Digging Hampton Hawes as we gingerly approach interminable lists season when choice is the key word in the eternal wrangling of the battle of the best-ofs.
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::ALBUM OF THE WEEK::
So, hello Mary Lou.
Lost, locked unwillingly and mute in our minds since 2021 until today, was a wonderful record by Chris Pattishall.
Unmuted today and listening again the pianist's album was a Mary Lou Williams-themed release based on The Zodiac Suite from the mid-1940s.
And we return to the Zodiac Suite happily great memories of the work triggered by the release of New York based South Korean bassist Jeong Lim Yang's fabulous free-ish trio version of the mighty Mary Lou creation just out. Check the bassist's fine solo on 'Taurus'. And look it's Gerald Cleaver on drums and I hadn't even noticed the personnel but was certainly wondering at some of the reasons the whole thing works so well. Cleaver is one of the best avant drummers anywhere. The pianist Santiago Leibson is completely unknown to us - listen to the Argentina-born player on 'Scorpio' to scoop up into your head just what this dynamic player can do. The Monkishness if you like of 'Aires' is so livewire and again something worth zoning in on. Reassured was recorded last year and is a breath of fresh air.
What we glean most in all this is the greatness of the composition and how two very different approaches (the Jeong Lim Yang treatment not at all elaborately arranged, less swinging but much more intimate in nature) achieve a validity not in spite of but because of the vitality and ideas inherent in their individualism. Interpretation is all.