The Reservoir label debuted with this excellent effort from trumpeter
Valery Ponomarev
, who was making his first recording as a leader. Five years earlier he had ended a nearly four-year stay with
Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers
, and although he never seems to receive the fame he deserved,
Ponomarev
since then has been one of the top
Clifford Brown
-inspired hard bop trumpeters around. On this set,
teams up with tenor saxophonist
Ralph Moore
, Japanese pianist
Hideki Takao
(who filled in for the briefly ill guitarist
Kevin Eubanks
and surprised everyone by his superior playing), bassist
Dennis Irwin
and drummer
Kenny Washington
. Six of the trumpeter's mostly straight-ahead originals are performed, along with
"I Remember Clifford,"
and the music should please hard bop collectors. ~ Scott Yanow