COMPOSERS: Bartok,Gershwin,Purcell,Shorter,Tyner
LABELS: Miles Music
WORKS: Tamburello
PERFORMER: King (ss, as, clt, ky, perc); Steve Melling (p, ky); James Hallawell (ky, prog); Alec Dankworth (b, perc); Stephen Keogh (d, perc)
CATALOGUE NO: MMCD 083 DDD
If Peter King had actually set out with the express intention of demonstrating once and for all that he is more than just a matchless Charlie Parker disciple, he could not have produced more convincing proof of his all-round musicianship than is contained on this rich and varied album. Superbly supported by his regular UK band, King does produce his trademark bop-inflected alto sound on the odd ballad, and injects soulful energy into both McCoy Tyner’s ‘You Taught My Heart How to Sing’ and Wayne Shorter’s ‘Yes or No’.
But it is his less overtly characteristic excursions into arrangements of material by Purcell (‘Dido’s Lament’), Gershwin and Bartók (the theme from the Second Violin Concerto, which begins King’s highly affecting four-part threnody for the late Ayrton Senna) that remain in the mind. This is certainly King’s best recording since the ravishing Brother Bernard, and Tamburello should bring him the worldwide attention he has deserved for so long. Chris Parker