Customer Reviews

Tuskegee Experiments

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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Despite being one of his lesser known albums, this is possibly Don Byron's most beautiful. It features amazing tunes, mostly Byron originals but also Duke Ellington's "Mainstem" and Robert Schumann's "Auf Eiener Burg". Byron's playing is as always tasteful, virtuosic and full of life. His support cast is also fantastic. Particularly noteworthy is Bill Frisell who features on some of the album's highlights, the funky latin "Next Love" and the very emotional, aptly named "Tears". A wonderful, varied album.

This CD still resonates with me today, Don Byron really tapped into something special in his debut outing, which he hasn't quite been able to capture since. While the CD loosely revolves around his feelings regarding the Tuskegee Experiments and race in general, there are many departures here. The music is as broad as Byron's expansive range of instruments, echoing Eric Dolphy on bass clarinet, alto sax and flute. Reggie Workman, Bill Frisell and Ralph Peterson (check out Ornettology from the same time frame) lend stellar support. Hard to believe this was nearly 15 years ago.

Don Byron is an amazing clarinet player and a very interesting composer. In this album he exercises his skills with a small tight group (tracks 2,4,5,6), solo or almost solo (1,3,9) and "other", like the spoken-word title track. I think it was somewhat typical of the 90's, when a musician had a chance to record a solo album he'd put in all his styles and various projects, knowing that there may not be a chance to record a second one... which often makes for uneven, but very interesting albums). But Byron's clarinet, which is powerful and expressive, bridges the different moods and styles, and makes it cohesive.

In tracks 2-4-5-6, the group has Bill Frisell (guitar) Lonnie Plaxico (bass) and the gigantic Ralph Peterson Jr. on drums, plus Edsel Gomez (piano) on 4+5. These tracks are fantastic, each member capable of imposing his will on the whole group so the give-and-take is often relentless.

"Diego Rivera" is the most free-form track on the album (with Greta Buck on violin). "Tuskegee Experiment" is built around Sadiq's furious recitation of a poem about the horrific story from our American history. It's hard to talk about the music in this track because the words are so painful, but as throughout the album, Byron's clarinet speaks with human-like power and expressiveness.