Nate Wooley Quintet - (Dance To) The Early Music (2015)

Defying boundaries, those which state that there is a corner represented by Wynton Marsalis and an opposite corner in which Nate Wooley has marked his own name, the Nate Wooley Quintet presents us with an unexpected CD of the leader’s own versions of Marsalis’s music. Unexpected for some, but not for Wooley: after all, the American trumpeter became interested in jazz because of the Wynton Marsalis recordings he heard while forging his first steps in music. Without any aesthetic, political, or ironic baggage, Nate Wooley just felt that it was time to show why he loves albums like “Black Codes”, “J Mood” and “Wynton Marsalis”, while translating it to his unique style. His concept is clear from the liner notes to this recording, while the passion and joy in this music is clear from the recording itself. The leader here is at a point in which he senses that jazz – more than experimental and free improvised music – is once again bringing him «to new and increasingly intellectual paths». The results are astonishing, in what we hear and in what “(Dance to) the Early Music” represents, making us expect much more in the future of this personal rediscovery.