Percy Heath: A Love Song

This 80 year old bassist from one of the great jazz families, the Heaths, has finally recorded his first session as a leader, and it is a touchingly atmospheric affair. Only one really catchy melody graces the album, "Django," from Percy Heath's Modern Jazz Quartet days of a half century ago, but this album is less about tunes with hooks than about establishing a graceful air, tunes blending into one long session of delicate jazz impressionism.

Aided handsomely by pianist Jeb Patton and brother Albert "Tootie" Heath on drums, Heath adds a second bassist, Peter Washington, for his "Suite for Pop." The title track showcases Percy Heath in a pensive mood, as if searching for the thread of a song to encompass the sense of loss connected to a lost love. The leader's sure feel for the blues is underscored in a number of originals in that style. This is an album requiring deep concentration, and rewards such, in an introverted style recalling the Modern Jazz Quartet at its most meditative.