Throughout his long, itinerant life, appearing and vanishing without notice, Freddie Redd has had several jazz careers. His most prominent period was the early 60s, when he created the music for the Broadway play (later a movie) The Connection. He’s self-taught and proud of it, with a natural talent for inventing off-centre but catchy tunes, and an effective piano style that has been described as unpolished. Here he leads a sextet, mostly half his age, through nine pieces that alternate between the tumbling urgency of bebop and some measured, unsentimental slow ballads. The trombonist John Mosca, bass clarinettist Stefano Doglioni, and especially the arrangements by alto saxophonist Chris Byars, catch their spirit perfectly.
