Mark Masters Ensemble: Sam Rivers 100

The Mark Masters Ensemble released Porgy and Bess Redefined! (Capri Records) in 2005. The music was taken from the George Gershwin/DuBose Heyward English-language opera, which was first performed in 1935. Masters' take on the classic was brilliantly expressed by the ensemble, who dug into his adventurous charts with freedom mixed with respect for the familiar and often-covered (most notably by the Miles Davis/Gil Evans teaming) original. It was a breakout effort for Masters. Billy Harper was there on tenor sax, and Gary Smulyan sat in the baritone saxophone chair. The album told us two things: Masters had what it takes to put a large ensemble together and arrange for it, and he was a genius at redefining the past masters.

"Redefinition" became Masters' forte. Past masters who Masters chose to examine:: trumpeter Clifford Brown, composer Alec Wilder, saxophonist Dewey Redman and alto saxophonist Lee Konitz. The magic of Masters' arranging goes full throttle into the music of the avant-garde jazz pioneer, with Sam Rivers 100, in celebration of the composer/multi-reedist's 100th birthday.

Rivers' debut as a leader, Fuschia Swing Song (Blue Note, 1965), gets particular attention. All six of the album's songs are reexamined here, along with five other tunes from the Rivers songbook, by a 14-piece ensemble that digs deep into the loose-limbed, loosely structured compositions. Masters wanted players willing to take chances, with flexible tetherings in terms of the pieces' formal architecture.

The disc opens with the tune "Fuchsia Swing Song," a choice of the familiar. It does indeed swing. Harper, a player who takes chances with the best of them, gets wild and woolly on his solo. Jeff Colella, on piano, reins the sound in a bit, with a concise, constrained (relatively, coming after Harper's turn) solo that seems to conjure he ghost of Ahmad Jamal. Saxophonist Jerry Pinter is up next, trying to turn the sound into a powerhouse blowing match with Harper, while drummer Kendall Kay plays with the energy of mid-career Art Blakey.

Though Rivers was usually tagged as a free jazz guy, that tagging proves that labels are, at best, inadequate. "Fuschia Swing Song" was, in Rivers' hands back then, and in the Mark Masters Ensemble's numerous hands now, an approachable piece of music. So too, his "Beatrice," one of the jazz oeuvre's prettiest tunes, is covered often and well. Here it, opens on a melancholy piano turn. Harper's solo has a rich, burnished feel to it. The band backing is understated, featuring glorious harmonies. If a top Rivers tune must be picked, this is it. A revisitation of earlier Mark Masters Jazz Ensembles works—especially Porgy and Bess demonstrates that Masters can add a taste of the wild side to even the most sophisticated, mainstream work. Listening to Sam Rivers 100 says he can go to the wild side and make it wilder, and still pull it back into a beautiful, mainstream flow.