JAZZ

The latest releases reviewed

ANDY PANAYI News from Blueport Woodville ****

Panayi, a brilliant multi-reedman, is confined to baritone saxophone here; add the virtuoso trombonist Mark Nightingale with Simon Woolf (bass) and Steve Brown (drums), and a raft of Gerry Mulligan originals, plus Art Farmer's Blueport and Bill Crow's title track (both written for Mulligan) and you get the picture. Well, not quite. The instrumentation and the delightful use of counterpoint may be the same as the old Mulligan-Brookmeyer quartet. But Panayi and, especially, Nightingale (who recalls Frank Rosalino rather than Brookmeyer), play with such exuberant imagination, cushioned by Woolf and the immaculate Brown, that their sheer joy in performing is palpable on these live sessions. And almost irresistible. www.musicconnection.org.uk - Ray Comiskey

INGRID JENSEN At sea ArtistShare ****

Jensen, on flugelhorn and trumpet, is a complex, probing performer who has retained the sense of control and lyricism that marked her work when she played here in the early 1990s. She has a kindred soul in Geoffrey Keezer (piano/Fender Rhodes/keys), part of a basic quartet lineup with Matt Clohesy (bass) and Jon Wikan (drums/percussion). Their flexibility and spirit of adventure are abundantly evident in the freedom with which they transform, rhythmically and harmonically, material such as Keezer's Tea and Watercolours and Captain Jon, and her own At Sea, As Love Does, Swotterings and KD Lang. A pair of standards, There Is No Greater Love and Everything I Love, have their fabric stretched almost to bursting to create something rich, fresh and consistently imaginative - not a bad description of the whole album. Available only online at www.ingridjensen.com. - Ray Comiskey

ANTONIO FARAÒ Takes on Pasolini CamJazz ****

Faraò is such a superb pianist that it's difficult, at times, not to be swept up in the sheer virtuosic dazzle of his playing. And when he responds with heart-on-sleeve passion to the work of film director Pier Paolo Pasolini, a poet, romantic and political sophisticate full of contradictions, it can be a bit overwhelming. Nevertheless, with the arresting Miroslav Vitous (bass) and Daniel Humair (drums) urging him on, this is an astonishing trio, their gripping dialogue unfolding with no sense of a safety net, full of in-the-moment risk-taking. It has its downside; sometimes it's done at the expense of structural cohesion. But at its best, especially on Faraò's originals inspired by Pasolini's Teorema, Medea and Oedipus Rex, it's breathtaking, coherent and compelling. http://uk.hmboutique.com - Ray Comiskey