This box of 4 CDs was made from broadcast air checks that captured Coltrane, Dolphy and company in a five-day run of concerts that took them to Paris, Copenhagen, Helsinki and Stockholm. They played many of the pieces several nights in a row, but their approaches were so varied, there is no likelihood that listeners open to the band\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s innovations will be bored by repetition. Among the performances are two renditions of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Naima,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d three of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Blue Train,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d four of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Impressions\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and six of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153My Favorite Things\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201deach with power and chance-taking that shocked many listeners in the early 1960s who were not ready for Coltrane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s departures. The music heartened others who cheered his opening of new pathways in jazz. It made heavy demands on listeners and offered commensurate rewards.<\/p>\n Considering that the broadcasts were recorded off the air, sound quality is acceptable to good. Album notes by the British saxophonist Simon Spillett place in perspective Coltrane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s transition from the forward edge of the mainstream into the avant-garde and, not so incidentally, enormous popularity.<\/p>\n Steve Kuhn<\/strong> Trio, Wisteria<\/em><\/a> (ECM)<\/p>\n Soon after Steve Kuhn was graduated from Harvard, he was the original We played six nights a week, and the place was always packed. It was just incredible the way people would rise during one of Coltrane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s solos, as if they were in a church revival meeting. I was just finding my way, trying different things \u00e2\u20ac\u201c laying out sometimes while he improvised, comping other times. Coltrane was only in his mid-30s, but he might as well have been a million years older than I was, he was on such another level.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Kuhn found his way. At 21, he had already been a member of Kenny Dorham\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s quintet. After Coltrane, he played with Stan Getz then with Charles Lloyd, Art Farmer and Art Blakey. Following a few years in Sweden, he returned to the United States and has led his own groups since. His relationship with bassist Steve Swallow goes back to 1960, when the two were both new to New York. With drummer Joey Baron, they make a trio of surpassing sensitivity undergirded by rhythmic strength. As Swallow observed in a recent conversation, Kuhn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s keyboard touch allows him to give the impression that he is pulling or coaxing the notes from the instrument rather than striking a key that makes a hammer hit a string. The title ballad, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Wisteria,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by Farmer, is a perfect demonstration of Kuhn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ability to give the piano tonal personality.<\/p>\n In \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Chalet,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d one of six Kuhn compositions in the album, Baron creates melody in his drum solo, as he does in his breaks in Swallow\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s amiable \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Good Lookin\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Rookie.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Yet, time keeping is his true specialty, and throughout the CD he does it incorporating accents and asides that enhance the swing, rather than distract from it. Swallow abandoned his acoustic bass decades ago to concentrate on the electric bass guitar. In the ensembles his walking lines retain the thrust, tonal quality and power that many listeners recall in his acoustic work. His solos often have characteristics of the guitar, notably so in the high register, as in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Morning Dew.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d That Kuhn piece contains a passage of his piano harmonies richer than it might seem reasonable to expect from only two hands. It is one of many rewards that this album yields to close listeners.<\/p>\n Paul Hemmings<\/strong>, The Blues and the Abstract Uke<\/em><\/a> (Leading Tone)<\/p>\n Danilo P\u00c3\u00a9rez<\/strong>, John Patitucci<\/strong>, Brian Blade<\/strong>, Children Of The Light<\/a><\/em> (Mack Avenue)<\/p>\n![\"So](\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/So-Many-Things.jpg\")
<\/a>Not long after the seminal tenor and soprano saxophonist settled on the lineup of players in his quartet, he took them on a European tour that included France and Scandinavia. For a short period, Coltrane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s band also included the alto saxophonist, flutist and bass clarinetist Eric Dolphy, who in certain respects was even more idiosyncratic than Coltrane. Supported by pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Reggie Workman and drummer Elvin Jones, Coltrane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s and Dolphy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s explosive creativity announced\u00e2\u20ac\u201dif by the early sixties there was any doubt\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthat the corner had been turned from the orthodoxies of bebop. Ornette Coleman\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s free jazz had affected both of them, but the individualism of Coltrane’s musicians and their collective impact was so powerful that his band gave birth to a new strain in modern jazz. Coltrane, Tyner and Jones quickly became universal role models for players of their instruments.<\/p>\n![\"Wisteria\"](\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Wisteria.jpg\")
<\/a> pianist in Coltrane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s quartet. They appeared for eight weeks in 1960 at the Jazz Gallery in New York. Kuhn has written about that time,<\/p>\n![\"Hemmings\"](\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Hemmings.jpg\")
<\/a>The title alludes to a classic 1961 Oliver Nelson album, and the blues is at the heart of Hemmings\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 CD. He fingerpicks the ukelele like a guitar, makes use of his thumb and evokes the spirit of Wes Montgomery in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153West Coast Blues.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He pays tribute to Jim Hall in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Careful\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and his own minor blues, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Study Hall.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Hemmings compensates for the instrument\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s short sonic range with voicings as full as four strings can deliver. The pieces include departures from standard blues forms, Johnny Cash\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Folson Prison Blues\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (11 bars) and Hall\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Careful\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (16 bars). Hemmings\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 arrangements make resourceful use of Curtis Fowlkes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 trombone, Greg Tardy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s tenor saxophone, Gaku Takahashi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bass and Rudy Royston\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s drums. Fowlkes and Tardy are impressive in the generous solo time Hemmings allots them. The results are more soulful than anything you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re likely to hear from a ukelele on the beach at Waikiki.<\/p>\n
![\"Perez,](\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Perez-Patitucci-Blade.jpg\")
<\/a> one\u00e2\u20ac\u201dWayne Shorter. Pianist P\u00c3\u00a9rez, bassist Patitucci and drummer Blade have been the saxophonist\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s rhythm section for 15 years and have absorbed his music so deeply that the presence of his spirit may be implied. Their close listening and reactions to one another make them a compelling trio. Titles of the many of the 11 compositions reflect the album\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s theme, manifestations of light. They include Patitucci\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Moonlight On Congo Square,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d P\u00c3\u00a9rez\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Light Echo\u00e2\u20ac\u009d paired with Shorter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Dolores,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and his \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Luz Del Alma.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d On \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Lumen,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d using two keyboards P\u00c3\u00a9rez incorporates the Latin dance impulse that guides much of his music, in this case the Afro-Cuban strain. With its brevity and air of contemplation, Blade\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Within Everything\u00e2\u20ac\u009d seems to sum up what Shorter calls in a brief album note the group\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sense of mission\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6to point to places unknown or places yet to be.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"