Name: Talking Horns
Brand: Delmark (Label)
SKU: 201320
Price: 13.35 USD
Availability: InStock

Performer Notes

Personnel: Malachi Thompson (trumpet); Oliver Lake (alto saxophone); Hamiet Bluiett (baritone saxophone, contrabass clarinet); Willie Pickens (piano); Harrison Bamkhead (bass); Reggie Nicholson (drums).
Recorded at Riverside Studio, Chicago, Illinois on March 2-4, 1999. Includes
liner notes by Malachi Thompson.
Personnel: Malachi Thompson (trumpet, cowbells, shaker, wood block); Hamiet Bluiett (contrabass clarinet, e flat clarinet, baritone saxophone); Oliver Lake (alto saxophone); Willie Pickens (piano); Reggie Nicholson (drums).
Audio Mixer: Bundy K. Brown.
Liner Note Author: Malachi Thompson.
Recording information: Riverside Studio, Chicago, IL (03/02/1999-03/04/1999).
Malachi Thompson has little patience with dogmatists who claim that a jazz musician has to live in New York to be legitimate. The veteran trumpeter has been around the Chicago jazz scene all his life, and he knows darn well that there are many accomplished Midwestern improvisers who don't have a Manhattan address. In the liner notes that he wrote for Talking Horns, Thompson spends a lot of time discussing the Chicago/St. Louis connection in jazz -- a connection that Delmark founder Bob Koester is well aware of because he started the label in St. Louis before moving it to Chicago. Both are Midwestern cities that have made important contributions to jazz, and this 1999 session finds Thompson acknowledging the cities by leading a sextet that consists of four Chicagoans (Thompson, pianist Willie Pickens, bassist Harrison Bankhead, and drummer Reggie Nicholson) and two St. Louis natives (alto saxman Oliver Lake and baritone saxman Hamiet Bluiett). Together, the improvisers favor an inside/outside approach and divide their time between hard swinging post-bop and more abstract, AACM-minded avant-garde jazz. "Circles in the Air" and the African-influenced title track are among the CDs more left-of-center offerings, while "Brass and Oak," "Way Back When We Didn't Understand," and the McCoy Tyner-ish "Lucky Seven" are hard swinging post-bop items that are more inside than outside. Thompson, true to form, insists on keeping his options open -- the trumpeter sees no reason why he cannot be influenced by Freddie Hubbard one minute and Lester Bowie the next. As a result, Talking Horns is unpredictable -- you never know from one track to the next if the sextet will go in a straight-ahead post-bop direction or an AACM-influenced avant-garde direction. But whatever direction the sextet chooses, this album is consistently strong and serves as a fine example of Midwestern acoustic jazz. ~ Alex Henderson

Professional Reviews

The Wire (10/01, p.76) - "...A pungent antidote to formalism. It's rootsy and daring in equal measure, steeped in black American music history, yet utterly here and now."

CMJ (8/20/01, p.14) - "...An organic avant-garde jazz vision..."

JazzTimes (12/01, p.152) - "...Thompson's outfit reinvestigates familiar territory - robust hard-bop edged with squeally outbursts - with moderation and restraint..."

Album: Talking Horns
#	Song Title	Time
1)	Woody's Dream
2)	Brass and Oak
3)	Scope
4)	Way Back When We Didn't Understand
5)	Fred Hopkins
6)	Talking Horns
7)	Lucky Seven
8)	Circles in the Air

Album: Talking Horns
#	Song Title	Time
1)	Woody's Dream
2)	Brass and Oak
3)	Scope
4)	Way Back When We Didn't Understand
5)	Fred Hopkins
6)	Talking Horns
7)	Lucky Seven
8)	Circles in the Air