Label: HighNote Records, 2019
Personnel - Tom Harrell: trumpet; Mark Turner: tenor sax; Charles Altura: guitar; Ben Street: bass; Johnathan Blake: drums.
Ace trumpeter Tom Harrell’s new recording, Infinity, brims with uncomplicated structures, harmonic sophistication, nervy improvisations, and a mix of kaleidoscopic hard-bop and straight ahead post-bop influences. The album comprises ten Harrell compositions subjected to wonderful musical treatments by a hot quintet that includes Mark Turner on tenor sax, Charles Altura on guitar, Ben Street on bass, and Johnathan Blake on drums.
All these musicians have recorded with the trumpet player before and, on this particular album, their skills stand out in clean-cut narratives such as “The Fast”, which is pinned down by a hooky rocking vamp in seven, and “Dublin”, charmingly introduced by acoustic guitar before a 4/4 modal jazz is installed. Both pieces feature Harrell and Turner as soloists, with Altura and Blake contributing incisive improvisational work on the former composition. Turner is simply genial, shaping conversational phrases with momentary out-of-focus incursions, while Harrell puts a lot of sensitivity in melodic articulations surrounded by the finest light.
If the easy-listening “Folk Song” exhibits a gentle backbeat that produces cool and sophistication vibes, the time-shifting “Hope” offers percussive rattles and shakes, parallel melodies, rarefied reverb-drenched guitar, and an unforeseen bolero-ish routine that, in a flash, morphs into a vibrantly swinging locomotion. This is a clinical demonstration of Harrell’s compositional facility and inventiveness.
Both “Coronation” and “Ground” exude happy thoughts. However, whereas the former feels blatantly popish, the latter has the restless up-and-down trajectories of the bass instilling the spirit of disco-funk.
Immediately upon finishing “Duet”, a short trumpet-saxophone extravagance, Harrell brings the album to a close with the sweeping, busy, and vibrant post-bop of “Taurus”, whose mutable dynamics pack a punch.
The trumpeter is an intelligent, exceptionally melodic sculptor who channels discipline and freedom to the right places for the most breathtaking effect. He is outstanding here, and so are his bandmates.
Grade A
Favorite Tracks:
01 - The Fast ► 02 - Dublin ► 10 - Taurus