The New York Times
The Arts
Tuesday, August 13, 1996
critics choice/Jazz CD's
"Simple" Equaling "Effective"
By Ben Ratliff
Aside from the fact that they have the tenor saxophonist Ellery Eskelin in common,
these recordings document how three of New York's downtown jazz improvisers matured
through immersion in basic black American rhythms. Trying to reduce jazz to it's
essences doesn't always make it great, but it's notable that for these three musicians, who
have been working around the edges of the avant-garde, simple means effective.
Ellery Eskelin's "Sun"
Ten years ago, in his late 20's, Ellery Eskelin was already mature and intuitive,
superbly controlling time and drama. (His long, harmonically rich, squawky but balanced
phrases evoke Archie Shepp at his early best as well as David Murray and Coleman
Hawkins.) With "The Sun Died" (Soul Note), Mr. Eskelin has not only finally produced a
flattering document of his playing, but also an inspired notion. The concept exploring
music by and associated with Gene Ammons, the Chicago tenor saxophonist who put a
rhythm-and-blues felling into be-bop might seem a typical downtowner's idea: curatorial
and cabalistically hip.
But Mr. Eskelin neither gives Ammons pallid worship, nor does he remake him as some
sort of revolutionary: he's simply working with durable blues and gospel melodies
that fir his sensibility. Marc Ribot stays unslicked where plenty of guitarists would
turn on the juice for a party-time atmosphere; his fuzzed obbligatos are organ like and
fascinatingly muted. Kenny Wollesen offers the simplest and strongest of drum rhythms,
shifting attack constantly. It's a remarkable record.
Baron Down's "Crackshot"
The virtuosic drummer Joey Baron started his own trio, Baron Down, five years ago,
with Mr. Eskelin and the trombonist Steve Swell, and initially it sounded like "fun"
with the quotation marks welded on. No idea they stumbled upon would go unmocked,
and the compositions, sort of jazz-interplay comedy sketches, were of a formula that seemed
all the rage. Neither Mr. Swell nor Mr. Eskelin got much solo space, and the music
was maddeningly self contained.
Without Mr. Baron needing to alter the concept radically, the band has progressed
by great leaps. On "Crackshot" (Avant), Baron Down's third album, they're often dealing
with the most basic verities of the blues form. But they've been at it long enough
that the schtick aspect in "Toothpick Serenade", the trombone acts as bass anchor for
two saxophone blues choruses, and then the two musicians comically trade places
becomes subsumed by the integrity of the improvising. The quotient of feeling in
Mr. Baron's drumming has grown; where he once distanced himself from his own music with a
deadeye clatter, now he has become an organic part of it.
Mark Helias's' "Loopin"
Skill for the bassist Mark Helias as it was for his mentor, the drummer Edward Blackwell
lies in transforming the simple into something much greater; it serves as the basis
for "Loopin' the Cool" (Enja), the fourth album with Mr. Helias as leader. Mr. Eskelin's tenor saxophone blends on the melodies with Regina Carter's tart violin;
Mr. Helias's solid lines bounce on the rhythms of the drummer, Tom Rainy, and the
percussionist, Epizo Bangoura, and often turn without warning from a simple ostinato
to a little melodic essay. Mr. Helias is open-minded without trying to be all-encompassing;
hints of African, Arabic and Spanish melodies blow through, but they're an integral
part of a musicianly imagination, not tacked on as learning modules.
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