David Hilbert, it’s been said, was the last man to grasp the entirety of mathematics up to and including his own time, and to contribute to all its many subdisciplines. From that point on, mathematics became too complex and diverse a discipline for anyone to master completely: mathematicians necessarily became specialists. Jazz has its Hilberts too – figures who encapsulate virtually the whole history of the music and add something of their own – but their numbers are inevitably dwindling. Steve Lacy, bless his soul, was one of them. Von Freeman, now 82 years old, is another – a figure bridging “the great divide” between the present and jazz’s heroic past. His new album reunites him with drummer Jimmy Cobb, who played on Freeman’s 1972 album Doin’ It Right Now. The rest of the band – bassist John Webber and undersung veteran Richard Wyands – is also drawn from Cobb’s Mob (the drummer’s current working band). The album is thus a meeting between harmonious but distinct sensibilities: there’s a striking contrast between Freeman’s craggy, guileful improvising and the trio’s gracious accompaniment. The material includes several tributes to giants of the saxophone – Hawkins, Young, Parker – as well as “The Chant,” a lovely rubato piece recalling Trane circa 1965. Freeman’s tone and approach are almost surreally malleable: “This Is Always” and “Be My Love” are mordant, droopyeyed balladry cut across by gabbling outbursts and strained, wheedling cries; Hawkins’ blues “Disorder at the Border” is given a positively elemental reading, while on “Never Fear” Freeman is insanely jittery, a 1930s swing saxophonist run amok. Perhaps the backing trio could have been a little spunkier, but it hardly matters: this is 50 minutes of classic Von, above all the remarkable a cappella “Violets for Your Furs” that brings the album to a close.

Nate Dorward

Signal to Noise, Spring 2005