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Karolina Strassmayer, as;<br />
Drori Mondlak, d; Cary<br />
DeNigris, g; John Goldsby,<br />
b. July 26, 2011, Nürnberg,<br />
Germany.<br />
YORON ISRAEL<br />
VISIONS: THE MUSIC<br />
OF STEVIE WONDER<br />
RONJA YI3072<br />
ANOTHER STAR/ BIRD OF<br />
BEAUTY/ ALL IN LOVE IS<br />
FAIR/ CREEPIN’/ VISIONS/<br />
YOU ARE THE SUNSHINE<br />
OF MY LIFE/ CONTUSION/<br />
PASSIONATE RAINDROPS/<br />
WHERE WERE YOU WNEN<br />
I NEEDED YOU/ VISIONS<br />
REPRISE. 61:10.<br />
Yoron Israel, d, perc; Lance<br />
Bryant, ss, ts; Lazlo Gardony,<br />
p, kybd; Ron Mahdi, b;<br />
Thaddeus Hogarth, g 2, hca<br />
8; Larry Roland, spoken word<br />
5,10. Waterford, CT, no date<br />
given.<br />
New Issues<br />
137 | CadenCe Magazine | april May June 2013<br />
nect in a way that only players with extensive top-level<br />
experience can do. And<br />
Strassmayer meshes nicely with them. The saxophonist<br />
composed four of the eight tunes (the ninth track<br />
is an extended drum solo), DeNigris wrote two, and<br />
Mondlak wrote one. The guitarist’s charts add some<br />
funk/fusion to the session. His “See You Later” skips<br />
along sprightly and his “What Was That” sports a funky<br />
and infectious drum cadence. Strassmayer’s tunes,<br />
on the other hand, are more mainstream, the modal<br />
“Calling All Shadows” beginning in the incantatory<br />
manner of Coltrane’s “Alabama” before ratcheting up<br />
the tempo (DeNigris plays a wonderfully flowing solo<br />
here supported by Goolsby’s propulsive walking bass<br />
line). But her “You’re Either a Goddess or a Doormat”<br />
projects a wistful serenity before and after her alto<br />
reaches its agressive climax. Mondlak’s fast “After All”<br />
features his tuneful drums, some Cannonball-evoking<br />
alto, and swinging guitar and bass solos. Carolina<br />
Strassmayer is a consummate jazz saxophonist and<br />
Drori Mondlak a tasteful, melodic drummer (listen to<br />
his solo performance “Overtime”) who can swing. With<br />
two superb cohorts rounding out the quartet, Klaro!<br />
offers pure delight for listeners desiring freshly-minted,<br />
up-to-the-minute, mainstream modern jazz.<br />
David Franklin<br />
To no one’s surprise, Stevie Wonder’s songs provide<br />
fine material for jazz groups. For his fifth album,<br />
drummer Yoron Israel, with his band High Standards,<br />
offers a somewhat personalized collection of them.<br />
Pianist Lazlo Gardony’s arrangement of “You Are The<br />
Sunshine Of My Life” appears in 7/4, and the opening<br />
“Another Star” comes off as relaxed, gently swinging<br />
mainstream jazz, in contrast to the more active disco/<br />
soul original, for example. But overall the recording<br />
projects the feeling of a straight-ahead jazz combo<br />
utilizing songs written by top-flight popular song<br />
composers and selected to reflect the typical assortment<br />
of tempos and styles. An exception is when Larry<br />
Roland speaks his original poem to Wonder’s affecting<br />
“Visions,” the album’s title tune.<br />
The tasteful Israel brings a wealth of experience to
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