Redman is a saxophonist of such intelligence and energy that you could probably place him in any musical setting, and he would find a way to make himself at home. Sitting in with the trio Soulive on Thursday night for a JVC Jazz Festival performance at Le Poisson Rouge, he did just that.
Although Mr. Redman is best known as a master of straight-ahead post-bop jazz, he has made some appealing side trips over the years into the groove-heavy funk that is Soulive's specialty. Furthermore, like most jazz musicians who have risen to prominence in the last two decades, he knows his history. In the 1960s some of the most vital (if critically underappreciated) jazz was the work of tenor saxophonists backed by soulful organ trios, of which Soulive is a contemporary variation. Mr. Redman must have relished the opportunity to revive that tradition.
The best of the old jazz organ groups, though, could be smooth and ingratiating as well as hard-rocking. Soulive, at least in the first of its two sets on Thursday, was more one-dimensional. The three musicians played with tremendous skill and generated a lot of heat. There were stunning solos by the guitarist Eric Krasno and the keyboardist Neal Evans (who played synthesizers as well as an old-school Hammond B3 organ), and the drummer Alan Evans kept things moving with a ferociously focused drive. But there wasn't a single subtle moment.
