US drummer/composer Terri Lyne Carrington has lent her signature mix of rock power, jazz hipness and relaxed precision to many big-time jazz leaders, but her own world-music leanings went down better in Europe than in the US for two decades until her Grammy for The Mosaic Project in 2011. But her musicianship always attracted stars, and the 2002-2004 tracks on this fine compilation from Munich’s ACT label include Herbie Hancock, saxophonist Greg Osby and guitarists Kevin Eubanks and Nguyên Lê. Choosing to make Jazz Is a Spirit – which is a little reminiscent of The Fast Show’s “jazz club” sketches – the album opener was perhaps an unwise choice, but elsewhere the ferocious east-west guitar virtuosity of Lê’s 2002 Jimi Hendrix project with Carrington balances cool-Miles/Wayne Shorter postbop from Hancock and horn players Terence Blanchard and Gary Thomas, and some spine-tingling interventions from French-Malian singer Aida Khann. The tumultuously Africanised Voodoo Child might make you jump out of your seat.
