A star for his R&B and hip-hop work, Robert Glasper here applies his elegant jazz skills with an all-acoustic trio to an inviting tracklist that was mostly written to be sung. That’s Glasper’s broad-appeal secret – on Covered, seductive anthems by Radiohead, Musiq Soulchild or John Legend keep glimmering through eloquent improv from the pianist and his long-time jazz trio of bassist Vicente Archer and drummer Damion Reid. Breezily greeting his studio audience with a “Whassup, y’all?”, he opens with fast, pithy variations on his Black Radio: Volume 2 piece I Don’t Even Care that always reflect the tune’s shape, the 13-minute In Case You Forgot mixes free-jazz scrambles and hit-tune quotes like Time After Time, while the evergreen Stella by Starlight has an unexpectedly Bill Evans-like sumptuousness. Quotes on black self-respect from Harry Belafonte and the haunting sound of a piano-shadowed childrens’ chorus namechecking African-Americans who have died at police hands furnish some sobering context for a warm, musical and humane Glasper venture.
