Within the Realms of Our Dreams
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Track listing
- 1 Zaire 6:12
- 2 The Sepia Love Song 8:33
- 3 Una muy Bonita 5:11
- 4 Donna Lee 4:18
- 5 Up Behind the Beat 5:40
- 6 Time to Go Home 6:10
- 7 Delfeayo's Dilemma 4:59
- 8 A Raggamuffin & His Lance 6:34
- 9 A Slave's Tale 5:08
- Total length: 52:45
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1 Review
The fact that nobody has reviewed this before me really is a sad sign of the times, especially considering how many jazz fans frequent this site. If Courtney Pine had been active on the scene in the 1960s he would be regarded today in the same breath as John Coltrane, Wayne Shorter, Sonny Rollins and Dewey Redman. His technique is beyond reproach. Just check out his very Coltrane-ish soprano sax on the opener, "Zaire". It's gloriously intense and always builds in an impressively ebullient and urgent manner--impulsive, exultant and utterly charged. You tangibly feel his intensity as he stands at the very edge of the proverbial precipice of "the new land".
He's equally adept at the slower tempo numbers, like (the beginning of) his original composition, "The Sepia Love Song", where his playing is shown off in all its multifaceted glory. Later as the song progresses, he builds up to some nice "outside" soloing. Backed by Charnett Moffett on bass, Kenny Kirkland on piano and Jeff "Tain" Watts on drums, this is a powerful and committed quartet, easily able to to hold their own with the best quartets of the past. Besides original and strongly ideosyncratic takes on Ornette Coleman's, "Una Muy Bonita" and Charlie Parker's, "Donna Lee", Pine's own compositional skills are readily apparent on the infectious "Up Behind The Beat", the immense tour de force blowing of "A Raggamuffin And His Lance" and the solemn "A Slave's Tale". Nice too to hear Pine in a strictly acoustic, "trad" environment, where he can show off his creative prowess without other distractions.
That this CD can be found on amazon starting at a buck fifty or so is testament to the enduring (and growing) fact that talent alone is not enough to garner an audience that is commensurrate with one's level of said talent. As this album's producer Delfeayo Marsalis writes in his liner notes, "In this generation, to accomplish anything of substance (let alone art) is a remarkable feat for several reasons. First and foremost, the 'let's just have fun' conception has been bastardized to such a degree, that seriousness is treated as an HIV symptom". And this is true, as with the dance-centric early 1990s (and I assume he also means the related simplified no brainer music), today's mainstream image centric music swamps so much else of a true artistic bent that mediocrity becomes the goal--the valley replaces the one time peak that had previously been aspired to. He continues by saying, "the question we face in the nineties is a simple one: is there currently a place for anything else? Let's hope so." Well, as corporate dance music and faceless, interchangeable pop stars glut so much of the public's consciousness in the 2000s it's sad to say there is little room for this type of jazz for the great unwashed masses. Nice to know, therefore, there is still a minority who do have some discernment--and that's you fellow RYMer!
Like James Carter, Pine knows the "importance of tradition" while forging bravely ahead into an uncertain future with his own deep satchel of ideas. As Marsalis writes, "Just as any student must emulate, yet question the work of his teachers, Courtney Pine has grown to understand the importance of tradition." And knowing that tradition, he builds upon it, creating a fresh, emotionally charged music that sweats and pulses in a manner far removed from a mere academic emulation of his distinguished predecessors. Like Carter, Pine is aware of the achievements of the jazz greats of the past but is not interested in becoming some kind of "museum" musician, working in a musical vacuum, re-creating past glories (which really brings to mind Delfeayo's brother Wynton, who for all intents and purposes has taken it upon himself to become the curator of that very museum!), he is a true seeker and someone who should be recognized in the future as one of the very best of his generation. Sadly not nearly as many who sing the praises of Coltrane will probably be doing the same for Pine but hopefully a growing legion will over time.
Certainly one hopes there will be enough people who will be getting into Pine's music to help "up" the price on his used CDs from a buck fifty! Of course the upside of this is that that low price is your cue to get your ass over to amazon to order this CD! There is little justice in the world but we can all do our part to redress the balance a bit.
(As an aside, Pine is the only jazz sax colossus to have ever appeared in a Doctor Who episode. He popped up playing some serious sax in the Seventh Doctor story "Silver Nemesis" back in 1988 with Sylvester McCoy as the Doc. The Doctor and Ace (his companion) are sitting at an outdoor club, along a lazily flowing stream, on a beautiful spring day watching Pine and his band kick some ass (musically speaking). Hell the Cybermen even get a metal earful of Pine's sax later in the episode when the Doctor blasts a Pine recording on Ace's boombox and the sweet sounds fill the Cybermen's spaceship. Fun shit. As McCoy comments in the episode, "Just what I like, straight blowing". Hey, you heard the Doctor, what are you waiting for?)
He's equally adept at the slower tempo numbers, like (the beginning of) his original composition, "The Sepia Love Song", where his playing is shown off in all its multifaceted glory. Later as the song progresses, he builds up to some nice "outside" soloing. Backed by Charnett Moffett on bass, Kenny Kirkland on piano and Jeff "Tain" Watts on drums, this is a powerful and committed quartet, easily able to to hold their own with the best quartets of the past. Besides original and strongly ideosyncratic takes on Ornette Coleman's, "Una Muy Bonita" and Charlie Parker's, "Donna Lee", Pine's own compositional skills are readily apparent on the infectious "Up Behind The Beat", the immense tour de force blowing of "A Raggamuffin And His Lance" and the solemn "A Slave's Tale". Nice too to hear Pine in a strictly acoustic, "trad" environment, where he can show off his creative prowess without other distractions.
That this CD can be found on amazon starting at a buck fifty or so is testament to the enduring (and growing) fact that talent alone is not enough to garner an audience that is commensurrate with one's level of said talent. As this album's producer Delfeayo Marsalis writes in his liner notes, "In this generation, to accomplish anything of substance (let alone art) is a remarkable feat for several reasons. First and foremost, the 'let's just have fun' conception has been bastardized to such a degree, that seriousness is treated as an HIV symptom". And this is true, as with the dance-centric early 1990s (and I assume he also means the related simplified no brainer music), today's mainstream image centric music swamps so much else of a true artistic bent that mediocrity becomes the goal--the valley replaces the one time peak that had previously been aspired to. He continues by saying, "the question we face in the nineties is a simple one: is there currently a place for anything else? Let's hope so." Well, as corporate dance music and faceless, interchangeable pop stars glut so much of the public's consciousness in the 2000s it's sad to say there is little room for this type of jazz for the great unwashed masses. Nice to know, therefore, there is still a minority who do have some discernment--and that's you fellow RYMer!
Like James Carter, Pine knows the "importance of tradition" while forging bravely ahead into an uncertain future with his own deep satchel of ideas. As Marsalis writes, "Just as any student must emulate, yet question the work of his teachers, Courtney Pine has grown to understand the importance of tradition." And knowing that tradition, he builds upon it, creating a fresh, emotionally charged music that sweats and pulses in a manner far removed from a mere academic emulation of his distinguished predecessors. Like Carter, Pine is aware of the achievements of the jazz greats of the past but is not interested in becoming some kind of "museum" musician, working in a musical vacuum, re-creating past glories (which really brings to mind Delfeayo's brother Wynton, who for all intents and purposes has taken it upon himself to become the curator of that very museum!), he is a true seeker and someone who should be recognized in the future as one of the very best of his generation. Sadly not nearly as many who sing the praises of Coltrane will probably be doing the same for Pine but hopefully a growing legion will over time.
Certainly one hopes there will be enough people who will be getting into Pine's music to help "up" the price on his used CDs from a buck fifty! Of course the upside of this is that that low price is your cue to get your ass over to amazon to order this CD! There is little justice in the world but we can all do our part to redress the balance a bit.
(As an aside, Pine is the only jazz sax colossus to have ever appeared in a Doctor Who episode. He popped up playing some serious sax in the Seventh Doctor story "Silver Nemesis" back in 1988 with Sylvester McCoy as the Doc. The Doctor and Ace (his companion) are sitting at an outdoor club, along a lazily flowing stream, on a beautiful spring day watching Pine and his band kick some ass (musically speaking). Hell the Cybermen even get a metal earful of Pine's sax later in the episode when the Doctor blasts a Pine recording on Ace's boombox and the sweet sounds fill the Cybermen's spaceship. Fun shit. As McCoy comments in the episode, "Just what I like, straight blowing". Hey, you heard the Doctor, what are you waiting for?)
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