ALLAN BROWNE — Shreveport Stomp (review)

ALLAN BROWNE — Shreveport Stomp album cover Live album · 2011 · Avant-Garde Jazz Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
js
Acoustic piano trios have been one of the more happening trends in recent jazz history, and while there was a sameness setting in for a while as too many trios seemed to copy the popular sound of the trend setting e.s.t., in recent years these modern trios have been showing a lot more variety, as well as a stronger willingness to push themselves into new musical territories. With this rise in creativity comes new challenges as aspiring pianists try to find ways to rise above the pack.

Although “Shreveport Stomp” is credited to drummer Allan Browne, this album is really all about up and coming piano virtuoso Marc Hannaford, not that Browne and bassist Sam Anning aren’t very talented in their own right, but Hannaford is the well deserved star of the show here. Marc has a strong jazz side, but after just a few minutes listening you can tell he is very comfortable with modern concert hall music too. One of the first things that hit me about Hannaford was that I thought I heard a strong element of 12-tone serialism ala Arnold Schoenberg etc. In fact Marc often sounds like a humorous unlikely mix of the abstractions of Schoenberg with the further jagged abstractions of Theolonius Monk.

Serialism is a composer’s style of music that uses math-like formulas to construct music in which all notes and rhythms share equal importance and any repetition of material is avoided. This process may sound cold and intellectual, but I’ve always found the piano music of total serialists such as Milton Babbit to be anything but cold or sterile. What is remarkable is that Hannaford can duplicate this composer generated style in an improvisational setting. The big plus with Marc is he makes all this sound fun, with plenty of deconstructionist humor and just plain bizarre takes on some tunes we may have heard before from Monk, Jellyroll Morton, Brian Wilson and others.
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