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JAZZ TIMES REVIEW 1993 BUELL NEIDLINGER QUARTET Big Drum K2B2 3069 (60:10)
ED SCHULLER & BAND The Eleventh Hour Tutu CD 888 124 (88:52)
Buell Neidlinger and Ed Schuller constitute something of a cross-generational continuum. Since the '50s, Neidlinger has busted through the gates of all the music ghettos, playing with everybody from Pee Wee Russell to Cecil Taylor and Frank Zappa. Even as a teenager, Ed Schuller was hip to polar opposites, as he leavened the influence of his father, Gunther Schuller, with large doses of Hendrix; the resulting wideangled perspective eventually landed him in the bands of, among others, Tim Berne, Paul Motian and Mal Waldron. Neidlinger and Schuller share an erudition that's laced with audacity, fine leadership qualities that give Big Drum and The Eleventh Hour their edge and energy. Schuller has gotten over a major career hump with The Eleventh Hour. He goes beyond writing catchy heads, supplying plenty of smart comping and transition devices that keep longer cuts like "Keeping Still/Mountain" simmering. Schuller also penned an engaging multitracked bass feature, "For Dodo." As a player, he's always stretching; his racing underpinning of "Shamal" is more bristling than the solos of many marquee bassists. And, it all rubs off on his ensemble-saxophonist Greg Osby trombonist Gary Valente, guitarist Bili Bickford, drummer Victor Jones and percussionist Arto Tuncboyaci. If, like The Sporting News, JazzTimes had Power Ratings, Ed Schuller would be leapfrogging over a lot of bassist/composer/leaders in the next listing on the strength of The Eleventh Hour. Neidlinger's Big Drum is big fun. Though this is a program where 14 bar blues, sacred Papago melodies and chromatic contrapuntal bridges are baseline fare, it by no means has the feel of a post graduate seminar in obscurantism. Neidlinger, tenorist Marty Krystall, trumpeter Hugh Schick and drummer Vinnie Colaiuta, have refined an elastic, rapidfire rapport. There's humor and honest hot improvisation in this live set. In turn, the quartet gives the material a Mingus like grittiness, a Nichols derived songfulness, or unmitigated Buellness (read: slightly madcap zeal). Their reading of "Brilliant Corners" is a pungent reminder of just how modern Monk can still sound. More than 35 years since his first sides with Cecil Taylor, Buell Neidlinger is still creating challenging, exciting music. -Bill Shoemaker |
