Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
He's done it again, September 20, 2002
Ben Allison is on a roll. It started with Medicine Wheel, continued with Third Eye, and seemingly peaked with Riding the Nuclear Tiger; but trust me, he's outdone himself with Peace Pipe, his latest.Old hands Michael Blake on sax and Frank Kimbrough on piano are on board along with newcomers Michael Sarin on drums and Malian kora player Mamadou Diabate. The trademark world jazz/downtown sound continues. But he's taking it new places, largely, it seems, because of the new players. Peace Pipe, strangely, sounds more alien and more familiar at the same time. More alien, because the kora, which sounds like a cross between a zither and a koto, adds an unmistakably exotic element to the proceedings; more familiar, because, somehow, this music resonates with the deepest places in our hearts. Make no mistake, Ben Allison has done something special: He has created a whole new context, maybe even a whole new vocabulary, for world jazz as well as establishing a new baseline. Everything coming after will be measured against this incredible musical yardstick.
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderful musicians and even greater human being!!!, September 4, 2003
We had the pleasure to organize (and to witness to) three concerts for "Peace Pipe" here in central Italy where I live (Avezzano-L'Aquila) on 28/29/30 august 2003. In these, Ben (on the upright) and his fellow musicians Frank Kimbrough (piano) Joel Frahm (sax) Michael Sarin (drums) and Balla Tounkara (kora) played all the compositions included in Peace Pipe. What is evident is that these guys pursue the goal of givin' a real spin to the jazz music, refreshing the traditional language. This is achieved composing new, original tunes that include all the possible influences from the external environment, would this be either the "third rail of the NYC subway" or the music of Neil Young!!! The end result is a very peculiar yet fully enjoyable record. It is done, anyhow, with traditional acoustic instruments and this reminds me the stamina and the freshness that Steps Ahead showed some twenty years ago (geez if time passes!!!). Definitely good music from beautiful human beings. Worth the money spent. Every penny. (Check out the Jazz Composers Collective activities)
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Incredibly Creative, December 22, 2005
Ben Allison's Peace Pipe is one of the more ambitious and unbelivably original jazz project's I've ever heard. Allison creates incredible textures and rhythmic patterns by using so many different unusual elements in the music: muted piano, prepared piano, picking bass strings with a subway card, cymbals on the drum heads and of course, the defining aspect of this recording, the traditional Malian kora, a harp made from a gourd. Mamadou Diabate is a stunning musician, but the kora makes a certain thought about this music on this album even more incredible. I had the pleasure of seeing Diabate live once and realized that the kora is actually a diatonic instrument. It can only play in one key at one time. As a result, the writing process of this music must have been extremely difficult in order to make jazz with the harmonic limitations of the kora. The result is music like you've never heard before. The improvisational ablities of the musicians is outstanding as usual. Get ready for a musical treat with Peace Pipe.
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by Ben Allison 
