Carlos Henriquez

Bassist and composer Carlos Henriquez is one of the first truly bilingual musicians, a virtuoso in both jazz and Afro-Latin traditions. Henriquez has been a member of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra since he was only 19 years old. The Bronx native has been a phenomenon since high school, back when he was playing with local heroes like Puente, Eddie Palmieri, and Celia Cruz, and tonight’s program is the world premiere of his latest project, The South Bronx Story.

In 1964 John Coltrane recorded A Love Supreme with McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison, and Elvin Jones. It's one of most influential and imposing jazz suites ever written, and on this debut CD for the Palmetto label, The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, featuring Wynton Marsalis, adapts Coltrane's immortal composition to the big band. Not to be outdone by his brother Branford's quartet version of this material recorded live on DVD, Wynton and company skillfully extend and elaborate on the Coltrane's work, and preserve the soul-searching spirit of the four-part suite, which deals with the blues, 4/4 swing, Afro-Latin rhythms, and ballads. Pulsed by Carlos Henriquez's sure-footed basslines, Herlin Riley's spiritual syncopations and Earl Lewis's profound pianisms, saxophonist Wess "Warmdaddy" Anderson's Tranish cries, and the leader's triumphant trumpet tones are as fluent and fierce as ever. Collectively, this brilliant orchestra goes where no large ensemble has gone before.

Given the significance of Afro-Latin rhythms in jazz’s development, there’s inherent value in a premier repertory ensemble like the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra collaborating with legendary Panamanian singer Rubén Blades. But the delight of this 2014 live performance is hearing the musicians stretch themselves beyond the safety of well-trodden Latin jazz territory. Along with reliably excellent performances of salsa tunes, Blades brings Rat Pack brashness to American standards like “Too Close for Comfort,” “Fever,” and “They Can’t Take That Away From Me.” And in bassist Carlos Henriquez’s arrangements of Blades classics like “El Cantante,” the JALCO shifts between its always-convincing swing and bona fide clave, educating us in the rhythms’ historic connections along the way. After the full orchestra’s sheer sonic force, Blades’ “Patria” is an album highlight, with a scaled-down ensemble of percussionists, bass, and trumpeter Wynton Marsalis backing the singer in stark magnificence.

Wynton Marsalis & Eric Clapton - Play the Blues: Live from Jazz at Lincoln Center (2011) {Reprise Japan WPCR-14190}
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© 2011 Reprise / Rhino / Warner Japan | WPCR-14190
Blues / Jazz / Blues Rock / Contemporary Jazz / Jump Blues

United by dalliances with purism as young men and an abiding love of classic blues and jazz, Eric Clapton and Wynton Marsalis are a more comfortable fit than it may initially seem. Both musicians are synthesists, not innovators, stitching together elements from their idols in an attempt to preserve the past while bringing it into the present, so their sensibilities are aligned and, in 2011, they’re amenable to a partnership that explores their common ground. So, Clapton and Marsalis held a series of concerts at New York City’s Jazz at Lincoln Center in April of 2011, the guitarist selecting the songs (apart from “Layla,” performed upon the request of bassist Carlos Henriquez), the trumpeter picking the band and working up the arrangements, using King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band as his template yet finding room for piano and, of course, guitar.

Willie Nelson & Wynton Marsalis - Two Men With The Blues (2008) {Blue Note 50999 5 04454 2 4}
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© 2008 Blue Note / EMI | 50999 5 04454 2 4
Jazz / Blues / Mainstream Jazz / Progressive Country

History has proven that Willie Nelson will duet with pretty much anybody who comes along, and while this open-hearted open mind sometimes backfires, more often than not it results in some of his most sublime recordings. Two Men with the Blues, his album with jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis recorded over a two-night stand at Jazz at Lincoln Center on January 12 and 13, 2007, belongs in the latter category, standing as truly one of the most special records in either Nelson's or Marsalis' catalog. If the pair initially seem like an odd match, it's only because Wynton long carried the reputation of a purist, somebody who was adamant against expanding the definition of jazz, which cast him as the opposite of Willie, who never found a border he couldn't blur.

As his first album of all-original material (performed with a quintet or less) since his 1988 release Thick in the South: Soul Gestures in Southern Blue, Vol. 1, and his first album for Blue Note Records, trumpeter Wynton Marsalis' The Magic Hour is a disappointing return to progressive, small-group jazz. This is not to say that there aren't some excellent things here, but taken as an album, The Magic Hour seems logy and inconsequential.