dreadpirateroberts With ‘Rite of Spring’ Hubert Laws brings jazz to an album completely made up of classical works, this time sourced mostly from Impressionist composers. Bach also makes an appearance, but perhaps the most impressive piece is Stravinsky’s ‘Rite of Spring’ which serves as a wonderful title track. Arranger Don Sebesky would use Stravinsky again on ‘Giant Box’ two years later (also featuring Laws) but here the combination is probably more enjoyable, in terms of its suddenness and brooding nature, its unpredictable shifts of mood. In fact, through use of guitar and vibes, along with percussion, the piece, at times, takes on a South American folk or even tribal feel.

Now whether you believe jazz and classical music can be truly melded, it’s clear Laws can play both styles, and he demonstrates that a jazz sensibility can be taken to classical compositions. Not every piece benefits as much from the mixture, as the gentle, melancholy aspect of ‘Pavane’ for instance, isn’t diminished, but neither is it improved or altered too much. That sounded incredibly stuffy of me, but basically James’ electric piano and the percussion don’t compliment the material as well as the flute does in this instance. Overall, it’s still lovely. Conversely, the use of guitar (across the whole album) is another matter. While the classical style of playing brings Spain to my mind (doubtless because of Rodrigo) both Bertoncini and Scharf are quite important to the record, in part due to the kind of bridging role they play, working to flesh out the space between the jazz rhythm of bass and drums and the lead voices of flute or bassoon.

As is often the case when I put on a CTI-era Laws album, there’s a piece or two that fails to click with me. I am in no way a classical music buff, but it seems that the Impressionist and Romantic styled pieces play better than the Baroque stuff. The pomp of composers like Bach and Mozart don’t seem to marry with jazz as effectively, and certainly not always on the Laws’ albums I own. While the Bach movements are lively here, there’s something missing between the jazzy rhythm and the flighty lead voices.

‘Syrinx’ is another showcase for Laws, like Airegin on 'In the Beginning', who takes it as a solo piece, playing a duet with himself. It's a delicate and quite mysterious reading of the Debussy piece, and while it’s not the highlight for me, it has a quality.

So if you like any of Laws, or CTI’s efforts to merge classical and jazz, wherever you’ve come across it, and feel like you need a bigger hit, then ‘The Rite of Spring’ has it. While not a collection of back to back triumphs, this should have enough interesting attempts to fuse two seemingly separate styles to keep you listening.