Jack Walrath Unsafe At Any Speed

Trumpeter Jack Walrath's music by the mid-'80s tended to play off of the melodies of tunes and their moods rather than merely following chord changes and predictable patterns. Heading a sextet on this Blue Note CD that includes tenor saxophonist Carter Jefferson (who doubles on clarinet), guitarist John Abercrombie, pianist James Williams, bassist Anthony Cox and drummer Ronnie Burrage, Walrath performs such originals as the exciting "Village of the Darned," the somewhat scary "Fright Night," the impressionistic "England" and a remake of "Beer." Although somewhat overlooked, Jack Walrath is always well worth checking out for he avoids the obvious and his music is full of surprises.

Jack Walrath and his Masters of Suspense turn to an idiom that was once among jazz's more popular, but in recent years has been almost ignored - funk/soul-jazz. Besides a decent remake of James Brown's "Get On The Good Foot," the group opens with "Anya And Liz On The Veranda" and also does Charles Mingus' "Better Get Hit In Your Soul." Walrath's trumpet and flugelhorn horn solos are always intense and occasionally exciting; only the Brown remake falters, mainly because it was a textbook funk piece and doesn't translate well to a straight instrumental setting. Otherwise, the Masters of Suspense do a good job of displaying their soul-jazz chops.

When many of the bop-based Young Lions who emerged in the '90s made it known that they were only interested in playing in the tradition and that they had no interest in avant-garde experiments, Jack Walrath insisted that he was playing out of the tradition and didn't shy away from an inside/outside approach. Walrath isn't as radical as Lester Bowie, but he certainly isn't as conservative as Wynton Marsalis, either. One of the many impressive albums he provided in the '90s, Journey, Man! finds the trumpeter leading a band he called Hard Corps and employs a cast of players you'd expect to find on a hard bop date, including Bobby Watson (alto sax), Craig Handy (tenor and soprano sax), Kenny Drew, Jr. (piano), Ray Drummond (bass), and Victor Lewis (drums)…