Exactly 30 years ago, pianist Michele Rosewoman received financial support from the National Endowment for the Arts to pioneer a 14-piece New Yor-Uba ensemble to explore the journey of the musical heritage of ancient African forms of song and rhythm, from Nigeria in particular, to Cuban folklore and subsequently to American jazz. This is not latin jazz as we generally know it. It's deeper; a quite extraordinary recording and all the compositions are driven by the amazing trio of bata drummers of whom Pedrito Martinez is a superstar in these circles and who provides animatedly passionate lead vocals. Her arrangements for the five horns feature dissonant melodies, often with striking contrapuntal sections, with Howard Johnson's tuba ensemble work adding extra weight to the sound, all hypnotically underlined by the relentless, often extremely complex bata rhythms. The influence of Rosewoman's stint with Steve Coleman's group can be heard in sections of the scores and there's often a heavy funk groove overlaid on the African rhythms. Of the soloists, the leader apart, the relatively avant-garde saxophonist Oliver Lake is outstanding, especially on soprano and there are some cryptic comments from Freddie Hendrix's trumpet. The two CDs contain a total of 14 widely varied songs. Of these, perhaps special mention should be made of the opener ‘Divine Passage’, the funk of ‘Natural Light’ and ‘Vamp For Ochun’, the way which ‘Where Water Meets Sky’ develops and builds with the bata drums going hell for leather and, probably the most outstanding of all, the epic closer, ‘Earth Secrets’ with its brilliant Pedrito Martinez vocal. The live band appeared recently at Dizzy's Coca Cola Club in NYC – with Antonio Hart and Billy Harper depping for Lake and Mike Lee – and tore the place apart. Imagine what it would be like at Ronnie Scott's. If only!