Word: corea
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...could forgive the obvious bullshit involved if the presence of Clarke--and his Return to Forever colleague, Chick Corea--had somehow managed to make this album worth listening to. But they are no more than sidemen on LifeTimes. Diana Hubbard, on her first album, runs the show, playing piano, (Corea isrelegated to the synthesizer on the one cut he graces) and writing all the music. But unfortunately Hubbard lacks emotion, technique; in fact, she lacks any creative vision beyond a vague desire to "contribute to a renaissance in romanticism...
...must wonder then, why the hype? Why should Corea and Clarke endorse this album, write poems to Hubbard, much less play on it? The answer is that Hubbard is only a part-time musician; the bulk of her time is spent as an executive in her father's--L. Ron Hubbard's-- Church of Scientology, and both Clarke and Corea are scientologists. Hubbard said she was trying to make no social statement with this album--she achieved all she wanted from her work in her church and was content with that...
Then Hancock joined fellow crossover artist Chick Corea for a series of duet piano concerts, which reconfirmed both players as skilled and important improvisationsts. Both the Quintet and the piano tour served to generate among fusion fans an interest in mainstream jazz, and both were commercially successful. But both projects seem to have been dropped, and Herbie Hancock is back on the road with his funk band...
...gutsy jazz singer's standard. Serenade features Joe Farrell's tenor sax, an undersung quantity if there ever was one. Stanley Clarke performs a lengthy acoustic bass solo that is more a technical coup than a creative improvisation. His sheer enthusiasm makes the cut listenable despite serious intonation problems. Corea begins the show's finale with a 17 minute piano solo. His playing is so damned interesting that he very nearly carries off this whole venture by himself, and here, on his own, he imaginatively probes his Spanish roots and builds to the concert's climax...
...Corea segues into the opening chords of his "Spanish Fantasy" suite, easily the best ensemble piece on the album. The horns really cook, belying their earlier sterile proficiency. Clarke's electric bass works beautifully, and Corea is literally all over the place--playing synthesizer, playing piano, stamping his feet with excitement. Appropriately, the encore is a Corea-Clarke duet; the chemistry between the two is obvious as they perform a free improvisation that is loosely based on the bop standard "On Green Dolphin Street...