New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Saxophonist Branford Marsalis, one of the foremost jazz artists of our time and a pacesetting creative force in the music for more than four decades, is set to make his Blue Note Records debut with the March 28 release of Belonging, a full album interpretation of Keith Jarrett's 1974 ECM album of the same name which introduced the pianist's European Quartet. Belonging is Marsalis' first new release since 2019 with his acclaimed longstanding quartet featuring pianist Joey Calderazzo, bassist Eric Revis, and drummer Justin Faulkner. The lead track "Spiral Dance" is available to stream or download today.
Marsalis admits that he was into other music when Belonging was released in 1974. "I was a freshman in high school, listening to R&B," he recalls. "I didn't know Belonging existed." That changed once he shifted his focus to jazz, although he was only familiar with Jarrett's solo piano music until pianist Kenny Kirkland introduced him to Jarrett's European Quartet with saxophonist Jan Garbarek, bassist Palle Danielsson, and drummer Jon Christensen. "We were sitting on a plane sometime in the eighties and Kenny put his headphones on my ears and played [Jarrett's 1979 album] My Song. When he tried to take the headphones back after five minutes I slapped his hand away; and when we got to the next city, I went out and bought every recording by that band."
A similar discovery occurred when Marsalis decided to include "The Windup" from Belonging on his band's previous album, 2019's The Secret Between the Shadow and the Soul. "We were all listening to 'The Windup' for the last record, and Revis said that we should just record Belonging, the whole album is so great and we could do things with it. We all liked the idea, and then the pandemic came. When the pandemic ended, we all still felt that yeah, we should do this."
The quartet applied Marsalis' previous approach to classics by Charles Mingus, the Modern Jazz Quartet, John Coltrane, and others - neither slavish fealty to the originals nor extreme deconstructions. "On the composition 'Belonging,' I clearly played things that Jan played on the record," Marsalis points out. "I didn't try to reject the idea when it occurred, but at no point did we plan to consciously pay tribute. I'm always listening to the whole record, not just the saxophone solos, and the most impressive thing about Belonging for me is how it all fits together."
Unlike Jarrett's band, which convened for the first time when it recorded Belonging and would only later become one of the signature groups of the 1970s, the Marsalis Quartet can call upon a rare history as a band. Revis joined in 1996, Calderazzo in 1999, and Faulkner in 2009, and their ability to hear and react to each other is unparalleled. Of equal importance to Marsalis is the lessons time has imparted. "The biggest benefit we have is 50 years of information that Keith's band didn't have, and our ability to process that shared experience."
Marsalis notes that "The whole purpose of this group is to be more like a chamber group than a jazz group," and in the process he has taken listeners along without compromising his approach. "All that any audience for any music wants is a great melody and a great accompanying beat" he explains. "It doesn't really matter where our journey goes, as long as we keep the dance going."
The quartet will be touring extensively across North America and Europe over the coming months. Visit branfordmarsalis.com for tour information and stay tuned for additional concerts to be announced shortly.
