Soul on Soul
It makes sense that Dave Douglas's major-label debut should be his most accessible recording yet.Soul on Soul's user-friendly quality stems not only from its standard jazz instrumentation (trumpeter Douglas, pianistUri Caine, trombonist Joshua Roseman, bassist James Genus, drummerJoey Baron, and either Chris Speed or Greg Tardy on reeds) but also from its inspiration. As he had with earlier albums devoted to Booker Little (In Our Lifetime), Wayne Shorter (Stargazer), and Joni Mitchell (Moving Portrait), Douglas pays tribute to big-band arranger, boogie-swing pianist, and sacred-jazz composerMary Lou Williamsby revamping her tunes and creating new compositions in her style. The young trumpeter neither slavishly imitates the legend nor obscures her. Instead he uses her materials--orchestral harmonies, bluesy syncopation, sophisticated gospel--as the building blocks for his thoroughly modern music. The instinctive improvisations always evolve organically from the cerebral compositions, and the solos always find unexpected detours before coming home. A great album.--Geoffrey Himes