An Advanced Course in Strumology

It’s a fair estimate that more guitars have been sold in the past four or five decades than any other instrument. The guitar’s presence in jazz has benefited enormously from so many new players, all eager to find their own way.

If fusion jazz and jazz-rock did nothing else, they at least provided the opportunity for the enormously diverse potential of the electric guitar (with all its ancillary attachments) to enter the jazz mainstream. In doing so, the music’s younger practitioners were afforded a tonal range undreamed of by the instrument’s first generation or two of players. What are they doing with that range these days? Quite a bit. Here’s a look at four new CDs showcasing some impressively high-level performances from the jazz scene’s most adventurous guitarists.

Bill Frisell, “Blues Dream” (*** 1/2, Nonesuch). Frisell’s appearance at the Skirball Cultural Center in December included material that seemed to circle repetitiously around themes with no centers. Some of those pieces came from this album. The difference here is a three-man horn section (trumpet, trombone and alto saxophone) whose harmonic timbres and occasional contrasting passages bring the works into far more effective musical focus.

A pair of tunes in Frisell’s all-original program are dedicated to musical heroes. “Ron Carter” moves over an ostinato bass pattern that serves as an obvious tribute to the powerful rhythmic energies of its subject. Frisell’s folk qualities surface in other pieces (whimsically so in the stylistically alternate versions of the same theme in “Pretty Flowers Were Made For Blooming” and “Pretty Stars Were Made to Shine,” and the similar variations of “Where Do We Go?” and “What Do We Do?”), enhanced by the pedal steel guitar of Greg Leisz.

But Frisell’s musical curiosity is too far-ranging for him to remain in any particular stylistic arena for very long. And, although Leisz tends to lend a country quality to much of the material, Frisell continually throws expectations off base with horn solos, ensemble textures or sudden bursts of electronic sounds. Much of the music has so many elements criss-crossing each other that repeated listening keeps turning up new aural perspectives. If there’s a problem in this otherwise compelling collection, it is that Frisell’s tendency toward repetitions via vamps, ostinatos and melodic rephrasing is omnipresent. But when he provides enough contrast to use the repetitions as a referential undercurrent, this becomes a fascinating album indeed. (It will be released Jan. 30.)

John Scofield, “Works For Me” (*** 1/2, Verve). The title is intriguing, given Scofield’s stylistic shifts of agenda during the past few years. But this time--unlike 1999’s pop groove, “Bump”--mainstream jazz fans will be happy to hear Scofield in a largely straight-ahead set. And with Kenny Garrett present on alto saxophone, as well as the stunning all-star rhythm team of pianist Brad Mehldau, bassist Christian McBride and drummer Billy Higgins, it would be hard to imagine the music going in any direction other than well-crafted, hard driving jazz.

All-star ensembles don’t always produce all-star results, but these players appear to have a natural musical affinity for each other, despite an age range of 28 (McBride) to 64 (Higgins). The all-original material is generally first-rate--even more so with boppish lines such as “Big J” and the variation on “There Will Never Be Another You” in “Not You Again.” Soloing is universally well-done, with Scofield’s twisting, bent-note lines the product of an imagination comfortably blending an eclectic combination of musical elements. Mehldau is low-keyed but supportive, and the McBride-Higgins rhythm team shows how to make music come alive.

But the album’s most appealing quality is the interaction between Scofield and Garrett--comparable and a bit similar to the current combination of Charles Lloyd and John Abercrombie, and the obvious product of similarly oriented players with a remarkably synchronized musical vision.

Kurt Rosenwinkel, “The Next Step” (***, Verve). Rosenwinkel cites Frisell and Scofield (as well as Pat Metheny) as important influences, and the connections are apparent in this, his third album as a leader. Interestingly, like Scofield and Garrett, there is a powerful and extremely compatible linkage in many of the tracks between Rosenwinkel’s guitar and the tenor saxophone of Mark Turner. (On one track, “The Next Step,” Rosenwinkel sets aside his guitar for piano--his first instrument--adding yet another textural shift.)

Rosenwinkel is charting his own musical path, however, apparent in his use of unusual tunings and echo-like vocalizations with his musical lines. His efforts here are the product of a potentially innovative young artist, once his identity becomes more present. But he will need to find a palette with a wider spectrum of tonal colors, and a perspective that reaches beyond the too dominant dark shadows heard here.

Philip Catherine, “Blue Prince” (** 1/2, Dreyfus Records). With a few exceptions, some standards among them, this is another collection of largely original material. In this case, the guitarist-composer is a 58-year-old Belgian who has been working the territory between funk, fusion, groove and jazz a decade longer (back to the ‘70s in Jean-Luc Ponty’s Experience) than Frisell and Scofield, and several decades more than Rosenwinkel.

Surprisingly, despite his apparent efforts to display a rock point of view, Catherine’s playing sounds far more connected to a swing perspective (which may explain why Charles Mingus once referred to him as the “young Django”). Most of the originals are catchy themes without a lot of substance, and Catherine’s best playing--his ability to craft melodic improvisations--takes place on the standards. He is easily matched by trumpeter Bert Joris, whose airy, Chet Baker-like solos nearly steal the recording.