Jamaica Plain-based jazz guitarist John Stein has released another of his fine albums. Aptly named Serendipity, Stein, along with bass guitarist Ed Lucie and drummer Mike Connors, continues to find exquisite melodies with his guitar, seeming to pull them out of the ether, instinctively harnessing his music into something good each time. Each piece on this Serendipity album cruises along with several nice touches from each player.
“Alfie’s Theme” by Sonny Rollins pulls in coolly with some hip, lightly picked high guitar notes. Stein’s mellifluous playing inspires his trio mates to jazz coolly too. Ed Lucie’s mellow, unobtrusive low end notes slink around like a sly cat while Mike Connors injects plenty of nimble fills on his drum kit
“On Green Dolphin Street” is a more robust number than the previous. Stein plays his high pitched melodic phrase with a lot of motion, the melody dancing around with energy and freedom. The rhythm section, bulbous and lively, move along a jaunty path, seeming to hopscotch through the soundscape created by Stein, lead by him while supporting him. It all assembles into a wedge of fun jazz.
A pushy rhythm section makes Thelonious Munk‘s “Well, You Needn’t” move forcefully forward. Bassist Ed Lucie plays his own melodic line on his bass as the drums play around his beat and Stein performs guitar gymnastics over it. It’s a clever assemblage of instrumentation and it becomes one heck of an interesting piece. Bouncing ideas off each other, these three players make you want to get down and dirty with jazz.
Moving along with many moving parts, Stein‘s original “Labor Of Love” swishes around the soundscape with the players releasing intervals of pleasant notes within a tight framework. Bits of flinty guitar notes fly off the fretboard. Rumbling bass notes loom around the piece with a pressing urgency. The drum work party shuffles things along, giving the guitar a platform to send shards of notes scurrying for the low end support.
“Insensatez (How Insensitive)” opens with Lucie playing an ominous bass intro, low end notes that forbore something dark. The entire piece that follows comes to be a sensitive rendering of the composer A. C. Jobim’s heart and soul. Stein plays a low key melodic phrase, indicating the aftermath of a bad experience. There may have been a lack of sensitivity that caused the event that inspired this piece. But, this piece rises above that with its own abundance of sensitivity. Each player keeps it low key to allow the others to express sorrow, pain, and regret. Eventually, Connors adds a trotting percussion to hold up the entire work, and that keeps this whole experience above water, emotionally.
Stein’s guitar work on his own “Bing, Band, Boom!” contains intervals of sprightly notes, bits of sound that jump, dance, and weave. Getting unobtrusive support from the rhythm section., Stein expands on his interval until he is picking several different notes, creating a larger sound to capture the listener’s imagination by building an entire world with his instrument.
With a rock and roll feel in its plethora of drum fills and rolls, Elvin” is the most swinging piece on this Serendipity album. After setting the vibe for this piece, Connors powers it with a lighter percussive line whereas Stein picks off some hip, feel good notes. While the rhythm section consistently maintains a light, loosey, goosey feel, the melodic guitar moves around every open space left by that sly, subtle rhythm section. One would enjoy this piece in particular to hear the players move around each other with acute awareness of where the others are going. Musical chemistry at its finest.
“The Night Has A Thousand Eyes” has an element of mystery about it. Stein’s guitar line dances merrily along a challenging, twisty path. Its notes are clear and bright, suggesting there’s a love affair afoot. Yet, the more complex interplay between chords and a gorgeous groove loaded with drum smacks, suggest sly movement, things a detective hiding his face behind a newspaper in a black and white movie would notice. Again, it is the textures, tones as much as technique that can make things happen when these men have instruments in their hands.
The intriguing title “East Of The Sun And West Of The Moon” finds Stein maintaining a steady, hip guitar line. His jazz is arrow straight until he wants to shift directions with another tempo, dynamic, or another instrumentalist all together. He lets Lucie take the wheel for a more rugged interpretation of the line without ever losing the piece’s direction. Getting breezier near the end, Stein makes space, between his precise, flinty notes, for Connors to chime in with an offering of drum fills, hip rhythmic nuggets that keep things interesting as Stein gets ready to swoop down for a landing.
Close out track “Happy House” by Stein makes us feel like it’s party time.. Stein’s guitar, lively and peppy as ever, moves in fun, elegant ways, suggesting much motion. Connors injects his trademark drum fills, a plentitude of those bumpy drum smacks. If Stein’s guitar line is the water jumping out of a huge fountain, Connors drum work is the rippling pool of water those ever rising guitar notes descending into.
Mike Stein and his cohorts Ed Lucie and Mike Connors have come up with some fascinating, intrigue music on this Serendipity album. Fascinating because the three play so well, especially the interaction between each player. Intriguing because they can tell a story, paint a picture with colors, tones, tempos, and dynamics. This album should appeal to any fan of jazz, jazz fusion, instrumental music, progressive rock, and maybe a few others groupings as well. Produced by Stein, Serendipity was recorded at New Bedford Art Museum in August of last year during the pandemic and broadcast on the internet for AHA! Night. It’s released on Whaling City Sound in New Bedford, Massachusetts.
