Jazz

Emma Rawicz
Inkyra
ACT Music ACT8018-2; LP: ACT8018-1

Over the last two years this amazing saxophonist and composer, now still only 23, has introduced her own big band, writing and arranging the music and fronting it with her own deeply schooled but wild and passionate solo playing. There have been many other projects, and after her ACT debut Chroma came last year’s Big Visit, a virtuosic duo with pianist Gwilym Simcock. Now, for Inkyra, she leads her own sextet, together since 2021 and including her old mentor Gareth Lockrane on flutes, as well as stalwart guitarist David Preston, who can range from rock to romance, and pianist Scottie Thompson, whose expansive synth sounds bookend the album with ‘Earthrise’ and ‘A Long Goodbye’. Stirring and impressive. SH

Sound Quality: 90%

Howl Quartet
Night Song
Howl Records HQ003CD; LP: HQ003LP

Three of the four Quartet members here have played together since their Cardiff days at the Royal Welsh College. Named for the best-known work of beat poet Allen Ginsberg, this collaborative band gelled in London in 2017, when drummer Matt Parkinson joined alongside bassist Pete Komor. And as with Howl’s two earlier self-produced albums, the interplay between the saxophones of Dan Smith (alto) and Harry Brunt (tenor) is all-important, recalling but going beyond the contrapuntal ideas of 1950s West Coast jazz. But the band’s approach majors on storytelling, with well-crafted pieces that have shape and structure, as well as thoughtful solos. SH

Sound Quality: 85%

Charles Lloyd
Figure In Blue
Blue Note 7844919; LP: 7844920 (two discs)

After playing his 87th birthday concert, the veteran saxophonist’s latest trio recorded this double studio album of material old and new. Reprises of earlier homage pieces include the Duke-inspired title track, with Marvin Sewell’s soft chords complementing Jason Moran’s nostalgic piano, and a new take on ‘Blues For Langston’ that showcases the guitarist’s Delta bottleneck style. Lloyd’s tenor may be less forceful now, but his execution and ideas are miraculously alive and well, especially when, unaccompanied, he takes us back to pre-history with ‘Ancient Rain’. And closing with ‘Somewhere’, Lloyd imbues the West Side Story song with his own faraway vision. SH

Sound Quality: 90%

Snarky Puppy & Metropole Orkest
Somni
Ground Up Music GUM1125SPSDIG; LP: GUM1125SPSV (two discs)

It’s 21 years since bassist Michael League, still a student in Texas, started Snarky Puppy as a ten-piece that would record its first album, The Only Constant, in 2006. The band has since drawn on an ever-larger pool of musicians and for its second live recording with Holland’s famous pop/rock orchestra (the first won a Grammy in 2015) the lineup included four drummers. And yet, League says, ‘it was one of the smoothest records we’ve ever made’. You feel the audience grooving to the hypnotic riff of ‘You Are But Not As You Were’ or to Bob Reynolds’ soaring sax solo on ‘Between Worlds’. Nostalgic and reassuring, this is good-time fusion with no rough edges. SH

Sound Quality: 85%