Acting Trio

The Bad Plus - Inevitable Western (2014) {Okeh 88843 02406 2}
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© 2014 Okeh / The Bad Plus / Sony Music | 88843 02406 2
Jazz / Post Bop / Neo Bop / Modern Creative / Avant-Garde Jazz / Piano Trio

It's in the opening moments of "I Hear You," the first track on Inevitable Western: the mercurial, mysterious, yet utterly musical sense of adventure that lies at the heart of the Bad Plus' sound. After recording the rigorous, mathematically challenging score for Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring – released only six months prior to this – one can almost hear relief in the trio's return to its own universe. These nine tracks are equally divided compositionally among bassist Reid Anderson, pianist Ethan Iverson, and drummer Dave King.

The Reverend Peyton's Big Damn Band are actually a trio – the Reverend Josh Peyton on primitive slide guitar, harmonica, and vocals; his wife, Breezy Peyton, on washboard and backing vocals; and Aaron "Cuz" Persinger on percussion (often buckets and trash cans) and background vocals – but the sound is big indeed, a boozy, uncontained noise in which jug band, country, blues, and down-home boogie tumble around in a joyous, uplifting cacophony……

Primarily known as an avant-garde jazz drummer, Tyshawn Sorey is also an adept classical composer whose music doesn't so much straddle genres as leap over them. Whether playing with his own groups, like his trio with pianist Kris Davis and saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, or with such luminaries as trumpeter Dave Douglas and saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell, Sorey has proven himself a mutative player with a sympathetic ear for highly impressionistic group interplay. So sympathetic, in fact, that he often melds so deeply into the overall group sound that you're left with less a sense of Sorey's own playing than of the group's.

Larry Goldings & Peter Bernstein & Bill Stewart - Toy Tunes (2017) {Pirouet PIT3100}
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© 2017 Pirouet Records | PIT3100
Jazz / Soul Jazz / Cool / Hammond Organ / Guitar / Drums

Just look at the cover art—the swirl of colors, the bodies drawn to the eye as misshapen designs, the beauteous blotches, the sturdy rhythms of angularity. In some ways it's almost inconceivable to imagine all of that acting as one, yet these images form a perfectly perceivable whole—a picture that feels like home yet sits in its own space, artfully different yet accessible and inviting. It's a perfect parallel for the work of these three master musicians, collectively viewed as the most creatively durable organ trio in jazz.