Mark Masters Ensemble: Our Métier

Arranger and composer Mark Masters has been leading bands since the mid-Eighties. With Our Métier, he leads his Mark Masters Ensemble in a vigorous program of his own original compositions plus a pair of brief small group collective improvisations. He’s enlisted some heavyweight guest stars to help him out, including the great Andrew Cyrille on drums, saxophonists Gary Foster, Oliver Lake, and Mark Turner, and trumpeter Tim Hagans. One of Masters’ masterstrokes (pardon the pun) is to invite musicians from very different niches in the jazz world to collaborate and see what develops. Another guest performer, bassist Putter Smith, has been a mainstay of the Southern California scene since the mid-Seventies, and he’s frequently performed alongside Foster, but I would never expect to find him in the same rhythm section as Cyrille. Or to discover saxmen Gary Foster and Mark Turner side by side, even knowing of Turner’s great appreciation of the veteran Foster, expressed in a laudatory note in the booklet. As Masters writes in his notes on the songs, “honest, original voices improvising” is one of the key elements in his preferred way of making music. With such authentic individualists as Lake, Turner and Hagans on board, plus the always impressive Cyrille making his presence felt, a powerful dose of “original voices” is assured. Their stirring solos and the freshness of the musical relationships combine with the challenges of Masters’ multi-faceted and unpredictable tunes and his beautifully balanced ensemble to make Our Métier a uniquely enjoyable musical experience.
Capri; Tim Hagans, Scott Englebright, Les Lovitt (tp) Les Benedict, Ryan Dragon, Dave Woodley (tbn) Stephanie O’Keefe (Fr hn) Gary Foster, Oliver Lake, Kirsten Edkins (as) Mark Turner (ts) Jerry Pinter (ss, ts) Bob Carr (bars, bcl) Ed Czach (p on *) Craig Fundyga (vib on #) Anna Mjöll (vcl) Putter Smith (b) Andrew Cyrille (d); Glendale, CA, April 8-9, 2017; Borne Towards the Stars#/ 51 West 51st Street/ Lift#/ Ingvild’s Dance*/ A Précis of Dialogue/ Dispositions of the Heart*#/ Obituary*#/ Luminescence#/ In Our Time/ Our Métier#; 55:32. caprirecords.com