Plays the Music of Burt Bacharach
Editorial Reviews
From Jazziz
If you unashamedly love the music of Burt Bacharach - as anyone with a taste for pure American pop should - Refractions is a tough recording to open your heart to. A clever, often fascinating project, Refractions finds pianist and arranger Marie McAuliffe pulling a bang-up postmodern overhaul on such B.B. classics as "Do You Know the Way to San Jose?," "The Look of Love," "Are You There With Another Girl?," and "Alfie." Bacharach devotees will be rankled, as some of the most sensuous and openly expressive music of our time is drained of its sensuality and genuine sentiment. But taken on its own terms, this demonstration of displaced inspiration - it's just too individual an interpretation to call an homage - has its own skewe charms. McAuliffe's rearrangements enthusiastically mess with the carefully shaped harmony, melody, rhythm, and formal structure of the original compositions. The charts, swarming with highly detailed writing, make full use of a well-balanced three-horn-and-rhythm ensemble. Tenor saxophonist Rich Perry, trombonist/tubist Chris Washburne, trumpeter Rob Henke, and bassist Dave Hofstra are all standout players who sound as if they've been working through McAuliffe's elaborate lines for decades. Each contribute to the palpable seriousness behind it all; camp revision has no place in the leader's aesthetic. Pleasure may not hold the ace here; it's wealth of invention that wins the day. McAuliffe takes chances: "A House Is Not a Home" gets turned into a duet for tuba and bass; "Trains and Boats and Planes" becomes a haunting fugue-like chamber-jazz piece; "One Less Bell to Answer" takes on the quality of a stark Vienna-school miniature; "The Land of Make Believe" is transformed into a poly-tonal swinger - you get the picture. Strong solos abound, but McCauliffe's daring writing takes pride of place. (A distinctive pianist, McAuliffe hardly features herself, often sitting out arrangements altogether.) Don't file Refractions alongside your Dionne Warwick CDs quite yet. For now, it'll sit more comfortably next to Tzadik's Bacharach set in its Great Jewish Music series.
--- JAZZIZ Magazine Copyright © 2000, Milor Entertainment, Inc.
Plays the Music of Burt Bacharach,Marie McAuliffe,Avant Records,Jazz,Jazz Music,Pop
Plays the Music of Burt Bacharach
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