McCoy Tyner 'Illuminations'

McCoy Tyner              “Illuminations”           2004 TELARC

McCoy Tyner, piano

Gary Bartz, saxophones

Terence Blanchard, trumpet

Christian McBride, bass

Lewis Nash, drums

            What does it matter if a review is belated? It’s not a preview—that would be different. Great music is timeless anyhow, while extemporized jazz is already old before it’s mixed & mastered.

#1 Illuminations (Tyner) kicks off with Lewis Nash’s tight skinwork and disciplined horns—then Blanchard takes it, paced and deliberate through a celebratory hard-bop mysticism until Bartz completes his thought with deft agility that bespeaks a mystery lurking beneath the pulsating surface of rhythm sustained by Nash, Christian McBride and Tyner, who now takes over and lets rip—a very different pianist than used to lay the harmonic foundations for Trane—then suddenly segues into a bass solo by McBride of rare staccato reverberation—a bit of ensemble, some more feisty drumming by Nash and a lingering flourish to bring the track to a close.

#2 Angelina (Tyner)

Intro: more the familiar modal Coltrane-Tyner sound, although smoothed and softened with the years; that Latin tinge sparks up, then we are lulled back into dreamy indolence, wisps of other great keyboardist/composers like Hancock and Corea, then McCoy lays on sharp, spare notes emphasizing modality before proceeding to shred the changes—a pause, a question mark?—and Bartz suggests a tentative answer, building confidence as he builds tension until his spectral possibility becomes an affirmation. Blanchard takes his time as if testing each note before he takes us on a journey, an impassioned pilgrimage inside the harmony. Now Nash gets deep into an introspective meditation but before you can say “Om” the lulling, seductive head returns, somehow richer and more evocative now that we are all a little wiser from the experience.

#3 New Orleans Stomp (Tyner)

Marching snare snaps into Beethoven-heavy creole piano riff funky as Hell—surprisingly this one is also a Tyner original—Blanchard hits some hot, blues-inflected frontline jass and gets you shakin’, underpinned by Tyner’s insistent comping, Bartz interweaves a few lines before taking the stand himself, swinging legato and then punctuating rests like a trumpet player (effecting a labial, rather than interdental stop, for the linguists out there—the reed players out there know better than I how feasible this is vis-à-vis their embouchure) winds to a perfectly cadential close, the band makes a dynamic pause before Nash and McBride take a relaxed, casual stroll through the French Quarter, McCoy gives us a few more tinkles and the whole ensemble flare up again to bring this delectable little number to a close (if you’re like me and can never get enough hot sauce you may want to repeat the track again.)

#4 Come Rain or Come Shine (Harold Arlen)

As usual, Nash sets the pace, this time with a highly syncopated and ponderous post-bop rhythm—Tyner quickly moves from sparse chords to quicksilver runs, smoking minarets that tower above us in sheer cliffs which drop off abruptly, leaving us alone with McBride’s best solo thus far, all muscle and sinew; then McCoy and Lewis trade 4’s, Tyner builds it back up to an urbane blues, finishing with that glassy twinkle that is the timbral envy of any pianist, jazz or classical.

#5 Soulstice (Bartz)

This is a brilliant composition by Gary Bartz. Christian counts the tempo with a Blakeyan fill before the quintet take off in a sophisticated melody reminiscent of Shorter-era Miles—Bartz dazzles with ribbons of silken metal before Blanchard chills on the downpulse, subdividing into a crescendo of assured pleasure—then, oh boy, we’re given the Real McCoy, chords stacked like brick and suspended, while Tyner moves ivory faster than a Portuguese privateer—a contemplative solo from McBride swings into a brief spotlight by Nash, again conjuring the bop greats, and then a hurried finish.

#6 Blessings (Blanchard)

This number by Terence Blanchard is a dramatic pivot from the preceding—plaintive, rich harmony, a Silenian lament; Blanchard shows off Milesian arrogance before Bartz ponders the meaning of it all in rich tenor vibrations—McCoy gets vaguely Latin again, a-la a hungover philosopher poolside at the cabana in Havana; an almost tribal, insistent statement by Nash (so far my only complaint with this disc is the brevity of the drum solos; clearly L.N. could keep at it, heavy and inventive, for many a measure without dulling.)

#7 If I Should Lose You (Leo Robin, Ralph Rainger)

Sweet and soft, this piece, Tyner’s reverberations of marble giving way to demonstrations of ferocious virtuosity, fingers that know every scale and chordal extension…McBride gives one of his heaviest, drowsiest, most lolling yet precise solos, then Bartz picks up a higher-register sax and lays lyrical lines reminiscent of Coltrane near his relaxéd best. A pure, perfect ending.

#8 The Chase (Tyner)

Exciting, down-South N’Orleans feel again, courtesy of Tyner’s profound grasp of rhythm and harmony which he can bend to any occasion—quickly becomes an insane bopacalypse of almost arbitrary harmonic tension, all driven by purposeful rhythm and Nash’s indefatigable yet never repetitive trap work. Despite the fabulosity of the horns and the enviably sharp but resonant timbre of McBride’s double-bass, this group is never as exciting as when McCoy and McBride are trading and interweaving their contrapuntal apotheoses.

#9 West Philly Tone Poem (McBride) is rich in angular melodies and incessant rhythms and

#10 Alone Together (Arthur Schwartz) is best left for the listener to discover without further descriptor.