David Liebman: Lieb Plays the Blues à la Trane - review

David Liebman is one of the most creative jazz saxophonists on the planet – but he adds to that an unmistakably single-minded devotion to fresh music-making that makes each new album feel like an informal meeting with an inspired friend. Liebman didn't plan this Coltrane-dedicated trio exploration of the blues – he just turned up on tour at Belgium's De Singer club with bassist Marius Beets and drummer Eric Ineke and felt like examining Coltrane's harmonically revolutionary approach to the idiom. Three pieces here are therefore Coltrane blues originals, alongside a feverishly whirling visit to Miles Davis's All Blues and a finale of Duke Ellington's Take the Coltrane. In between is the deliciously lazy swinger Up Against the Wall that turns into a slamming improvisation, a skimming Mr PC featuring the powerful Eric Ineke, and a quietly whimsical and eventually exultant Village Blues. It's a sax master-class, as usual. JF