Terell Stafford: Brotherlee Love

Capri Records
By Ric Bang
Buy CD: Brotherlee Love

Some time has passed since I’ve reviewed a “small jazz” (quintet)-sized combo that plays a truly pleasant mix of both new and standard straight-ahead arrangements, all of which swing nicely. Of course, with the artists involved here, that’s no surprise. Terell Stafford is one of the most gifted — and hardest-working — trumpet players to have developed during the past 20 years, and his pianist, Bruce Barth, has the same reputation.

Stafford was attending the University of Maryland in 1988 — to obtain a degree in music — when he met Wynton Marsalis, who recommended that he study with William Fielder (who, at the time, was at Rutgers University). During this period, Stafford joined Bobby Watson’s group, Horizon. Stafford subsequently played with McCoy Tyner, Benny Golson, Kenny Barron, Jon Faddis and the Dizzy Gillespie All Star Band, along with his own groups.

This album is dedicated to Lee Morgan, a sensational young trumpeter who, at 18, had joined Dizzy’s big band. Morgan was another icon who met an untimely death; he was shot to death by his common-law wife when he was just 33.

Morgan wrote seven of these nine tracks; Stafford composed “Favor.” “Candy,” the lone standard, is an Alex Kramer tune.

This is a “happy” album; you can feel the enjoyment projected by the artists during each track. Very often, even with famous names, the musicians can sound a bit bored, but that absolutely isn’t the case here.

This is the kind of group you want to spend an entire evening listening to.

Gary McFarland Legacy Ensemble: Circulation

Planet Arts
By Ric Bang
Buy CD: Puzzle

I suspect only true jazz historians — or fans from my generation — are familiar with Gary McFarland. Born in Los Angeles in 1933, he came to jazz relatively late, while in the Army. He tried trumpet, trombone and piano, and settled on vibes in the mid 1950s. He also was a vocalist, but his skills as a composer, arranger and producer set him apart.

A musician is known by the company he keeps, and by those who seek him out. McFarland’s closest friends included luminaries such as Bill Evans, John Lewis, Bob Brookmeyer, Gerry Mulligan, Stan Getz, Anita O’Day and Clark Terry. And, like so many of his peers, McFarland attended the Berklee School Of Music.

Alas, his life and career were all too short. He and a friend were poisoned at a bar by someone who poured liquid methadone into their drinks. McFarland suffered a fatal heart attack and died; he was only 38 years old.

This album, by the Gary McFarland Legacy Ensemble, includes 11 of McFarland’s compositions. The quintet features another vibes icon, Joe Locke, along with pianist Bruce Barth, bassist Mike Lawrence, saxophonist Sharel Cassity, and drummer Michael Benedict. 

The track menu was chosen from different segments of McFarland’s all-too-brief career. The opening track, “Dragonhead,” is an up-tempo swinger from his time at Berklee. “Why Are You Blue” and “Blue Hodge” demonstrate his feel for the blues; the latter has become a jazz standard. “The One I Could Have Loved” and “Summer Love” represent his softer, balladic, side. Everything clearly demonstrates McFarland’s talent.

“Unknown” usually means “not missed,” but that isn’t the case here, or with McFarland in general. Thanks are due all those associated with the creation of this lovely memorial.

Holiday Jazz 2001: ’Tis the season to swing

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.13.01

[Web master’s note: Northern California film critic Derrick Bang — the eldest, youngest and only son of this site’s jazz guru, Ric Bang — has surveyed the holiday jazz scene since the late 1990s, with lengthy columns that just keep growing.]


As the song goes, Christmas time is here.

Which means it’s also time for my annual survey of Christmas jazz releases, at one time an insignificant subgenre that has blossomed into a retail-driven growth industry (now true of Christmas music in general, rather than jazz in particular).

And, as always, quantity is no substitute for quality ... but I’ll happily admit that this year’s new releases outpace what I found in 2000.

That said, the first new release that hit my CD player this season also is one of the most disappointing: Making Spirits Bright (GRP 314 549 839-2), a compilation collection produced by Lee Ritenour and Bud Harner. Expectations were high, because GRP’s three-disc Christmas Collection set, released between 1988 and 1993, remains a standard by which holiday jazz compilations can be measured. Alas, Making Spirits Bright doesn’t belong in that company; somebody seems to have mistaken the GRP label for Windham Hill. Too many otherwise nice instrumentals are drowned out by chanting choruses, monotonous (and canned) percussion, gimmicky electronic sound effects and a veritable tsunami of strings.

Yes, you’ll find two genuinely nice tracks: Joe Sample’s solo piano rendition of “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus,” and Diana Krall’s “Jingle Bells” ... but the latter already has been released on her own Christmas EP, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.

Every time another cut threatens to become pleasant — say, Marc Antoine’s guitar interpretation of “What Child Is This?” — it’s destroyed by overwrought background twaddle.

Making Spirits Bright should be fine for those who find Kenny G too challenging; despite this disc’s presence in the jazz bins, it’s anything but jazz.