Joe Lovano, Us Five - Bird Songs
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CD Details
Artist: Joe Lovano, Us FiveEdition: Music CD
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
CD Release Date: 2011-01-11
Music Label: Blue Note Records
Product features:
- LOVANO JOE BIRD SONGS
- Passport
- Donna Lee
- Barbados
- Moose the Mooche
- Loverman
- Birdyard
- Ko Ko
- Blues Collage (carvin' the bird-bird feathers-bloomdido)
- Dexterity
- Dewey Square
- Yardbird Suite
Music reviews of Bird Songs
Music Review: Not a 'tribute', a uniqe and interesting spin
Rating: 4 Stars
Charlie Parker was certainly one of the most important jazz musicians historically, and practically every horn player struggles to get his licks down. It is only natural that they try and play tribute sometimes, as Joe Lovano has done here. Unfortunately, that sort of tribute can easily sound derivative, a tired retread of the Bebop idiom that is neither unique from nor better than what Parker himself would have played. Why not just listen to Bird play it better? This is not such a tribute, it is a unique and interesting evolution of Parker's music, with such a wonderful idiosyncratic spin that they could just as easily have been all been Lovano originals.
Tackling the Parker songbook is Lovano's wonderful double drum quintet 'Us Five' consisting of James Weidman on piano, the spectacular Esperanze Spalding on bass and the drum talents of Otis Brown III and Francisco Mela. The real strength of this band is the strong sense of interplay between its members, particularly the two drummers, who trade back and forth with audible glee. The band has stripped these songs down to their elements and built them back up in a way that is entirely their own. 'Barbados' retains the Carribbean feel of Parker's original interpretations and sticks largely to form, but most of the other cuts have been very much re-interpreted. My favorite cut, 'Moose the Much' builds almost a round like groove in the bass and piano with little elements taken from the melody, while Joe swings through the slow groove of song itself. "Ko Ko", now a sax and two drums trio, has become almost a free-exploration of Charlie Parker and the bebop idiom, playing little snippets of traditional bebop phrasing while cycling through keys with a fluid sense of time. Capping the album is their take on "Yardbird suite" which has become, in Lovano's words, a hymn. It is slow and elegant, hardly recognizable as a take on Parker, but beautiful. As it cycles from the main statements of the melody to the solos, it picks up a bit and we are treated to a great waltz groove.
All in all, this feels much more like a Joe Lovano album than it does a tribute to Bird. Sometimes Bird's influence shines through the album, but just as often it is much more subtle. If you are at all familiar with the Joe Lovano Us Five's first album "Folk Art", you should know the range and depth of this band, and this album is a worthy successor to that debut. The band is dynamic and Lovano keeps every track fresh, choosing new styles and interpretations and switching horns often, from his standard tenor, to a straight alto, his famous 'aulochrome' double soprano and on 'Lover Man' the rarely used G mezzo soprano. From start to finish this album was a pleasure. Highly recommended.
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Description of Bird Songs
"I didn't approach this as a tribute record," states Joe Lovano, dispelling right off the bat any preconception that his new album Bird Songs--an exploration of the Charlie Parker songbook--is a mere retread. Lovano's 22nd album for Blue Note Records (the release of which will mark his 20th year on the label) breaks the mold of Bird tribute records. Bird Songs is a thrillingly adventurous, thoroughly modern, and uniquely personal look at one of the most influential figures in jazz history by one of the most important voices in the music today. Us Five turned out to be the perfect vehicle for his exploration. Lovano's dynamic young band--which features drummers Otis Brown III and Francisco Mela, bassist Esperanza Spalding, and pianist James Weidman--has been captivating audiences around the world for several years now. Their debut recording--2009's Folk Art--was a wide-ranging set of Lovano's original compositions that resulted in Us Five being awarded Best Small Ensemble of the Year at the 2010 JJA Jazz Awards and winning the Best Jazz Group of the Year category in the 2010 DownBeat Critics Poll. Lovano completed a double-triple of awards by also winning the JJA's Musician and Tenor Saxophonist of the Year, and DownBeat's Jazz Artist and Tenor Saxophonist of the Year. "Putting this recording together I kept wondering how Bird would have developed within these tunes, not just as the incredible soloist that he was but as an arranger and band leader. From what we know about him it is clear that he was into the world of music beyond so called Jazz and Be Bop and I'm sure we would have all been surprised at every turn in his approach just as we were with Miles, Coltrane, Rollins and Coleman, four of his most distinguished and celebrated disciples. At the young age of 34 Charlie Parker passed and left us with all of these questions about what would be. This recording is my humble attempt to answer some of those questions in my own way."Jazz CDs
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