Little Big III is pianist/composer Aaron Parks’s sixth album as a leader and his second for Blue Note. Between his groundbreaking 2008 Blue Note debut, Invisible Cinema, Parks has issued a solo piano, two trios, and two albums with his Little Big quartet.
Parks cut his chops with Terence Blanchard in the early 2000s and made a splash with Invisible Cinema, which gained even more notoriety in subsequent years for its heady mix of contemporary jazz and indie-pop. It eventually inspired his Little Big Quartet, which has the same instrumentation but a different lineup of musicians. Parks’ discography is a bit uneven as he’s battled mental health issues in the past decade and a half, but his Little Big unit released its debut in 2018 and followed with another in 2022, so the close rapport and synergy of the band is Parks’ most consistent thread. He claims this is their most focused and ‘ distilled down to the essence’ of the three, perhaps partly helped by co-producer and Blue Note President Don Was. Little Big features co-leader and guitarist Greg Tuoey, bassist David Ginyard Jr. (who also plays with Terence Blanchard’s E-Collective), and the in-demand drummer Jongkuk Kim.
“Flyways” kicks it off, its churning motion immediately from the get-go and into a Tangerine Dream/Kraftwerk kind of vibe with Tuoey’s guitar and the leader’s tinkling acoustic piano. Parks introduces “Locked Down” with remarkably dark chords, amplified by Ginyard’s resonating bass and Tuoey’s deliberate, haunting guitar. It’s as fitting a piece for those hazy days of the pandemic as any. “Heart Story” unfolds simply and brightly in its slow pace by the highly harmonic melding of the piano and guitar. The only reference point for such a sound in terms of tone (at least for me) is the music of Kurt Rosenwinkel, to whom Touey’s playing bears some similarities and not coincidentally with whom Parks has recorded. Tuoey, on the other hand, points to the triumvirate of Bill Frisell, Jimi Hendrix, and Jonny Greenwood as his influences. He has melded their styles to forge his singular sound.
Single and standout track, “Sports,” from Tuoey is also simply structured, resting on just four chords with a series of ostinatos and South African cross-rhythms that inevitably conjure the sound of Weather Report, with Tuoey leading just as Shorter and Zawinul did in that iconic band. Each member shines with Kim’s vibrant kit work, Ginyard’s insistent grip on the vamp, and the leader’s solo that embellishes the basic chords with clusters and trills. “Little Beginnings” pushes toward jazz-rock fusion, with Parks shifting to keyboards and synths. “The Machines Say No” is mostly a riveting dialogue between a chord-driven Touey and a kinetic Kim. At the same time, another standout, “Willimina,” has the ringing, folkloric style we associate with Frisell. Yet, as the tune unfolds, it is markedly dramatic, with the guitar floating over alternately subtle and distinct rhythms like waves breaking ashore. Parks’ piano adds to the effervescent vibe in his solo and judicious comping. The free-rolling repetitive swing of “Delusions” becomes almost hypnotic before it turns dark, culminating in Touey’s dissonant lines and Park’s exclamatory chord.
The closing, “Ashe,” is Parks’ hymn-like, elegiac palette cleanser that is a rework of the piece that first appeared on Terence Blanchard’s A Tale of God’s Will (A Requiem for Katrina) (Blue Note). The Yoruban translation is “so be it,” essentially an ‘Amen” to this stirring album that melds so many different influences yet totally stands apart from anything else. It’s tempting to call it jazz fusion, but it’s both more cerebral and emotional than most of that ilk.
