John Fordham 

Harrison Smith

Lauderdale House, London
  
  


In celebrating the music of the late sax master Joe Henderson, the London musician Harrison Smith is inadvertently drawing attention to both the musical originality and the undeserved obscurity they have shared.

Supporting him on his current tour, mixing Henderson pieces with his own originals, were a fine trio of local players - Liam Noble on piano, Dave Whitford on bass and Winston Clifford on drums. A few unintended whistles and split sounds revealed Smith's public discomfort in the early stages, but he quickly rediscovered the special muse that has always marked him out.

Smith displayed many of Henderson's characteristics with a cliche-free, spontaneous melody, and a rare blend of tenderness and brusque, muscular power. On Henderson's famous Black Narcissus, Smith similarly swept boldly over the long, whirling lines, held the sustained sounds with tremulous eloquence, and echoed the American's dark, haunted lower tones. Pianist Noble reflected the mood of restless avoidance of the obvious, giving each solo a shape and character of its own.

A Smith original, Outside Inside (a nod to a Henderson album title, In 'n Out) developed from an unaccompanied bass clarinet overture of deep sounds, sudden barks and hoarse multiphonics. A repeating bass figure brought the music to a slow-tempo reverie, alternately airily lyrical and raw, then an accelerated episode dominated by Noble's animated-Jarrett figures and Clifford's subtle percussion. Punjab, a bumpy Henderson tenor swinger, explored a kind of insistent bleariness, with the piano mirroring the sax line. A really fine contemporary jazz quartet, and an ensemble of formidable equals.

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