Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Stan Kenton: Adventures in Time

363

Stan Kenton: Adventures in Time

By

View read count
Stan Kenton: Adventures in Time
Out of the entire recorded oeuvre of the Stan Kenton Orchestra, Adventures in Time is one of the most adventurous and musically satisfying records. The album features eight compositions by Johnny Richards arranged in a suitelike totality, with the title "A Concerto for Orchestra."

If Richard's "Concerto for Orchestra" bears little harmonic resemblance to the composition of the same name by Bela Bartok, the overall conception of the work is indeed influenced by the Hungarian master. Richards treats the jazz orchestra as a single soloist, exploiting the available multifaceted textures and sonorities in an organic fashion.

While some critics have derided this album as bombastic and unjazzlike, Kenton and Richards were aiming for much more than the typical fare for a big band. What the Modern Jazz Quartet did in synthesizing the jazz combo and European chamber music, Kenton was doing in combining the big band with the complexities and sonorities of the traditional European orchestra.

The music contained herein expresses a range of emotions and textures every bit as complex and affecting as those found within a symphony by Gustav Mahler. There are times when Kenton's forces roar with a full orchestral tutti, episodes of incredible lyricism, and numerous instances of inspired improvised solos and intense swing.

One of the most interesting aspects of Adventures in Time is that it is one of the first instances of a jazz recording made employing unusual time signatures (for jazz, that is), such as 5/4, 9/8, 6/8 and 7/4. Four musicians provide the bulk of the solos: Gabe Baltazar on alto sax, Don Menza on tenor, Marv Stamm on trumpet and Ray Starling on mellophonium.

Ray Starling is one of the most underappreciated figures in jazz. A musician of incredible subtlety and invention, he made the unwieldy (and intonationally suspect) mellophonium do things that one would have thought impossible. In the laconic "Artemis and Apollo," Starling delivers a solo as movingly beautiful and powerful as anything ever recorded by Freddie Hubbard.

Gabe Baltazar's solos on "Artemis" and "March to Polaris" reveal him to be a saxophonist who was every bit the equal of the acoustic behemoth of the Kenton brass section.

And nowhere is the unique sound of the Kenton trombone section heard to greater effect than in "Quintile," so named because of its 5/4 time signature. Adventures in Time sounds as breathtakingly modern today as it did when it was first released over forty years ago.

Track Listing

Commencement; Quintile; Artemis; 4 3 X 3 X 2 X 2 X 2 = 72; March to Polaris; Septuor from Antares; Artemis and Apollo; Apercu

Personnel

Stan Kenton, piano; Bud Parker, trombone; Dalton Smith, trumpet; Ray Starling, mellophonium; Dave Wheeler, trombone; Gary Slavo, trumpet; Steve Dweck, tympani, percussion; Tom Ringo, trombone; Ray Florian, sax; Johnny Richards, arranger, conductor; Jim Amlotte, trombone; Dee Barton, drums; Bob Behrendt, trumpet; Allan Beutler, sax; Joe Burnett, mellophonium; Bucky Calabrese, bass; Dwight Carver, mellophonium; Bob Fitzpatrick, trombone; Joel Kaye, sax; Keith LaMotte, trumpet; Don Menza, sax; Marvin Stamm, trumpet; Gabe Baltazar, sax

Album information

Title: Adventures in Time | Year Released: 2003 | Record Label: Capitol Records

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT




Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Tramonto
John Taylor
Ki
Natsuki Tamura / Satoko Fujii
Duality Pt: 02
Dom Franks' Strayhorn
The Sound of Raspberry
Tatsuya Yoshida / Martín Escalante

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.