Rabo de Nube Charles Lloyd Quartet

• 1 Prometheus 14:51
• 2 Migration of Spirit 10:14
• 3 Booker's Garden 14:32
• 4 Ramanujan 11:38
• 5 La Colline de Monk 04:01
• 6 Sweet Georgia Bright 12:16
• 7 Rabo de Nube 07:35
• Total Runtime 01:15:07

Info for Rabo de Nube

Benannt wurde das Album nach einem Stück des kubanischen Sängers und Songwriters Silvio Rodríguez. Die wunderbare Ballade, mit der das Quartett seinen Auftritt beendete, ist schon seit langem eines von Lloyds Lieblingsstücken. Es ist auch nicht das erste Mal, daß Lloyd 'Rabo de nube' (zu deutsch: 'Wolkenschweif') auf einem ECM-Album präsentiert. 2002 hatte er die Ballade schon einmal für 'Lift Every Voice' (ECM 1832) aufgenommen. Alle anderen Kompositionen indes stammen aus Lloyds eigener Feder. Darunter befindet sich auch 'Sweet Georgia Bright', ein Stück, das Lloyd erstmals 1964 aufnahm, sowohl mit seiner eigenen Band ('Discovery! The Charles Lloyd Quartet', Columbia Records) als auch mit dem Cannonball Adderleys Sextet ('Fiddler On The Roof', Capitol Records). Die schwungvolle Nummer ist seit dieser Zeit immer ein Highlight bei Konzerten von Lloyd gewesen.

Dieses Live-Album, das 2007 bei einem Auftritt in Basel mitgeschnitten wurde, erscheint pünktlich zu Charles Lloyds 70. Geburtstag am 15. März 2008. Der Saxophonist präsentierte sich bei dieser Gelegenheit mit einem neubesetzten Quartett: von den Musikern, mit denen er 2004 'Jumping The Creek' (ECM 1911) eingespielt hatte, war nur noch Schlagzeuger Eric Harland übriggeblieben. Pianistin Geri Allen und Bassist Robert Hurst wurden von Jason Moran und Reuben Rogers abgelöst, die mit diesen Aufnahmen auch ihren Einstand bei ECM geben. Wie stets ermunterte Lloyd seine Mitspieler - die in diesem Fall nur halb so alt sind wie er selbst - sich nicht auf die Rolle der Begleiter zu beschränken, sondern eigene Ideen in die Musik einzubringen.

Charles Lloyd has always led exceptional bands, and this is one of the finest. Following on from the live “Rabo de Nube” which won both the Readers and Critics Polls of Jazz Times, here is a studio album from the quartet with Jason Moran, Reuben Rogers and Eric Harland.

Memphis-born Lloyd has played with some exceptional pianists in the course of his long career, starting with Phineas Newborn in his home town, with Joe Zawinul in the Cannonball Adderley group, and with Keith Jarrett, whom Lloyd introduced in his pioneering group of the 1960s. Subsequent Lloyd quartet pianists have included Michel Petrucciani, Bobo Stenson, and Geri Allen. Unfazed by the achievements of these distinguished predecessors, Jason Moran finds his own, exciting way to play inside Lloyd’s musical concepts. As the New York Times once observed, Moran reaches both further back in the jazz tradition and further outside it than most of his contemporaries. His strongly chordal approach and his percussive originality took off from an early interest in Thelonious Monk, but Moran (born 1975) studied with three great teachers – Jaki Byard, Andrew Hill, and Muhal Richard Abrams – who encouraged him to find his own path. He has recorded a number of critically-acclaimed albums as a leader, won a number of prizes including the Jazz Journalists Association’s Pianist of the Year Award, and performed with many great musicians from Wayne Shorter to Lee Konitz.

Jason Moran is a pianist, composer, and bandleader who mines a variety of musical styles to create adventurous, genre-crossing jazz performances. Moran’s signature corpus marries established classical, blues, and jazz techniques with the musical influences of his generation, including funk, hip-hop, and rock. On his solo piano album, Modernistic (2002), he explores the evolution of twentieth-century rhythmic techniques through his virtuosic execution of two-handed “stride” piano—a style used extensively by jazz artists in the 1920s—while Same Mother (2005) is a re-examination of the emotional and stylistic elements of the blues tradition.

Reuben Rogers was born in the Virgin Islands and grew up listening to calypso and reggae as well as jazz, exposure that seems to have impacted on the lyrical dancing swing of his bass playing. He works exceptionally well with Harland, exploring loose grooves behind Lloyd ’s solos, and speaks of the joy of “being in the music in the moment,” when the Lloyd band is improvising collectively, “without any worries, just giving it all.” A much sought after sideman, Reuben has also worked extensively with Nicholas Payton, Joshua Redman, Dianne Reeves and more.

Eric Harland is increasingly regarded as one of the most important contemporary jazz drummers. In addition to his work with Lloyd in the quartet and in the Sangam trio (with Zakir Hussain) he has played and recorded with McCoy Tyner, Pharoah Sanders, Greg Osby, Dave Holland and many others.

Booklet for Rabo de Nube