Common Ground - Enrico Le Noci Quartet

 © Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Like the harmonica and the accordion, there is a great deal of controversy surrounding the appropriateness of the organ in a Jazz setting: usually Jazz fans either love it or hate it.

I am a big fan of the organ in Jazz, and have been ever since I heard Jimmy Smith’s Hammond B-3 organ performances on his Blue Note recordings from the 1950’s and 60’s. With drummer Donald Bailey as his primary running mate, Jimmy’s recordings involve trios and quartets with sax and guitar that feature Stanley Turrentine, Tina Brooks and Ike Quebec on tenor saxophone and Thornel Schwartz, Kenny Burrell and Quentin Warren on guitar.

Guitarist Wes Montgomery’s earliest recordings on Riverside Records in the early 1960s featured a trio with Melvin Rhyne on Hammond B-3 and Jimmy Cobb on drums.

The ever durable Rhyne would reprise this organ-guitar-drums trio format in a series of recordings he made for Criss Cross in the 1990s with Peter Bernstein on guitar and Kenny Washington on drums.

Peter, of course, has been a long-standing member of a trio made up of Hammond organist Larry Goldings and drummer Bill Stewart that dates back to their college days together in the late 1980s.

And Larry has made some wonderful recordings on the Hammond B-3 as a member of uber guitarist John Scofield’s quartet with tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano and the marvelous Bill Stewart on drums.

Hammond B-3 organist Don Patterson often teamed up with tenor saxophonists Sonny Stitt, Booker Ervin or Junior Cook,, guitarist Pat Martino and drummer Bill James on hard-driving, “boppin’ and burnin’” releases for Prestige Records which have been collectively relabeled today as “Acid Jazz.”

On the West Coast, organist Richard “Groove” Holmes made Pacific Jazz recordings with tenor saxophonist Curtis Amy as well as under his own name for that label that featured tenor saxophonist Gene Edward, guitarist Joe Pass and drummers Lawrence Marable, Jimmy Smith and Billy Higgins.

These are but a few examples of the organ-guitar-drums + sax combo format that has been in place since the advent of the hard bop era of Modern Jazz. Brother Jack McDuff, Johnny “Hammond” Smith, Baby Face Willette - the list is endless for those who employed a similar format.

Not surprisingly, the organ-guitar-drums plus format has even been adopted by some of today’s European Jazz Modernists including French Hammond B-3 organist Eddy Louiss with tenor saxophonist Barney Wilen, guitarist Rene Thomas and drummer Kenny Clarke, Italian tenor saxophonist Max Ionata, who sometimes works in a trio with Hammond B-3 organist Alberto Gurrisi and various Italian drummers, and Dutch alto saxophonist Benjamin Herman who has made some funky “boppin’ and burnin’ recordings with three fellow countrymen, Jesse van Ruller on guitar and Carlos de Wijs on Hammond B-# along with the stellar Martijn Vink on drums and another with Jesse and Larry Goldings and the master groove drummer, Idris Muhammad.

So much for historical context.

For young players, the orchestral qualities of the organ in combination with the electric guitar and the sax opens up the possibilities of a Jazz-Rock fusion which is responsive to the way they hear the music today.

And especially for young guitarists, they can incorporate what they’ve been hearing in Pat Martino, Pat Metheny, John Scofield, Carlos Santana, Jerry Garcia, Eric Claptan and many other “straight-ahead” and “fusion-inspired” players into a Hammond groove which also fits nicely into a number of swinging musical situations.

What is required here is a guitarist who can recognize the beauty of the Hammond groove format and a drummer who can lay it down.

Enter guitarist Enrico Le Noci and master drummer Eric Ineke who are joined on Enrico’s latest recording- Common Ground - by tenor saxophonist Pietro Mirabassi and Hammond organist Arno Krijger in a series of performances that more than do justice to the venerable organ-guitar-drums + sax arrangement. 

Over Eric’s straight-ahead and swinging Jazz drumming, Enrico, who composed all seven of the albums original compositions, is free to use his influences to create on Pied Fries, a contrafact of sorts on Wes Montgomery’s Fried Pies, Arjun’s Blues, a slow blues that beautifully encapsulates the sensual moodiness that the sonority of the organ can create and In The House, a lovely three quarter time melody that’s played at an easy pace that allows everyone to comfortably stretch out.

The sound that Enrico achieves on guitar is clear and clean; his notes and phrases ring true and he doesn’t make mistakes, not an easy thing to do on such a difficult instrument. Pietro's tenor phrasing is infused with Coltranesque harmonic references, as is the case with many young tenor sax players today, but his sound is bold and his style is daring. Arno certainly knows his way around the Hammond organ but he plays it pianistically, more like Melvin Rhyne, without resorting to the orchestral devices for which the instrument is famous, or infamous, depending on your point of view.

Of the remaining four tracks: the title tune, Common Ground features a two-beat shuffle feel, which is almost a trademark for organ-based combos, with Pietro and Enrico playing the line in unison; a fun track from beginning to end.

Night Fears is an exquisitely slow ballad with Enrico’s guitar sound drenched in a country blues twang that elicits a melancholic sonority which Arno enhances with sustained notes and chords on the organ that adds to the mysterious aura of the track. Without question, a potential soundtrack for nightmares and other eerie feelings.

Keys, with its nice bouncy rhythm and simple, straightforward melody is almost a relief by comparison and finds both Enrico and Arno in a reflective mood.

And the closing track - Bright Changes - is a “bright” burner in the best tradition of hard bop swingers which finds everyone at that hard charging best. Its 12 bar blues structure is cleverly arranged by Enrico to give the tune a complexity that makes it interesting to listen to and to play on with Arno and Eric taking it out with 4-bar to 8-bar trades, respectively.

There’s so much to appreciate and enjoy in Enrico’s compositions as they both honor the Jazz tradition that went before them as well as expand them with his superb musicianship, fertile imagination and the inclusion of first-rate musical partners in Pietro, Arno, and of course, master drummer, Eric Ineke.

If you are looking for something new and different to add to your Jazz collection, look no further than Enrico Le Noci’s Common Ground which is available through ZenneZ Records.