Jimmy Cobb: Remembering U

Rating: ★★★★

Record and Artist Details

Musicians:

Tadataka Unno (p)
Jimmy Cobb (d)
Roy Hargrove (t, flhn)
Paolo Benedettini (b)
Javon Jackson (ts)

Label:

Jimmy Cobb World JCW

Dec/Jan/2019/2020

Media Format:

CD

Catalogue Number:

1001

RecordDate:

20, 21 and 28 June 2016

Cobb, now 90 and still very active, has selected this engaging session as the debut release on his own label. It's far removed from the expected post-Miles concept, more a series of personal reflections and familial evocations by his working trio and guests. ‘Eleanor’, which opens the album, is for Cobb's sister and is taken by Jackson as an elegiac ballad, quite slow and restrained, with Hargrove chiming in on flugelhorn at the end. Thereafter things perk up with Tokyo-born pianist Unno very much at the centre of things. A New Yorker since 2008, Unno is in constant demand for his Hank Jones-like facility and sensitivity; Cobb saying he's, “the backbone for me”. Most numbers feature Unno at length, Cobb his articulate, swinging self throughout. ‘Pistachio’ by Cobb's wife is brisk, with Cobb himself soloing vigorously, whereas Michael Jackson's ‘The Man In The Mirror’ has a gospel feel, Unno driving hard, funky in the approved Horace Silver manner. The title-track gives the excellent Italian bassist Benedettini his moment, the playing quite subtle, before ‘JC's AC’ brings Hargrove back, tightly muted on this boppish riff, Cobb the master of swing, drummer and trumpeter having fun in an exchange of eights. ‘W.K’ is for the late Wynton Kelly, a Cobb bandmate and friend, and again features the bassist before Unno excels in bluesy fashion. ‘Cobb's Belle’ is for the drummer's daughters and completes an album full of satisfying reassurances, first that Cobb is still on top of his game and, secondly, his trio companions are his equals in every way that matters. Incidentally, the note states that this session was Rudy Van Gelder's final assignment.

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