Word: saxe
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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CHARLIE PARKER IS ONE BIRD you can't catch. Parker, who died in 1955, was a jazz innovator, a sax master, a wildly talented instrumentalist who could improvise his way through songs with an easy daring and offhand profundity. Saxophonists who pay too literal tribute to Bird's work miss its spark and point--its emotionality is linked to its originality...
...rhythm section created a suitably dramatic background out of freely placed notes and rhythms. John Capello and Bruce McKinnon were exceptionally flexible in responding to the dynamic and tempo changes in the poetry and Batiste shadowed his wife elegantly on clarinet. At one point, Michael Schwartz rose from the sax section and played keening half-bent notes, breathy whispers and other soulful sounds on his alto. This solo moment lent a new degree of subtlely-pitched emotion to the reading...
...saxophone sonata, saxophonist Ian Carroll displayed comfort with the piece's classical and jazz elements. It is rare to hear the sax in a classical setting, and Carroll showed that the instrument is capable of much more than one might expect...
...even at the risk of alienating his huge following. Redman's sincere version of Ornette Coleman's "Una Muy Bonita" was the highlight of the first set, as he plumbed the depths of Ornette's sophisticated composition, trying to build a series of convincing melodic statements on his alto sax. Redman ended the set back on tenor, first recapitulating the irresistably "bright melody of "Una Muy Bonita" and then into a long cadenza that displayed his considerable chops. After the cadenza, however, Redman led his group into another directionless modal...
...signify a persistent lack of artistic maturity. He has the skills, but not the overall aesthetic sense to find an appropriate setting for them. One of the most aggravating motifs that continually recurs in Redman's playing in his insistence on rising into the shrill falsetto of his tenor sax at utterly inappropriate times. On a ballad entitled "Never End," Redman seemed to mock any legitimate musical statements he may have made earlier in the piece by turning the tenor sax into a penny whistle. Irony in jazz is a good thing, but Redman's silliness is not the same...