Pepe Mtoto Julian Priester

Pepe Mtoto Julián Priester, "Love, Love", ECM 1044ST

ECM, probably the only jazz-oriented recording company in the world consistent both in quality and quantity, carries on with Love, Love by Pepe Mtoto Julián Priester. Priester has pretty much picked up where his band with Herbie Hancock left off, with Dr. Pat Gleeson very prominently on the synthesizer controls, a cooking, high energy rhythm section, and not too much solo space. It seems Priester is more interested in his function as composer-bandleader-arranger than in his trombone playing, which is cool. The sound he makes with his band is beautiful, and hopefully, we'll hear some more of Pepe's trombone in future offerings.

Pat Gleeson is the only player I've heard use the synthesizer purely as a conjuror of sound, rather than as a weird organ. He's not a jazz keyboard player, and he doesn't treat the synthesizer keyboard like a piano or organ, blowing jazz lines, chords, etc. The sounds he fills the music with - tinkling shattering glass, chattering air hammers, collapsing buildings - are sounds, yet in ensemble context, are music. And Gleeson never lacks for imagination. The other electronics, particularly the Arp String Synthesizer played by Priester himself, work well too. lt's a gas to hear "strings" played by an improvisor in a small combo, especially when the improvisor is the likes of Pepe Mtoto Julián Priester.

-- Steve Wood