Curtis Fuller’s Once-Fleet Lines Missing

Trombonist Curtis Fuller’s long history in jazz reaches back to a role as a charter member of the Benny Golson-Art Farmer Jazztet in the late ‘50s. Since then he has appeared prominently with everyone from Dizzy Gillespie and Count Basie to Art Blakey and Stanley Clarke. On Wednesday night at the Jazz Bakery, Fuller turned up with a quartet consisting of Doug Carn on Hammond B3 organ, David Harper on tenor saxophone and Fritz Wise on drums. With few arrangements to provide much of a structural foundation, the set was largely limited to a line of familiar jazz standards: “Monk’s Dream,” “The Night Has a Thousand Eyes,” “Good Bait,” “Star Eyes,” “Yesterdays.”

Nothing wrong with any of those tunes, of course, all of which provide solid harmonic potential for improvisation. The problem rested in how that potential was fulfilled (and not fulfilled).

Fuller, unfortunately, never quite managed to reveal the fleet and flowing phrases that were so intrinsic to his playing in the early years of his career. Occasionally beginning a solo with an unexpectedly loud, blatting sound, his improvisational lines leaped randomly, sometimes chaotically. At 67, Fuller has demonstrated elsewhere that he is still a potent jazz artist, but little of that potency was present in Wednesday’s opening set.

Harper, a fluid, articulate player, made the most of his solo opportunities, despite the fact that his choruses generally tended to emphasize technical virtuosity at the cost of melodic invention. Carn’s organ only rarely surfaced with the blues-based phrasing that is essential to the B3.

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The Curtis Fuller Quartet at Jazz Bakery, 3233 Helms Ave., Culver City. Tonight through Sunday at 8 and 9:30 p.m. $25. (310) 271-9039.