Octogenarian drummer and NEA Jazz Master Billy Hart continues to make inspiring music, whether with his own quartet or as a sideman in several groups. Just is the third album and first since 2013 for Hart’s quartet of pianist Ethan Iverson, tenor saxophonist Mark Turner, and bassist Ben Street. The gap between albums just points to the fact of how busy these musicians are. Iverson led The Bad Plus for 17 years and has since issued several albums of his own as a leader. Turner is ubiquitous. In the past two months, he’s appeared on at least four albums as either a leader or sideman. This week, you’ll also see a review where Turner joins Steve Lehman’s Trio. This two-month period is just an indication of how busy Turner has been. The same can be said for bassist Street and Hart, who holds down the drummer chair in The Cookers, has led trios, and appeared on countless albums as a sideman. So, to get these four giants together is something special and worth celebrating.
Three of the four are composers: Iverson, Turner, and Hart. Iverson contributes four, with Turner and Hart weighing in with three each, all forward-looking, contemporary compositions that find the balance between tradition and the exploratory. The proceedings commence with Iverson’s “Showdown,” a highly lyrical, lilting piece featuring Turner, who can be bracing and aggressive, blowing in his ‘sweet’ mode and employing every key on his horn. Interestingly, the composer doesn’t solo, content to comp behind Turner’s lush playing, although we hear the distinct voices of all three rhythm sections finishing the piece. By contrast, Iverson’s “Aviation” motors along at breakneck speed, at a tempo that would challenge even the best players, but not these four.
The rhythm sections engage in a lively sequence, taking the tempo down slightly before Turner returns to continue at the blistering pace. Iverson offers another completely different composition in “Chamber Music,” which floats along nicely, somewhat akin to “Showdown” but more on the minimalist side. Turner coaxes gorgeous tones from his horn, melding nicely with Iverson to create enticing harmonics punctuated by Hart’s trademark cymbal flourishes. The fourth Iverson piece is the lively, abstract blues of “South Hampton,” marked by more emphatic kit work from Hart and rollicking piano over Street’s steady bass line. Turner, showing another aspect of his playing, digs in like the great Texas tenorists such as Arnett Cobb, Illinois Jacquet, and the like.
Hart’s title track moves to his emphatic beats, somewhat reminiscent of when he steered Herbie Hancock’s Mawandishi band in the ‘70s. Turner is again in rapid-fire, fluid cluster attack mode in this burner. Hart also brings two pieces from throughout his career. “Layla-Joy” opens with Turner phrasing like Coltrane in ballad mode before the melody evaporates into searching and exploratory group improvising, leading us into somewhat unpredictable sonic territory. Hart says, “Playing my older tunes, I’m not playing any freer with anybody than I play with them. Mark profoundly understands Coltrane, but also has total command of Lennie Tristano’s vocabulary. With Ethan, it’s like playing with Thelonious Monk or Andrew Hill one minute and Herbie Hancock the next.” Hart’s “Naaj” is a case in point, a simple riff over which his bandmates deconstruct and build back the melody in multiple ways as he stays busy in the engine room, shifting the tempos and pushing Turner in his soaring flights, Hart bringing the joyous excursions into a controlled manner as they exit.
Hart sets the pace for the up-tempo vamp of Turner’s “Top of the Middle,” a piece that chugs along relatively smoothly to a steady chord progression with space for a heady Iverson solo as Turner weaves his lines above the churning bottom. The flowing “Billy’s Waltz” has Turner composing a graceful waltz that mixes in bluesy swing. The quartet is arguably in its freest expression posture on the saxophonist’s “Bo Brussels,” they again take a relatively simple theme and twist it, embellishing it so we’re never sure where it’s heading.
Hart shows no signs of slowing down with his elite quartet; once again delivering top shelf contemporary fare.
