Esque is more. Jackie McLean-esque that is. US alto saxophonist Sarah Hanahan backed superbly by drummer Jeff 'Tain' Watts - the Branford Marsalis classic Quartet 1990s icon - along with hip pianist Marc Cary and bassist Nat Reeves who crucially in the sound was on Jay Mac's Montreal 88, an album that as here has a version of the Burt Bacharach classic 'A House is Not a Home.'
Hanahan whose sound is scalding, direct and provides visceral impact studied at the Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz at the University of Hartford’s Hartt School of Music in Connecticut. She worked with Reeves on 2021's Straight From the Hart. Hanahan's own tune 'NATO' works well and this very convincing album also features a treatment of John Coltrane's 'Welcome' that figured on the posthumously released Trane album Transition issued by Impulse in 1970. Percussionist, conguero Bobby Allende - who was on Wynton's satirical fable-of-modern-day-America 2020's The Every Fonky Lowdown - provides lit-up vibrancy on four tracks including exclamatory Hanahan original 'We Bop!' functioning well together with Tain.
Photo: sarahhanahan.com
Tags: Reviews