Brandon Allen celebrates Stanley Turrentine on upcoming album for Ubuntu

Interesting project coming up from fine saxophonist Brandon Allen who has a new record on the Ubuntu Music which pays tribute to Stanley Turrentine coming up for release in early-March. Brandon has paid tribute to Gene Ammons in the past and now …

Published: 2 Feb 2022. Updated: 2 years.

Interesting project coming up from fine saxophonist Brandon Allen who has a new record on the Ubuntu Music which pays tribute to Stanley Turrentine coming up for release in early-March. Brandon has paid tribute to Gene Ammons in the past and now turns his attention to the soulful, hard blowing Turrentine. Brandon says via the label: “When putting this project together I deliberated over the choice of tunes for some time. Listening to as many albums as I could, discovering some gems along the way, I slowly began to pick out some selections that resonated with me and that would work well with this line-up. I then began to arrange them for the quartet.

“Some of the original versions were orchestral in nature and so I tried to capture the essence of that large ensemble feeling. With the other tracks I have taken all the main elements of the song but have made some small alterations, textural changes here and there and opened up certain sections for solos.”

Check out 'Evil' from The Stanley Turrentine Project which finds Brandon with keyboardist Will Barry, bassist Conor Chaplin and drummer Dave Ingamells. The original Turrentine treatment is from 1974's Pieces of Dreams.

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Steve Slagle: Ballads: Into the Heart of It, Panorama ***

There's lots to like here: the stately feel of the ballads that US sax veteran Steve Slagle (Carla Bley, Joe Lovano, Mingus Big Band) chooses to include; then there's some great solo featured spots by Randy Brecker and wrapping all of this up so …

Published: 2 Feb 2022. Updated: 2 years.

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There's lots to like here: the stately feel of the ballads that US sax veteran Steve Slagle (Carla Bley, Joe Lovano, Mingus Big Band) chooses to include; then there's some great solo featured spots by Randy Brecker and wrapping all of this up so tidily an expert rhythm section with Bruce Barth on piano, Ugonna Okegwo on bass and Jason Tiemann on drums. Brecker on 'Reflections' brings a real humanity to his solo and the whole interpretation has a fantastic warmth to it. As for Slagle he is best on 'If You Could See Me Now' which makes you feel transported directly into a jazz club given how much late night atmosphere the track and for that matter the whole album has. OK to some Into the Heart of It may be just another middle-of-the-road standards album but that would be to deny the impeccable musicianship and taste of all concerned here.