Rudresh Mahanthappa & Bunky Green - Apex (2010)

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Rudresh Mahanthappa & Bunky Green - Apex (2010)

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There is a forceful strut to the unfolding patterns and shapes that swirl across the ten originals of this twin alto sax bash. Mahanthappa cites the undeservedly sidelined veteran Bunky Green as a major influence both favour a fruity tone and use modal scales as a starting point but there are many different shades to sustain interest, and the ensemble playing is top drawer. Green s wisp of blue smoke adds depth to the whirligig bustle of his young partner; Jason Moran fleshes out the lyricism with full-bodied piano. –FOUR STARS The Financial Times

Saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa is best known as pianist Vijay Iyer's regular partner, but he's paired here with an alto sax inspiration from his student years: the little-known (and now 75-year-old) former Charles Mingus sideman and eminent jazz educator Bunky Green. Like Mahanthappa, Green enjoys tonal manipulations that take liberties even by the standards of a music as unbuttoned as jazz. (The former absorbed this style from sitar players, the latter from street musicians in Algiers in the 1960s.) But much of this vigorous set is also full-on, restlessly rhythm-shuffling postbop, bristling with intricate themes. Welcome is a haunting exercise in atmospheric note-warping, but on the uptempo Summit and the staccato Who?, the saxes trade flying phrasing with a verve that obliterates the decades between them. Soft begins as an exercise in multiphonics that becomes almost Ellingtonian; Playing With Stones is crackling avant-funk; Rainer and Theresia a delicious cool-jazzy ballad. Two altos in constant company can get a bit shrill, but it's a scintillating encounter, made more so by having four tracks with Jason Moran on piano and Jack DeJohnette on drums. –FOUR STARS The Guardian