The Jay Azzolina Trio: Live at One Station Plaza

Best known for his stint with jazz fusion group Spyro Gyra, guitarist Jay Azzolina has recently taken a welcome tangent into the jazz mainstream, with last year's overlooked Past Tense —a crisp, snappy jazz workout featuring Chris Potter's fiery tenor sax and John Patitucci on bass—and now fronting a B-3 organ (Gary Versace) and drums(Adam Nussbaum) on Live at One Station Plaza

This set has a very different feel to it than the previous CD, with the cool breeze of the B-3 blowing washes of sound behind Azzolina's sharp, clean lines. The set—all Azzolina originals—is energized by the improvisational openess afforded by the backing organ taking over the bass chores. The CD opens with an up-tempo blues, "It's All About You", closes with a jaunty, driving cooker with "It's All About Me", gets thoughtful, poignant with "Irene", and tips a hat to Coltrane in the middle with "So Steps the Giant"

Azzolina has spent his time of late close to home for sake of family, teaching and working on his technique and writing, a mode that's obvious paid off.

And the sound: This is a live recording, but you'll have to listen closely to tell. The sound is clean and sharp with the after-song crowd applause set low in the mix; the band is tight, in a loose, flowing sort of way, the performance seamless.

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