans’s “Waltz For Debbie,” Kurt Roswenwinkel’s “Dream Of The Old” and the Diana of ancient mythology. His “Kalispel Bay” is almost certainly the only jazz composition ever inspired by a visit to Priest Lake, Idaho. In addition to the trumpet virtues mentioned in the opening line above, Palmer’s playing here encompasses a spaciousness that seems based in a refusal to let ideas crowd one another. That is a welcome attribute in an era when note-packing often seems the order of the day.