True Or False - Roy Haynes

Aug

5

True Or False - Roy Haynes

≡ Category: 1980s, Hard Bop, Highly Recommended, Reviews |
≅ Written by: Michael Kydonieus

JAZZBO NOTES HIGHLY RECOMMENDED RECORDING

Rating:

In the dark days of the 1980s, there was a commercial resurgence of interest in jazz, but it was the embalmed museum jazz of Wynton Marsalis and his ilk. For Marsalis, jazz effectively ended in the early sixties with Art Blakey’s Messengers.

In this environment, very few people dared to explore new directions in jazz. Even someone as well-known as Wayne Shorter was pilloried for his outstanding work in Phantom Navigator, one of the most forward looking jazz releases of the period.

Most jazz artists preferred to lay low. Occasionally, under the guise of traditionalism, some good work emerged. An example of that is Roy Haynes’ True Or False (issued on the Evidence Music label). Although, as a measure of just how hostile the 1980s were to decent jazz in the United States, True Or False was recorded live in Paris and wasn’t released on CD until 1997.

Haynes chooses tunes for the most part that haven’t been played to death, and those that have, such as In A Sentimental Mood, receive a new spin. Hayne’s plucks the rarely heard gem Played Twice from the Thelonius Monk songbook. He also wisely includes two underplayed Chick Corea tunes, Psalm and Bud Powell.

Psalm has an unusual sectional structure. The A section is a menacing tutti cadence with a staggered rhythm. The B section is essentially modal with a pedal point around which the harmony dances.

Chick Corea’s Bud Powell is more conventional, a straight up bop tune, but the melody is so memorable, it sounds like it must be a standard. It should be.

The band is easily up to the demands of the tunes as well. Bass player Ed Howard (unknown by me) walks beautifully and his solo work is tasty and creative, utlizing wide intervals and unusual note choices. Check out his work on Charlie Parker’s Big Foot.

I first caught pianist Dave Kikoski on Randy Brecker’s straight ahead date In The Idiom and wasn’t terribly impressed. He had the vocabularly down, all right, but he seemed tentative and lacked power. He is much improved in True Or False. He’s kind of like a watered down McCoy Tyner, but that isn’t as much of an insult as it sounds like. Tyner’s power, especially in his 70s recordings, is overwhelming. Unless you’re playing with Coltrane, if you play as powerfully as Tyner does, you’ll completely dominate the session. On True Or False, Dave Kikoski contributes knotty solos and provides powerfully percussive chord clusters that drive the tunes along, but he’s definitely a team player.

Ralph Moore has the sax chair, and he’s coming out of a Coltrane/Sonny Rollins bag without slavishly imitating either one. He isn’t that distinctive, but he’s consistently interesting, and that’s all that’s required.

Roy Haynes is in prime form on this release. He allows himself a reasonable amount of solo space without being self indulgent. His introduction on True Or False is a miniature master class in how to structure a drum solo.

To sum up, Roy Haynes’ release True Or False is the farthest thing from the lazy hagiography that was so pervasive in the 80s. Yes, it’s mainstream post bop, but it’s not content to mine the same old cliches. Haynes finds high quality material that hasn’t been done to death and explores it with competent bandmates who are committed to stretching and challenging themselves, in what is the true and essential spirit of jazz.