Customer Reviews

Joys & Desires

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And after multiple listenings, I'm beginning to think this may be his greatest accomplishment. What he's done here is to almost completely reconceive the idea of a big band, bringing it entirely into the twenty-first century. This disc breaths and effortlessly moves in precincts never before imagined by writers for and practitioners of big band music. Here, the large jazz ensemble becomes an organic creature, each instrument and section conceived as absolutely integrally related to all others. Hence, there's a kind of democracy of sound, a wild egalitarian consonance between woodwinds, brass, piano, keys, bass, and drums--each grouping or individual voice gaining uncanny gravitas on account of this approach, none standing out above its fellows, all equally leading or supporting as required.

One could, I suppose, regard this as a warm-up for his Large Ensemble, but that would be wrong. There's a weird anarchic serendipity operating here that isn't quite approached on that disc, A Blessing, brilliant as it is. Maybe it's the collaboration of Horst-Michael Schaffer and Heinrich von Kalnein, coleaders of the German Jazz Bigband Graz, with Hollenbeck that gives this disc its special cachet. The sound here is also absolutely spectacular. Whatever it is, I don't know, but this is certainly one of the most, if not the most, riveting jazz disc in my sprawling collection.

Three of the the seven tunes, "Just Like Him," "Abstinence," and "After a Dance or Two, We Sit Down for a Pint with Gil and Tim," have been previously recorded, "Abstinence" on both the Claudia Quintet's first and A Blessing, "After a Dance . . ." on the Claudia Quintet's first, and "Just Like Him" on I, Claudia. But they take on an entirely new character here--both, strangely, more frenetic and more logical.

What John Hollenbeck is doing both with the small jazz ensemble and with big band music is unprecedented (save, perhaps, in the latter case, with Ilhan Ersahin's Nublu Jazz Orchestra). If you want to encounter the absolute cutting edge of 21st century jazz, look no farther. But don't be scared off: there's nothing inaccessible or weirdly avant-garde about this music--just sounds of mystery, power, and wonder.