The following originally appeared, in altered form, on the All About Jazz website.
Joe Licari: Clarinet; Mark Shane: piano.
Had the responsibility of naming this CD fallen to me, I would have chosen “After Hours.” Not that this small gem of an album, rooted in the sensibility and protocols of the swing era (and in certain of that period’s antecedents) isn’t a model of forward propulsion. Indeed, in both its slow and middle tempo numbers, it swings mightily. I’m speaking of the intimate, late night mood it immediately evokes.
What we have here are two gifted artists with a long professional association, subtly functioning as extensions of one another. And while they are obviously making music for themselves, for the sheer joy of it, they never lose — as the structure and cohesion of their interplay and individual flights makes clear — their awareness that they’ve also got an audience to please.
I’ve written elsewhere about Licari’s “unfailing exuberance, his touch with a ballad and the marvelous symmetry of his solos.” In the decade or more that I’ve been listening to him (mostly at Arthur’s Tavern in Greenwich Village on Monday nights) I’ve likewise been impressed not only by his command of all of his instrument’s registers and by the new places he has taken the evident inspiration of Benny Goodman, but by how, week to week, he continues to try different approaches and to grow. And he’s in his mid-eighties now.
As for the estimable pianist Mark Shane, let me quote from Marianne Mangan’s excellent liner notes. “…after an early brush with modernism, [Shane] heard the likes of James P. Johnson and Fats Waller and never looked back. With Teddy Wilson, Count Basie and Art Tatum influences in the mix, he developed an all-star resume as a stride virtuoso himself, a masterful ensemble and solo jazz pianist.” I would add how expertly Shane uses his left hand to compensate for the absence of a bassist.
Wisely chosen to optimally reflect the unique talents of their interpreters, the sixteen tunes in this rich and varied collection, ranging from the ever-appealing “Sugar” to the Sidney Bechet classic, “Si Tu Vois Ma Mere,” include many outstanding if lesser known jazz standards as well. Virtually every track invites and will reward repeated hearings.
Track Listing: Sugar; Please, Waitin’ for Katie; Delta Bound; There’s a Cabin in the Pines; Drop Me Off in Harlem; Sweet and Slow; Evenin’; Deep Night; You Were Only Passing Time with Me; Pee Wee’s Blues; That Rhythm Man; Baby; A Melody from the Sky; Did I Remember?; Si Tu Vois Ma Mere.
Ordering information: Joe Licari, 539 So. Mountain Rd., New City, NY 10956.
$17.50 postage and handling included. Contact Joe Licari: jazzreeds1@netzero.net for information about orders from outside the United States.
Called by Nat Hentoff “a writer from whom I always learn something,” Robert Levin is a jazz critic whose work focuses on free jazz. Writing since the 1950s, he has contributed to Rolling Stone, The Village Voice, All About Jazz and DownBeat. He’s the coauthor of two books on free jazz and has penned more than 100 liner notes for major labels like Blue Note. They include albums by John Coltrane, Cecil Taylor, Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk. His criticism and memoirs reflect long-standing, first-hand engagement with the musicians and movement he documents.
Levin is also a writer of short fiction and general commentary, with multiple published collections. See the About and Front pages.