I Am a Man

Album review

Beware the heavyweight casting! For this I’m A Man, Ron Miles has summoned at his sides drummer Brian Blade, guitarist Bill Frisell, pianist Jason Moran and bass player Thomas Morgan. True all-stars who never rest on their laurels and who clearly aren't there just for the money. With this project as powerful as a raised fist, the trumpet player from Indianapolis has transformed his trio with Frisell and Blade (who penned Quiver in 2012 and Circuit Rider in 2014) into a quintet. A gang committed to the commitment! The one that has always inhabited the jazz and its illustrious representatives, and that Ron Miles resuscitates in an America whose racial injustices are still newsworthy. Hence this completely explicit title, I’m A Man, a reference to the inscription that brandished black municipal employees in Memphis in 1968, after the death of two of their colleagues in murky circumstances. It’s the voice of Civil Rights History that resonates here once again. A voice tinted with blues obviously, but most of all a plural voice, as Ron Miles wanted. He shared with his accomplices not only their parts, but the complete partition of his compositions. It’s a collective approach, sometimes libertarian, like the jazz from the end of the 60s knew how to generate, and which sounds here more modern than ever. © MZ/Qobuz