Artist: Andy Narell
Title Of Album: The Passage
Year Of Release: 2004
Label: Heads Up
Genre: Jazz, Latin Jazz, Fusion
Format: Flac/Cue/Log
Quality: Lossless
Total Time: 58:50
Total Size: 389 MB(+3%)
Artist: Andy Narell
Title Of Album: The Passage
Year Of Release: 2004
Label: Heads Up
Genre: Jazz, Latin Jazz, Fusion
Format: Flac/Cue/Log
Quality: Lossless
Total Time: 58:50
Total Size: 389 MB(+3%)
Tracklist
01 — The Passage
02 — Song For Mia
03 — The Long Way Back
04 — Sea Of Stories
05 — Mabouya
06 — Dee Mwa Wee
07 — Coffee Street
personnel :
Andy Narell — steel drums
Paquito D’Rivera — alto saxophone
Michael Brecker — tenor saxophone
Hugh Masekela — flugelhorn, Calypsociation.
Anyone who thinks the steel drums are limited to calypso and other
native West Indian styles has obviously never heard Andy Narell or
his collaborators on this disc, the French band Calypsociation.
Narell’s compositions take the music headlong into jazz, and the
richness of the steel pan sound ripples and sways throughout. For
added flavor and texture, guests Michael Brecker, Paquito D’Rivera,
and Hugh Masekela bring their horns, but they’re the icing on a
swinging cake (full praise to the percussionists who make the whole
ensemble swing). The music is deliciously complex without ever
sounding it. It works just as well on slower pieces like «Song for
Mia,» where the drums create a latticework of melody that remains
gorgeously balanced. Granted, at times it veers perilously close to
smooth jazz, but then it always steers faultlessly as far as melody
is concerned. The extended pieces, like the title cut and «Coffee
Street,» sail through moods, and «Dee Mwa Wee» offers slightly
darker hues in its lovely minor key, with Masekela’s flugelhorn
bubbling gently over the top. You have to hand it to Narell; his
imagination and skill have made the steel pans into a mainstream
instrument. ~ Chris Nickson