I'm All For You (Ballad Songbook)

Joe Lovano | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (December 27, 2011)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Blue Note
• ASIN: B0001Z36QE
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #106,732 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Saxophonist Joe Lovano has covered a waterfront of high-conceptual settings on record, ranging from orchestral efforts to protean trios, from strings-and-voices tributes to Broadway-based projects. I'm All for You has a concept going for it too--it's a ballads album that captures Lovano in his most elemental mode, playing tough but tender tenor in a conventional quartet setting featuring piano eminence Hank Jones, bassist George Mraz, and drummer Paul Motian. Lovano offers some of his most brilliant and heartfelt phrasing on gorgeous readings of classic standards and fresh re-workings of modern gems such as Thelonious Monk's "Monk's Mood" and John Coltrane's "Countdown." Lifted by Jones's supremely graceful harmonic touches and Motian's breezy sideways shifts and deceptive power, the music here is far from standard issue. --Lloyd Sachs

Product Description

I'm All For You (Ballad Songbook) by Joe Lovano

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I'm all for you, Joe!, May 4, 2004

By 

Jan P. Dennis "Longboard jazzer" (Monument, CO USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: I'm All For You (Ballad Songbook) (Audio CD)

The first Joe Lovano disc I bought was Village Life, way back in 1986. I was new to jazz at the time, and I couldn't make much of it. But I stuck with Mr. Lovano, and I've come to reap the benefits of artist loyalty with this spectacular disc.

Lovano has always been a wonderful ballad player; to hear him in this intimate context with players of the absolute highest caliber is a very special treat. Lovano has a kind of street-smart, blue-collar, no-nonsense approach that enables him to imbue his ballad playing with complete sincerity, devoid of sentimentality or irony. Just as importantly, in his middle-to-late years as an artist, he has found his way to a mode of expression uniquely his own: deeply honest, gently persuasive, and totally heartfelt. The tone he achieves is nothing short of remarkable. What strikes me about it is how conversational it is, while at the same time being subtly profound. It's almost as if you're casually chatting with him and all of a sudden he drops some major bomb about postmodern hermeneutics, absolutely apposite, effortlessly arising out of the topic at hand. No in-your-face pyrotechnics, no shouting-at-the-top-of-his-lungs declamation; just beautiful, reasoned, nuanced articulation of the highest order.

One might say he's mellowed in a similar way to Joe Henderson in his latter years (although he sounds almost nothing like him). One thing I love about his playing is his gorgeous vibrato. What makes it stand out is his ability to use it with absolute judiciousness all the while making it sound entirely natural. I would venture to say that of all living saxophone players (save, perhaps, Pharoah Sanders) he has the most distinctive approach to his instrument.

A note about his bandmates, Hank Jones (piano), George Mraz (double-bass), and Paul Motian (drums). All, of course, are first-rate jazz musicians. Of the three, Lovano has played most with Motian, having been a long-time member of his trio. This familiarity enables the two to achieve an instrumental simpatico among the most brilliant in the history of jazz. Motian and Lovano, seemingly effortlessly, enact an elaborate dancing back-and-forth vibe that marks these proceedings as something entirely special. Lovano has also played quite a bit with Mraz, always a player of impeccable taste, timing, and timbre. Hank Jones, of the brothers Jones, lifts this session into the stratosphere. A wise and canny choice for the piano chair, Jones seems to have lost none of his magic touch as accompanist and solo performer, desite his advanced years. Although he and Lovano haven't played together much, Jones brings such a deep knowledge of the entire history of jazz to this session that he always seems ready with the absolutely appropriate move be it in a comping or solo capacity.

A note about the production. This disc was recorded live to two-track analog tape. No headphones. No elaborate tweaking of the sound image. Not that I'm necessarily opposed to such procedures; it's just that this kind of stripped down auditory approach only works with players of the absolute highest accomplishment, and often falls flat unless everyone is absolutely on and into it. Thankfully, these players are, and the results more than justify the risks of such a high-wire approach. What you get is the warmth and immediacy of an intimate club date without the (often) compromised sound and annoying audience interaction.

I'm entirely taken by this spectacular disc, certainly the best from Lovano in many years, and perhaps his best ever. Do give it a listen.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Joe's for real, May 9, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: I'm All For You (Ballad Songbook) (Audio CD)

I'm always on the lookout for new jazz that I can play when friends are over, that I really want to listen to, but that my wife won't ask me to turn off. This collection of ballads is one of those rare albums. The echoes of Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Sonny Rollins, and John Coltrane create an atmosphere of soulful reverence made even more poignant by the this-is-the-real-thing-ness of Joe Lovano's complex, unvarnished tone, unsweet harmonies, and magical off-center phrasing. The title song, "I'm All for You", the only original on the album, by Lovano, epitmomizes the spirit. Built on the changes of "Body and Soul", you've heard it a hundred times before but never with this melody. And the title clues us in to where Lovano's heart is: he's rooting for us and there for us too. Hank Jones's perennially fresh piano accompaniment deepens the historical resonance, and adds joy, and warmth, and humor. Paul Motian's drumming--and cymballing!--intills the conviction, as usual, that something interesting is going on. And George Mraz's bass playing is perfect.

17 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Penetrating the Generational Gap, May 17, 2004

By 

Infinite Catalyst "C. Robert Dennis" (Monument, CO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I'm All For You (Ballad Songbook) (Audio CD)

I am a 22 year-old jazz enthusiast.

In my younger years I would incessantly make fun of my father for his gargantuan jazz CD collection, his nerdy mess-organization, and his defense of his passion, "you don't have the aesthetic appreciation to understand this music." While it was all part of his sense of humor, and he was joking at least in part, there was a huge amount of truth to his facetious saying.

Jazz is like coffee, or cigarettes, or old scotch. It is an acquired taste, and every person has his or her own preferences.

However, there are generational gaps of preference. Lovano, for the most part, is straight up for the baby boomers. His sax is mellow, his tone thick and sultry, breathy and creamy. His style is patient and minimal, subtle and quaint, uneventful like a slow moving train.

The percussion in this CD reminds me of Larry Mullin with U2, definitely not sound-wise, but tempo and contribution-wise. There are no fancy fills, no snazzy high hat tricks, just plain ambient classic jazz drums. The rest of the group all plays their parts, but again, Lovano is the central attraction here.

I STILL LOVE THIS CD SOMEHOW, SOMEWAY. I DON'T KNOW, I CAN'T UNDERSTNAD WHY I DIDN'T LIKE CLAM CHOWDER UNTIL I WAS 20 . . .

Lovano draws awfully close to Pharoah Sanders in tone here. A couple songs sound like he really spent some time keeping the sound raw in the studio and not doctoring it too much. The pay-off is huge. If you like mellow, predictable, tone rich jazz, then this CD was tailored specifically for your tastes.

4 and ½ stars.