Saxophonist
Steve Lehman
's
The People I Love
offers a bit of a departure from the provocative, well-executed fusion of modern jazz and hip-hop on 2016's
Selebeyone
and the large group aesthetics and electronic textures of 2014's
Mise en Abime
. On this ten-track set, he re-teams with drummer
Damion Reid
and bassist
Matt Brewer
. Pianist and fellow vanguardist
Craig Taborn
is co-billed as collaborator and fills out the ensemble.
The program is unusual in that
Lehman
and company visit a number of his peers' compositions, including
Kenny Kirkland
's "Chance,"
Jeff "Tain" Watts
' "The Impaler," and
Kurt Rosenwinkel
's "A Shifting Design." These are juxtaposed with some re-visioned versions of tunes from
's catalog originally recorded with quartets, quintets, and even an octet; they include "Beyond All Limits," "Echoes," and "Curse Fraction." In addition to three brief, improvised piano/saxophone duets -- "Prelude," "Interlude," and "Postlude" -- that are, in essence, place markers on this journey, there is a jagged cover of
Autechre
's "qPlay." "Prelude" establishes a ready rapport between
and
Taborn
, who play with an easy flow that ramps up to showcase their canny articulation of knotty swing on the only new composition here, "Ih Calam & Ynnus." While
Reid
syncopates across breaks and even junglist rhythms,
Brewer
establishes a taut pulse.
uses a two-chord vamp to establish an angular groove while he and
exchange lyric phrases, dissonant dialogue, and complementary combinations of color in their harmonic engagement.
's woody solo almost steals the tune though. The cover of "qPlay" rings out of the piano like a dusky bell, but opens to preserve the combinatory articulation of dark and light in a wide variety of gray levels atop the popping and feinting bassline and scattershot breakbeats. This interpretation is fraught with uncertain yet forceful emotion. The version of "Beyond All Limits" sharply contrasts the version on
.
uses dissonant circular runs to cross
's modal chords and sparse rhythmic voicings before the saxophonist, solo, moves back across the street to driving post-bop accented and punctuated by
's solo is not only in the pocket but in the tradition, playing against the contrapuntal snare and cymbal shimmers.
Rosenwinkel
's "A Shifting Design" is delivered here as a piano-less, modern-day homage to
's great influence
Jackie McLean
. It commences with the saxist offering the head in a hard-driving avant-bop exchange with
, who delivers a clattering, insistent,
Art Blakey
-esque run before
ushers in the changes.
's solo is full of pathos and humor as he moves across scalar invention into spastic nuances that play on the rhythm section's aggression. It's brittle, funky, squalling, and intense, and may be the best track here.
's catalog is full of gems that challenge de rigueur notions of modern jazz, but on
, he questions his own processes, trying to find essences and new ways of moving outside pre-designed limits. His quartet here not only offer support but propel the investigation ever forward. ~ Thom Jurek