Rich Pellegrin Quintet: Three-Part Odyssey (2011)

Dan McClenaghan

Senior Contributor since 2002

A lover of sounds, and the way they fit together.

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Published: August 11, 2011

Rich Pellegrin Quintet: Three-Part Odyssey

What a strange, compelling, often circuitous trip Three-Part Odyssey is. Pianist/composer/bandleader Rich Pellegrin has collected a youthful quintet of Seattle's boldest and most energetic musicians for his debut CD—73 minutes of audacious grooves inside a set of freewheeling compositions that showcase each band member's individual virtuosic prowess without abandoning the collective mood.

Along with the leader, three of the quintet's members contribute to the songwriting, starting off with trumpeter R. Scott Morning's labyrinthine "Part 1: Nothing Comes To Mind," a 12-minute journey within the CD's larger odyssey that begins sounding like a dark-hued and slightly warped vehicle that trumpeter Lee Morgan Lee Morgan
1938 - 1972
trumpet might have used. Tangy unison horns break into interwoven lines that give way to bassist Evan Flory-Barnes Evan Flory-Barnes
' hypnotic groove. Then Pellegrin comes in for an extended trio segment that shifts from robotic interludes to brightly melodic passages, evolving toward freedom. The groove returns, leading into tenor saxophonist Neil Welch Neil Welch
b.1985
sax, tenor 's solo slot, initially smoldering over Flory-Barnes' bass and inside the rumble and bounce of Christopher Icasiano Christopher Icasiano
b.1986
drums 's drums. Saxophone momentum builds, and trumpet and sax squabble over Pellegrin's Cecil Taylor Cecil Taylor
b.1929
piano -like free flights.

Flory-Barnes' contemplative ballad, "Distant, Distorted, You," showcases a lucid saxophone/trumpet conversation over Pellegrin's repeated, machine-like chords. Morning's "Obtusity" closes out the first part of Three Part Odyssey, the trumpeter blowing relaxed, elastic lines over the rhythm section's roiling turbulence before he cranks things into an atmosphere of agitation, biting off short, choppy,razor-sharp notes that fly out over the edge.

When a jazz quintet is composed of young players tagged as "forward-looking," that often means musicians trying to sound like trumpeter Miles Davis Miles Davis
1926 - 1991
trumpet ' second great quintet. It's a trap that Pellegrin and his band avoid, with a sound—with its multiple songwriting voices—that's remarkably original, the playing often fierce and stormy, at other times restrained and unabashedly beautiful. Pellegrin seems to have multiple influences, displaying at times the density and drive and penchant for repetition of pianist McCoy Tyner McCoy Tyner
b.1938
piano , elsewhere sounding free and unpredictable, like no one but himself on this superb debut.