Jazz Track
Mainstream
Pick: Mike Lee, Above The Battleground
(Consolidated Artists)
3/6/99 ,
by Rick Marx Mike Lee's
Quintet is a veritable definition of what's going
on in jazz in New York today. Specifically, it's
hard-edged, compositionally innovative,
technically first-rate and spun from the threads
of jazz tradition. Lee composes, plays saxophones
and clarinet, and his bandmates are regulars on
the scene: Tim Horner is one of the most creative
drumming voices on the city jazz scene--and he
plays a lot; Ben Allison is the founder,
Composer-in-Residence, and Artistic Director of
the Jazz Composers Collective; Tim Hagans is
celebrating his own brand-new Blue Note release, Animation/Imagination;
and Matt Ray plays piano. This album explores the
best of these new voices, playing Lee's
compositions (two of which placed in the 1997
Thelonious Monk/BMI Composition Competition.) The
creative interplay of the musicians can be heard
on songs like "Becca-Lou's Shoes," in
which Allison pulls new sounds from the bass
while Horner cranks out a military beat with
Ray's piano as a percussive accent. Hagans soars
over Lee's clarinet, until the two slide in and
out of the melodic motif. Throughout, the
improvisation always ventures just slightly
outside the established path. Consolidated
Artists Productions, the label founded by pianist
Mike Longo, is "dedicated to allowing
artists to pursue the types of projects that are
in line with their career objectives, and all of
the artists represented by CAP are
extraordinarily talented, both as composers and
performers." Lee's outing is true to the
label's intent.
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