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Joe Lovano
Flights of Fancy
(Blue Note)
Flights of Fancy (Blue Note) is the latest from saxophonist/composer Joe Lovano, who won a Grammy for his brilliant auditory recreation of Fifty-Second Street's post World War II jazz. "Flights" is radically different, a series of inventions with a variety of trios—trumpet, reeds and drums; two saxophones and a drummer; the more traditional bass, drum and horn format; and piano, harmonica and reeds.
Except for the harmonica group, to which I will return, the music is vivid and challenging, if occasionally more like a conversation or a warm-up exercise than a finished composition. Lovano stands equal to any jazz soloist today in terms of eloquence and vision, and that capacity continually reemerges; and, on his recreation of McCoy Tyner's "Aisha" he is painfully poetic. With trumpeter Dave Douglas he builds upon the Ornette Coleman/Don Cherry tradition.
The harmonica trio is the fatal flaw here. Toots Thielemans' instrument is more ambient, an atmosphere-creating instrument that is an inadequate foil for, or companion to, Lovano's horn, and drags the recording down. But there is enough here to satisfy adventurous jazz listeners.
— Jules Epstein, March 2001
Release Date: 13 March 2001
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last update 1 April 2001