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 | Artist: Barth,Bruce | | Title: "Somehow It's True" | | Media: Compact Discs | | Label: DTR | | Rel: 2000-08-08 |  | | List: $16.98 (Save 25%) | | Your Price: $12.75 |
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Review 1
1. Criss Cross - T. Monk
2. Tom Tom Thing - Barth
3. Estate - Bruno Marinio
4. Somehow It's True - Barth
5. Solitude - Bruce Barth
6. Criss Cross - Barth
7. Triste - A. C. Jobim
8. Light Blue - T. Monk
9. Criss Cross - Barth
10. We See - T. Monk
11. Solitude - Barth
12. Criss Cross - Barth | Review 2
Bruce Barth - Piano; Terell Stafford - Trumpet/Flugelhorn; Adam Kolker - Tenor/Soprano Sax & Alto Clarinet;
Ugonna Okegwo - Bass; Duduka DaFonseca - Percussion; Billy Hart - Drums | Players
Bruce Barth - Piano; Terell Stafford - Trumpet/Flugelhorn; Adam Kolker - Tenor/Soprano Sax & Alto Clarinet;
Ugonna Okegwo - Bass; Duduka DaFonseca - Percussion; Billy Hart - Drums | Tracks
1. Criss Cross - T. Monk
2. Tom Tom Thing - Bruce Barth
3. Estate - Bruno Marinio
4. Somehow It's True - Bruce Barth
5. Solitude - Bruce Barth
6. Criss Cross - Bruce Barth
7. Triste - A. C. Jobim
8. Light Blue - T. Monk
9. Criss Cross - Bruce Barth
10. We See - T. Monk
11. Solitude - Bruce Barth
12. Criss Cross - Bruce Barth | Liner Notes
Excellence has been the rule when Bruce Barth makes music under his own name, so the excellence of this
new set - his third for Double Time - will hardly strike anyone who has been following his career as news. Yet there
is a difference in this brilliant flow of solo, trio, quartet and quintet performances, one that indicates greater
risk-taking without in any way abandoning the clarity and technical fluency of Barth’s earlier efforts. Like the most
intriguing jazz musicians, Barth is growing more inquisitive and less set in his ways, and his onging evolution has led
to the creation of a program of diverse performances that demands to be heard as one large statement.
The three fleeting solo versions of “Criss Cross” that appear along the way and the longer final reading of
Thelonious Monk’s classic are the most obvious sign that Barth has his own ideas about performance and pacing.
They come from his fascination with Monk’s composition and his efforts to concentrate the various ideas this
particular piece evoked. “I did a bunch of individual `Criss Crosses,’ beyond counting,” he recalls. “The unusual
chord progression, and the six-bar bridge, create a challenging asymmetrical character; and there are fewer chords
than on many of his tunes, so you can stretch the material out. And when I found myself getting more and more
abstract, I decided to just play a series of one-chorus takes. They don’t always state the melody directly, but the
form is there, and provided a framework for creating something new. I hadn’t planned to use the shorter takes as
interludes originally; but found that they went well with the other music on the recording.”
So Barth teases the composition out in his three single-chorus inventions, then digs deeper on the longer
yet still succinct finale. Each version confirms Barth’s feeling that the best way to absorb the discoveries of a
revered composer/pianist like Monk is to understand his concepts without obviously quoting his style. Thanks to
Barth’s rhythmic strength, this process yields variations with surprise and momentum, where freedom and swing
coexist without conflict.
The multiple versions of “Criss Cross” also underscore one of three strands running through this album -
Barth’s love of Monk’s music. (Barth has made the point previously, especially with the ingeniously titled original
“The
Way He Wore His Hat” on the Double Time album Don’t Blame Me.) “Monk is the composer whose tunes are played
the most at jam sessions,” he notes, “because every one of his tunes has such a unique character.” To reinforce
the point, Barth also gives us a quintet version of “Light Blue” with a 6/8 ambience and a sweeping Terell Stafford
solo that recalls Monk’s preferred trumpeters Ray Copeland and Thad Jones, plus a limber trio reading of “We See”
that is the album’s most in-the-pocket performance. “Solo playing lets you be out there on the edge,” Barth
comments, “but I feel much the same freedom with a great rhythm section.” He has a great one here, and one
flexible enough to meet the program’s many demands, in Ugonna Okegwo and Billy Hart.
The music of Brazil is a second thematic strand in the present program. While Brazilian tunes have always
been among Barth’s passions, he has become deeply immersed in the genre since he made the acquaintance of
percussionist Duduka Fonseca and joining the band of vocalist Luciana Souza. Forseca is added on “Estate,” the
Bruno Martino tune that Joao Gilberto introduced to the world, and Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “Triste.” “Duduka’s a
great
drumset player in his own right, and at some point I’d love to do a whole session with him,” Barth says. “But Billy
Hart, whom I’ve been fortunate to play with quite a bit in the last five years, also has a deep feeling for Brazilian
music. Putting them together really worked out, as they have such mutual admiration.”
So did Barth’s unusual take on “Triste,” which adds an oddly-shaped vamp and a few different chords to
the bossa warhorse, then puts it into 7/4 time. Amidst these alterations, the lyricism of the original shines through
even more strongly. “The three-bar vamp felt so natural,” Barth comments, “and I would never reharmonize to the
point where the essential nature of the tune is lost. The harmony I added in one spot is very `Jobimish,’ with
descending major triads. After experimenting with the piece’s rhythm, I really liked how the melody worked in
seven.”
The modifications also sit well with Adam Kolker, who plays an effortless-sounding soprano sax solo over the
provocative terrain. Kolker, heard most frequently with Ray Barretto in recent years, has collaborated with Barth
since their students days at New England Conservatory and their joint tenure in the little big band Orange Then
Blue.
“I feel a strong musical and personal rapport with everyone on the album,” Barth notes, “and I love playing
with each of these musicians.” The mutual nature of that affection if highlighted on the quintet readings of two of
the originals that form the program’s third strand. “Tom Tom Thing,” with its take-charge introduction by Hart and
its heraldic melody, finds each soloist blowing with great energy and crackling rhythmic support. The quintet
“Solitude” (a Barth opus, not to be confused with the Ellington standard) translate the affinity marking the entire
session into the realm of open form. “This was the first time I put a free thing on record in terms of group
improvisation,” Barth notes, “and I was moved by the group’s entire performance, especially by Terell's and Adam's
empathy at the beginning of their collective solo.” Notwithstanding this kinetic interpretation, “Solitude” also has
an
intimate melody that Barth explores in a shorter solo performance, adding another fleeting echo to the disc’s overall
scheme. The warmth displayed by the pianist on this solo take also suffuses the lengthier “Somehow It’s True,” a
ballad that allows Barth balance his more exploratory instincts with the venerable techniques of the solo piano
tradition.
Albums where moods keep shifting and themes reappear can often end up sounding calculated. This one
may work as well as it does because the links were not predetermined, but rather discovered in the process of
creation. “This was really a pretty spontaneous CD,” Barth confesses. “The idea was just to go into the studio and
have some fun.” It is just such creative spontaneity that allows jazz to continue as a living language, and that
marks Barth and his fellow musicians as among its most fluent and articulate “speakers.”
-Bob Blumenthal |
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