| Jazz |
Too Classic to be aired on Bayou Blue Radio, it remains an excellent jazz album that will satisfy all of you who love this form of musical expression that has shaped the history of jazz. However, it is far from the excellent album by trombonist Michael Dease that I talked to you about some time ago (review: here), which also paid tribute to Gregg Hill’s music, but with particularly daring arrangements.
Here, we play note by note according to the score, nothing exceeds, so you won’t be disturbed by anything, although we greatly appreciated the playing of trombonist Chris Glassman, who shines in these ten compositions with his placement in this ensemble. The Midwest is the origin of these musicians from the University of Michigan, and composer Gregg Hill fully capitalized on this talent proximity with his latest album ‘Technocats. The ‘Technocats’ group includes Chris Glassman on bass trombone, Nathan Borton on guitar, Xavier Davis on piano, and Javier Enrique on bass.
‘Go Figure’ is certainly the most interesting title of this album due to its structure closely tied to the rhythm, and it’s on this track that the musical arrangements are most pleasing to hear. Gregg Hill’s music always has this element of timeless, poetic beauty that is the composer’s signature. We appreciate the piano parts here, much more lively and eloquent than the overly talkative guitar that intervenes here and there; for others, it will certainly be the opposite, but it doesn’t matter as long as you find your enjoyment in it.
We particularly like that it’s a generation of young musicians who are the performers here, but we would have liked more daring arrangements, which will probably come with time. In our opinion, a good album for those who love very classic and unsurprising jazz.
Thierry De Clemensat
USA correspondent – Paris-Move
Editor in chief Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News
PARIS-MOVE, August 9th 2023
::::::::::::::::::::::::::