Waves of Calm

Chronique

Saxophonist Jim Snidero turns his adept post-bop skills inward on the introspective, if still engaging 2019 session Waves of Calm. The album, which comes on the heels of several exuberant projects including 2016's Miles Davis-influenced MD66, and 2018's Jubilation! Celebrating Cannonball Adderley, is in part a response to his father's battle with Parkinson's Disease -- a struggle that ended with his passing shortly after the album was finished. While by no means a ballads album, though there are several here including a gorgeously moving rendition of "Old Folks," Waves of Calm is a work of far-eyed rumination that leaves plenty of room for searching, harmonically creative improvisation. Joining Snidero once again is his Jubilation! bandmate trumpeter Jeremy Pelt, as well as pianist Orrin Evans, bassist Nat Reeves, and drummer Jonathan Barber. Together they play with a warmth and style that is the epitome of post-bop sophistication. In some ways, the album is a balanced mix of the influences Snidero has been investigating since the early 2010s. Both "Visions," which features Evans on Fender Rhodes, and the angular "Truth" evoke Miles Davis' late-'60s modalism. Similarly, "Dad Song" is dusky Latin groover that brings to mind the classic hard bop recordings of Horace Silver. Equally evocative is the languid title track, which pulls the listener along as if floating on a boat in a soft evening breeze. As the title implies, Waves of Calm is the sound of Snidero taking a deep, tension-relieving breath before jumping back into the flow of life.
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