Latest releases reviewed
ANDREW HILL Time Lines Blue Note *****
Hill, headlining the Bray Jazz Festival this Bank Holiday weekend, has come up with one of the finest albums of his long career. It's also probably one of the pianist and composer's "free-est", though the term does little justice to the structured, intellectually satisfying yet emotionally accessible music played by here by his working band; Charles Tolliver (trumpet), Greg Tardy (tenor/clarinet/bass clarinet), John Hebert (bass) and the brilliant Eric McPherson (drums). Rhythmically complex, Hill's compositions and the quintet's performances have an oddly persuasive, angular grace, like his piano, with both group and solo piano versions of the elegiac, melancholy, yet celebratory Malachi just two superb examples of the profundity available to this remarkably individual musician and his impact on his colleagues.
Ray Comiskey
BILL HOLMAN The Fabulous Bill Holman Fresh Sound *****
First time on CD for a real rarity: composer, orchestrator and tenor saxophonist Holman's big band leader debut in that multiple role. Writing within the mainstream conventions of swinging big band jazz almost a half-century ago, he brought to it such talented individuality that it still sounds fresh. An outstanding band is packed with the cream of West Coast talent in Holman, Charlie Mariano, Conte Candoli, Herb Geller, Richie Kamuca, Lou Levy and Mel Lewis. But it's the leader's charts, full of ideas and deft use of counterpoint, yet uncluttered and swinging, that give it distinction. There are also 10 tracks by an octet Holman played in, with Geller, Bob Gordon and Don Fagerquist to savour, but the big band performances are something else. www.freshsoundrecords.com
Ray Comiskey
KEITH OXMAN Dues in Progress Capri ****
Superficially, this may seem a band of little known players, with a "name" (trombonist Curtis Fuller) brought in to give them some box office cred. But's much better than that. Saxophonist and composer Oxman's top level experience includes a long stint with Buddy Rich, and his richly detailed charts (with one each by Fuller and trumpeter Marcus Hampton) for the tenor/trumpet/trombone and rhythm section sextet are inventive, yet clear and swinging. They're also crisply and ebulliently played, with pianist Chip Stephens a fine soloist with an orchestral sense of structure; regular trumpeter Al Hood highly competent; Fuller contributing a couple of warm solos; and Oxman, an excellent tenor stylistically somewhere between Coltrane and Stitt, with plenty to say and saying it well.www.caprirecords.com
Ray Comiskey
