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Duke Ellington, BigBands Live (Jazz Haus)

Watching the Ellington band perform in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, the listener was likely to be struck by the contrast between the sidemens’ laconic demeanor and—on a good night—the joy of their performances. March 6, 1967 was a good night at the Liederhalle in Stuttgart, Germany. Beautifully recorded, the concert combines famous and barely known pieces. Good humor reigns in the ensemble performances, passion in the solos. Trumpet star Cootie Williams of the great 1940–‘41 band, back in the fold, soars, slides and growls through “Tutti for Cootie” and “The Shepherd.” Harry Carney’s baritone saxophone solo on “La Plus Belle Africaine” is a highlight. There is impressive work by Paul Gonsalves, Russell Procope, bassist John Lamb and Ellington. Alto saxophonist Johnny Hodges is magnificent on Billy Strayhorn’s “Blood Count,” for unexplained reasons retitled “Freakish Lights.” This is a jewel in the impressive Jazz Haus catalog of live recordings.

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Keith Jarrett, Charlie Haden, Last Dance (ECM)

Following Haden’s death last Friday, this duet recording of the bassist with his former boss takes on poignancy even beyond the empathy that he and the pianist develop in nine standard songs. The exceptions to ballad tempos are a brisk bop excursion through Bud Powell’s “Dance of the Infidels,” and “Everything Happens to Me” at the pace of a leisurely walk. The session also produced Jasmine, released in 2010. It took place shortly before Haden’s post-polio syndrome left him frequently unable to play. As usual, Haden invests his tone and his note choices with emotion that elevates his work. Jarrett rarely records in a duo format. The final track alone, “Goodbye,” with its compelling Haden bass lines and lovely solo, is reason for gratitude that Jarrett made an exception for his old friend.

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Denny Zeitlin, Stairway To The Stars (Sunnyside)

Stairway To The Stars comes from the same engagement as Zeitlin’s Trio In Concert, released in 2009. If anything, the sequel finds the pianist even more intimately engaged with the veteran bassist Buster Williams and the young drummer Matt Wilson. When this was recorded in 2001 at the Jazz Bakery in Los Angeles, Wilson’s drive, rhythmic inventiveness and humor were just becoming widely known. He and Williams give Zeitlin sensitive support on ballads including the title tune, “You Don’t Know What Love Is” and “Spring is Here.” They light a fire under Zeitlin for a blisteringly fast treatment of “Oleo,” the piece that brought him early recognition in his debut recording with flutist Jeremy Steig in 1963. Among the highlights in the new album: Zeitlin’s audacious chromaticisms in Wayne Shorter’s “Deluge.”

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Theo Croker, Afro Physicist (Okeh)
Much of the verbiage about the elimination of borders between musical categories is the work of publicists. It is marketable to be, or claim to be, cross-genre. However, in the case of Croker, an impressive 28-year-old trumpeter, his new album substantiates the claim. It touches on hip-hop, R&B, bebop and 1970s soul, but at its core his playing extends the mainstream jazz tradition of which his grandfather, the great trumpeter Doc Cheatham, was a vital part. Croker announces his credentials in a short unaccompanied piece. Then, supported by bright young contemporaries in various instrumental combinations, he plays gorgeously through 12 tracks and 12 distinct moods. Dee Dee Bridgewater encouraged Croker, produced his album and sings on three pieces, including a compelling version of Buddy Johnson’s R&B classic “Save Your Love For Me.”

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Sonny Rollins, Road Shows Volume 3 (Okeh)
Thriving on the energy he gets back from his listeners, Rollins can electrify them. In the third volume of his Road Show series the formidable tenor saxophonist sends currents through audiences in Japan, the United States and four places in France. The solitary listener to the recording may find himself joining in the ovations for Rollins’s audacity, humor and explosions of creativity. From 2001 to 2012, his accompanists vary, although the stalwart bassist Bob Cranshaw is a constant and trombonist Clifton Anderson is on most tracks. Alone with his imagination on “Solo Sony,” Rollins quotes dozens of tunes, stitching disparate snatches of melody together into a new creation. “Why Was I Born?” runs over 23 minutes and doesn’t contain a boring second. It’s been years since I’ve had this much fun listening to a record.

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Orrin Evans’ Captain Black Big Band, Mother’s Touch (Posi-Tone)

Regulars at the uptown New York club Smoke relish not only the musicianship but also the slap-dash camaraderie that pianist Orrin Evans’ big band exhibits during performances. Without the fun and games, the band is just as compelling in this studio recording. Evans’ “In My Soul,” slow and slinky with gospel overtones, sets the high standard that his contingent of bright youngsters and experienced veterans maintains throughout. Evans, tenor saxophonist Marcus Strickland, trombonist Conrad Herwig and trumpeter Tatum Greenblatt are among the excellent soloists. Greenblatt and saxophonist Stacy Dillard shine on Wayne Shorter’s “Water Babies.” Following Evans’ ethereal piano in “Dita,” lead alto saxophonist Todd Bashore solos with neo-Johnny Hodges sensibility. The two short parts of “Mother’s Touch” are built on a seven-note phrase in a head arrangement by this inventive band.

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Artt Frank, Chet Baker: The Missing Years, A Memoir

Frank’s personalized story is a valuable adjunct to James Gavin’s dark biography of Baker, Matthew Ruddick’s balanced bio and Jeroen de Valk’s exploration of the trumpeter’s music making. In an unpolished, conversational narrative, the drummer tells of his long friendship with the trumpeter and of sharing exhilarating high points and depressing low points in Baker’s life. In more than one sense, Frank was instrumental in Baker’s late-1960s comeback. He arranged for an engagement that tested whether Baker could still play following a brutal beating, and he was the drummer on the gig. His closeness to Baker gave Frank opportunities to observe him as a husband and father, the tribulations of his drug addiction and the fierce determination that underlay the fragmented pattern of Baker’s existence. Full disclosure: I wrote a blurb for the book jacket.

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Dick Titterington & The Three Trumpet Band, Three Trumpets, No Waiting (Heavywood)

Trumpet stars of the Portland jazz scene, Dick Titterington, Paul Mazzio and Thomas Barber blend and challenge one another. From the outset, the leader sets a high standard with the range, technical skill and crafty ideas of his extended improvisation on Michael Brecker’s “African Skies.” Mazzio’s reflective solo and Barber’s brief exercise in wit on John Scofield’s “Gil B643” are highlights. The harmonic textures of Titterington’s writing for the ensemble are effective throughout, notably so in his “Threnody For Willie” and Mike Stern’s “Upside Downside.” Greg Goebel, a rising piano star, owns the Stern piece with an imaginative Fender Rhodes solo. Bassist Andrea Niemiec and drummer Jason Palmer complete the energetic rhythm section. Three-trumpet albums are rare. It has been 57 years since the Donald Byrd-Art Farmer-Idrees Sulieman Three Trumpets. Titterington’s album is a worthy successor.

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Jessica Williams, With Love (Origin)

This masterpiece of quiet reflection is the pianist’s first recording since surgery repaired spinal deterioration that kept her out of action for more than two years. With exquisite slowness, she explores eight standard ballads and her composition “Paradise of Love.” In her notes, Williams writes, “I wanted to make an album that while still rooted in jazz, relied less on technique and improvisation and more on emotive depth, melodic purity and space.” Her approach to “My Foolish Heart,” “Summertime,” “But Beautiful,” “When I Fall in Love” and “I Fall in Love Too Easily” and the others accomplishes that goal. Largely rubato, she lingers over phrases, nowhere more movingly than in “It Might As Well Be Spring.” For all the melodic purity, Williams’s harmonic originality is on full display.

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Armen Donelian, Sayat-Nova: Songs Of My Ancestors (Sunnyside)

Alone and with a trio, Donelian plays works that inform his sense of who he is and confirm that great music is timeless and universal. The music of the Armenian composer Sayat-Nova (1712-1795) is redolent of Middle Eastern values, but as we become accustomed to musical idioms of the world melding, it would sound astonishingly modern even without the jazz and classical sensibilities that Donelian applies to it. Some of the solo pieces, notably “Without You, What Will I Do?” could have been written last week. Others prefigure Chopin. The trio performance of the minor “My Sweet Harp” with bassist Dave Clark and drummer George Schuller has profundity and sadness that Leos Janáček refined a century later. This two-CD album is certain to be regarded as one of 2014’s best. The invaluable 15-page booklet that can be downloaded from the CD should have been included in the package.

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Alan Broadbent And NDR Big Band, America The Beautiful (Jan Matthies Records)

Broadbent, a New Zealander who migrated to The United States, writes a tribute to his adopted land and records it with a German band. The shimmering complexity of his arrangement of Samuel A. Ward’s 1892 title tune portrays his affection for the country. That track and his eight other pieces reconfirm Broadbent’s stature among jazz composers and arrangers. His original works include what he calls a “study” on the Gillespie-Parker intro to “All The Things You Are,” an evocation of Billy Strayhorn, homages to his mentor Woody Herman and to pianist Sonny Clark, a fantasy on New Zealand and a reexamination of “Love in Silent Amber,” which Broadbent wrote for Herman when he was 23. His piano playing and the work of the NDR band and its soloists are magnificent.

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George Cables, Icons and Influences (High Note)

After nearly 50 years during which he himself has become a piano icon and influence, Cables offers a dozen pieces that have affected his approach. They are by, about, or reflect the inspiration of an eclectic assortment of musicians including Duke Ellington, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Dave Brubeck, Nat Cole, Dexter Gordon and Tony Bennett. He begins with new compositions in memory of the recently departed pianists Cedar Walton and Mulgrew Miller, then plays “Happiness,” a 1965 piece from the beginning of his own recording career. However effective and touching the tributes, Cables’ depth and originality emerge as the main impression of this beautifully wrought trio album. Bassist Dezron Douglas and drummer Victor Lewis are Cables’ strong supporters. One of many high points: a wry harmonic twist to end “The Duke” that would have brought a smile to Brubeck, the wry harmonic twister who wrote it.

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The slow acceptance of women as jazz artists is a microcosm of the larger struggle for equality of females in society. For decades, women jazz performers were largely relegated to ghettos known as all-girl bands. Today, increasing numbers of gifted women jazz artists are accepted on an equal footing with men. The Girls In The Band, created with skill, sensitivity and documentary professionalism, is the story of the women who opened the way. There were, and are, many more of them than the handful who became household names. This moving film produced by Judy Chaikin should be experienced by anyone concerned with music—and with human progress. It is winning awards all over the place, and no wonder. It is not yet on DVD. To see a clip, and for information about screenings, go here.

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The Keynote Jazz Collection 1941-1947 (Fresh Sound)

The Keynote records produced by Harry Lim trace jazz as it evolved from traditional through swing and bebop. The 11 CDs in the set begin in New Orleans with George Hartman’s trad band. By the time they end, the listener has spent time with a wide cross section of the decade’s best musicians, including Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Lennie Tristano, Red Rodney, Dinah Washington, Shorty Rogers, Sid Catlett, Dodo Marmarosa and dozens of others. Among the rarities: a 1945 Horace Henderson octet session and the Dave Lambert-Buddy Stewart bop vocalese recordings. The 124-page book with the discography and the story of Keynote is packed with photos. At last, we have all of the invaluable Keynote sides in a comprehensive, organized, beautifully produced box set. This is a major jazz event.

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Cava Menzies/Nick Phillips, Moment To Moment (NPM)

Although Pianist Menzies and trumpeter Phillips make judicious embellishments in the ballads of this enchanting collection, their operating principle seems to be adoration of the melody. The tempos are slow, the harmonies rich, bassist Jeff Chambers and drummer Jaz Sawyer finely tuned to the leaders’ wave length. The quartet illuminates standards including “The Peacocks,” For All We Know,” “You Don’t Know What Love Is,” “Speak Low” and Kenny Barron’s “Phantoms.” Phillips’ C-minor musings on his composition “You” and Menzies’ touch and folkish harmonies on her “Mal’s Moon” are highlights, far from the only ones. By day, she’s a music teacher. He’s an executive at Concord Music. The quality of this collection makes it unlikely that it will be their last one.

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Bill Kirchner, Lifeline (Jazzheads)

In 2008, I initiated an occasional series called Medium But Well Done. It highlights the accomplishments of groups bigger than combos but smaller than big bands. Introducing it, I wrote, “Six to eleven pieces allow arrangers freedom that the conventions and sheer size of sixteen-piece bands tend to limit.” There is no better recent illustration of that proposition than this release by Bill Kirchner’s Nonet. His arrangements of pieces by composers including Wayne Shorter, Cole Porter, Denny Zeitlin and Kirchner himself show that a skilled writer using what some might consider a limited palette can achieve excitement, expansiveness and an impressive range of tonal colors. His adventurous three-part “Lifeline Suite” is an important contribution to the literature of mid-sized bands.

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Anton Schwartz, Flash Mob (AntonJazz)

The front-line blend of the leader’s tenor saxophone and Dominic Farinacci’s trumpet may recall Hank Mobley and Kenny Dorham, but if this is hard bop, its 21st century attitude is Schwartz’s own. His compositions have a distinctive quality that incorporates disparate harmonies and rhythms. “Pangur Ban” could be a down home Irish reel, if there is such a thing. “Swamp Thang” has overtones suggesting that the swamp in question is on Georgia or southern Florida tribal land. Thelonious Monk’s and Kenny Clarke’s “Epistrophy” and Dorham’s “La Mesha” are interesting for Schwartz’s special treatments, but his 10 originals hold their own in that distinguished company. He and Farinacci play beautifully throughout. Pianist Taylor Eigsti, bassist John Shiflett and drummer Lorca Hart are an impressive rhythm team.