JAZZMEIA HORN - LOVE & LIBERATION (Concord Jazz, 2019)
Personnel - Jazzmeia Horn: vocals; Victor Gould: piano; Ben Williams: bass; Jamison Ross: drums, vocals; Stacy Dillard: tenor saxophone; Josh Evans: trumpet; Sullivan Fortner: piano.
Heavily steeped in straight-ahead jazz, Love & Liberation doesn’t defraud the expectations created with the 2017 debut release A Social Call. Jazzmeia Horn might not sound completely new, but it’s hard to resist to her vocal charms and swinging approach. The opener, “Free Your Mind”, is a blast, but if you think this is an energetic one, then wait for “Searchin”, an uptempo vocal endurance expressed with incredible articulation. Counting on great soloing contributions by trumpeter Josh Evans and saxophonist Stacy Dillard, Jazzmeia conjures up the spirits of Ella Fitzgerald and Duke Ellington (“Out The Window”; “Still Tryin’”), Horace Silver (“When I Say”), and Nina Simone (“No More”), and finishes up with a vocal/bass duet rendition of “I Thought About You”. Brand new standards going your way! [A-]
BRIAN LYNCH BIG BAND - THE OMNI AMERICAN BOOK CLUB (Holistic MusicWorks, 2019)
Personnel - Brian Lynch, Michael Dudley, Jean Caze, Jason Charos, Alec Aldred: trumpet; Tom Kelley, David Leon, Gary Keller, Chris Thompson-Taylor, Mike Brignola: reeds/woodwinds; Dante Luciani, Carter Key, Steven Robinson, John Kricker: trombones; Alex Brown: piano; Lowell Ringel: bass; Boris Kozlov: electric bass; Kyle Swan: drums; Murph Aucamp: percussion; Little Johnny Rivero: percussion + Guests: Dafnis Prieto: drums; Orlando “Maraca” Valle: flute; Donald Harrison: alto sax; Regina Carter: violin; David Liebman: soprano sax; Jim Snidero: alto sax.
American trumpeter/composer/bandleader Brian Lynch, a Grammy award winning artist, has brought a new burning charisma to the Latin jazz genre, raising consciousness through a colorful consolidation of diverse musical cultures. His double-disc big band album, The Omni-American Book Club, was inspired by literature and features noteworthy guests such as drummer Dafnis Prieto, flutist Orlando ‘Maraca’ Valle, violinist Regina Carter, and saxophonists David Liebman, Jim Snidero, and Donald Harrison. The latter completely kills on the smoothly funkified, R&B-flavored “The Struggle Is In Your Name”, where he exchanges heated phrases with the bandleader. Regularly disrupting the swinging rides with Afro-Caribbean passages, Lynch still has time to pay tributes to late saxophonist Blue Mitchell and trumpeter Woody Shaw. One of my favorite pieces is “Africa My Land”, an heroic adventure in six, where the baritone saxophone grooves beyond the lush horn-driven sections. [B+]
TOM PIERSON ORCHESTRA - LAST WORKS (Self Produced, 2019)
Personnel - Blue Lou Marini, Mark Vinci, Shu Enomoto, Neil Johnson, Michael Lutzeier: sax/woodwinds; Dominic Derasse, Mike Ponella, Tim Leopold, Lew Soloff: trumpet; Ben Herrington, Robinson Khoury, Dan Levine, Jeff Nelson: trombone; Tom Pierson: piano; Kanoa Mendenhall: electric bass; Pheeroan AkLaff: drums.
Composer/conductor Tom Pierson, a former protege of Gil Evans, shows all his musical qualities on Last Works, a beautifully arranged double-album, which represents 40 years of jazz composition for large ensemble. Expect majestic crescendos within epic noir ambiences (“Abandoned”), glib incursions on orchestral crossover with samba and funk on the first plan (“Chandra Lower’s Samba”; “Winter’s End”), melancholic reflexions boosted by explosive improvisations (“By The Marty’s Decree”), perplexing environments with inventive avant-garde forays (“Two Becoming 3”), dynamic jazz fantasies with contrapuntal wizardry (“Elipsis”), and fragmented bass grooves turned into continuously running fluxes (“45/8”) as Pheeroan AkLaff’s drumming is showcased. Previously unfamiliar with the work of this master orchestrator, I have to say I got particularly impressed with the emotional intensity revealed on some of the pieces. This is Pierson’s search for beauty. [A-]