Marionettes On A High Wire Baikida Carroll (OmniTone)
 

SCHWANN INSIDE Jazz & Classical
May 2001
by Kevin Whitehead

 
         On and off the scene for almost 30 years, Baikida Carroll has yet to get his due as a trumpet modernist. He’s helped spark albums by Julius Hemphill, Muhal Richard Abrams, Oliver Lake, David Murray and others. But kept busy as a composer of underscores for theater, Carroll’s made precious few discs of his own. His previous album was recorded in 1994 (Door of the Cage, Soul Note 121123, with most of the same cast as his new CD), though he played on and wrote two tunes for the New York Jazz Collective’s 1996 CD, I Don’t Know This World Without Don Cherry (Naxos Jazz 86003).

          Where many trumpeters impersonate Miles Davis when using a harmon mute, Carroll’s fat tone and popping attack on Marionettes’ “Miss Julie” suggest the formidable Lee Morgan. When Baikida bears down on the microphone a sec, the whole room can shake. On open horn, he doesn’t try to blow you down, favoring a tart, slightly puckered tone and conscientiously varied phrasing, enough to suggest why Dave Douglas is an admirer. Carroll’s sound can break up a bit here and there, but his incisive timing and sure double-time runs stave off any impression of loss of control.

          Besides the poignant “Miss Julie,” two other tunes began life as theater music. As you might expect, Carroll knows how to create a mood. He also has an admirable way of juggling solo assignments from track to track. Some melodies pass pleasantly by the ear without lingering in memory, but there are exceptions. “Ebullient Secrets” is built around a catchy staccato riff put through its paces: a blowing tune, but a good one. The title track and its loose treatment, and the repeated upward horn fillip that graces “Down Under,” recall without slavish imitation the deceptively simple pieces Wayne Shorter wrote for Miles Davis.

          In bassist Michael Formanek and drummer Pheeroan akLaff, Baikida has two alert and very inventive rhythm players who can dance lightly in support, attack the time from arcane angles or poke and prod a soloist. They propel leapfrogging horns on the pianoless freebopper “Flamboye,” and strive to keep the modal “Griot’s Last Dance” from sounding static. Pianist Adegoke Steve Colson’s work is fuzzier. He handles the tricky anchor motif on “Velma” – trembling a chord in 8/8 time with the right hand over half-speed rolling triplets from the left – but only suggests authentic stride piano on the brief stunt “Cab,” with its self-conscious echoes of early jazz. Saxophonist Erica Lindsay complements Baikida well on “Miss Julie” and “Down Under,” where her warm sonorous tone dovetails with his, but she’s often longer on timbre than stimulating ideas.

          Marionettes is uneven, but it is worth your time to hear Baikida step out and Formanek and akLaff hook up and logroll till dawn. The airy recording by engineer Jon Rosenberg, an unsung hero of the New York scene, is typically impeccable. He knows how to make a bass sound like a bass and keep a warm ambience from overheating.