Following his brief major-label foray (he was picked up by RCA Victor and dropped after two albums), D.D. Jackson marks his return to Justin Time with a new piano trio disc, augmented on a few tracks with guest musicians. The accent is on Latin styles and smooth grooves; there are also “out” moments in the manner of his mentor Don Pullen, and also tinges of 19th-century piano repertoire (including some outright pastiche in “Prologue,” which despite its title is programmed last). The album rather perplexingly skirts the kinds of banal consonances one might find on a smooth-jazz radio station, even as it leavens them with pricklier playing – “Romanza,” for instance, with its cheesy acoustic guitar stylings courtesy guest-artist Freddie Bryant, nonetheless accelerates in each chorus to a rather tougher climax. I’m all for jazz musicians’ taking on the challenge of making valid music out of banal or schmaltzy materials, yet Jackson often oscillates between a dignified, unapologetic use of such materials (which I like) and histrionic elaborations on them (which I don’t). The ballad “For Desdemona,” for instance, is initially rather beautiful, but Jackson later swamps it with florid pseudoclassical elaborations. “Sigame” manages to stay on the right side of good taste until the very end, though this time the fault lies not with Jackson but with the violinist Christian Howes, whose climactic solo is truly tacky. All the above notwithstanding, there’s music of charm and interest to be found here – “Fort Greene Park” is a lovely bouncing waltz which Jackson decorates with a light touch, and “Jam Band” and “Cubano-Funk” are much better than their unimaginative titles would suggest. Nonetheless, it’s a puzzling and mostly unsatisfactory album.

Nate Dorward

Coda, May/June 2002