Billy Hart Quartet: One Is the Other

Drummer Billy Hart is a vastly experienced player of other people's music, but it's taken the Washington, DC-born drummer until his seventh decade to really find his own voice as a leader. Unlike many star-led bands, however, the Billy Hart Quartet is a truly collaborative project – and it sounds it. On this more forceful follow-up to the group's debut (last year's excellent All Our Reasons), the leader shares the credits with pianist and jazz scholar Ethan Iverson of The Bad Plus, thoughtfully brilliant saxophonist Mark Turner, and bassist Ben Street. The latter's combination of solidity and movement is the perfect foil to Hart's inventive, unpredictable rhythms. The set includes excellent original material from Hart, Iverson and Turner, as well as a magically loose reading of Some Enchanted Evening. propermusic.com