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Lee Konitz / Dave Liebman / Richie Beirach: KnowingLee
ByApparently it is. While saxophonist Lee Konitz, nearly 20 years Liebman and Beirach's senior, admits to having missed out on the very generation of which these two sexagenarians were a partespecially in those critical exploratory years of the late 1960s and early '70sthere's a common element linking them together, and that's Lennie Tristano, an often overlooked pianist who was experimenting with the building blocks of both free and modal jazz long before they were "innovated," in the public eye, by Ornette Coleman and Miles Davis. While Konitz played with Tristano, and Liebman and Beirach simply studied him, KnowingLeea first encounter instigated by a chance letter to Konitz, written by Liebmanis a collection of standards, originals and spontaneous compositions compelling in its revelation of a subliminal connection shared at a deeper, conceptual level. Rather than diluting Liebman and Beirach's chemistry, Konitz actually enhances it.
Both saxophonists have forged immediately recognizable tones on what are largely considered to be their primary instruments. Konitz's alto tone is absolutely pure, as is Liebman's on sopranolargely warm, and avoiding the nasally tone of one of his main influences, John Coltrane. Both also play other axes hereKonitz soprano, and Liebman tenorbut it's unfairly dismissive to call them secondary. They are simply instruments played less often (though Liebman, these days, balances his two horns more equitably), and Liebman's tenor turns out to be an especially fine tonal foil for Konitz's alto on the freely improvised and appropriately titled "Don't Tell Me What Key."
The trio approaches well-known standards, like Dave Brubeck's "In Your Own Sweet Way," with a similarly open-mind, Beirach's subtle twists and turns never coming at the expense of a swing that's just as often implicit as it is overt. Liebman's soprano approaches clarinet-like warmth when it soars into the upper registers, while Konitz weaves relentless melodies in and around his partners as if they were, indeed, made for each other.
"Free" may have some specific stylistic precedents, but it's really about choice, and whether they are turning Miles Davis' "Solar" on its edgebreaking down into a stunning, unaccompanied alto/soprano exchange still predicated on formor playing completely without a safety net on the twin-soprano improv, "Migration," KnowingLee provides stunning evidence that even if it ain't broke, a little adjustment, every now and then, is far from a bad idea.
Track Listing
In Your Own Sweet Way; Don't Tell Me What Key; Universal Lament; Alone Together; KnowingLee; Solar; Migration; Thingin' / All the Things That...; Trinity; Body and Soul; Hi Beck; What is This Thing Called Love?.
Personnel
Lee Konitz
saxophone, altoLee Konitz: alto and soprano saxophone; Dave Liebman: tenor and soprano saxophone; Richie Beirach: piano.
Album information
Title: Knowinglee | Year Released: 2011 | Record Label: OutNote Records
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