
Even the youngster in the line-up, Mehldau, has more than two decades of recording and performing in the resume; so when a group like this gets together for an impromptu session at New York’s Birdland—one of jazz’s most productive live recording venues—magic can happen, and it did this night. It’s not a magic of the look at me, virtuosic, fireworks variety, but one of a melding of four different and very experienced perspectives on some of those jazz tunes that seem—after all these years—to be coded in our DNA, the musicians becoming one on this outing, creating melodic mutations that give birth to new sonic entities, new species altogether, maybe even a new genus or two, recognizable, but very different from the original organisms while still exuding a quality of familiar beauty.
“Loverman,” the opener, and Sonny Rollins’ “Oleo” are in the new genus category. If taken in small doses on a casual or distracted listen, they can be unrecognizable in snippets, and seem like forarys into free jazz. In part, they may be. Konitz is especially loose in his interpretations, drifting and swirling around in a variety of melodic side eddies that drift at unexpected times—usually briefly—back into the mainstream flow.
“Lullaby of Birdland” and “I Fall In Love Too Easily” don’t stray so far from what might be called standard interpretations, though it seems Konitz is trying to do just that, leaving Melhdau more the keeper of the melody, a task the pianist takes on with uncommon aplomb and originality and, yes, freedom.
Miles Davis’ “Solar” is a tune that has managed to sound timeless for more than 50 years. Konitz staggers in here, with a rather harsh and stentorian tone, like a blaring shower singer, until four crisp alto notes, followed post-haste by the piano rolling with the same riff, announce the tune, and draw in the masterful wandering of Motian and Haden.
It’s the title of another of the set’s American Songbook tunes, “You Stepped Out of a Dream,” that describes the mood. In the hands of these seasoned musicians, this music has an often skewed and surreal, out of a dream quality. We’ve heard them before, but never quite like this, unfolding in a way that doesn’t quite make logical sense; revealing new and unexpected angles of their beauty.
Personnel:
Lee Konitz: alto saxophone
Brad Mehldau: piano
Charlie Haden: bass
Paul Motian: drums
Brad Mehldau: piano
Charlie Haden: bass
Paul Motian: drums
Tracklist:
1. Lover Man
2. Lullaby of Birdland
3. Solar
4. I Fall in Love too Easily
5. You Stepped out of a Dream
6. Oleo
2. Lullaby of Birdland
3. Solar
4. I Fall in Love too Easily
5. You Stepped out of a Dream
6. Oleo
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