An adventurous saxophonist,
Charles Brackeen has been greatly underrecorded throughout his career. He cut an obscure disc for Strata-East in 1968 and was featured on a couple of
Paul Motian ECM discs, but did not have another opportunity to lead his own sessions until he cut three records for Silkheart in 1987; fortunately all have been reissued on CD. On his Silkheart debut,
Brackeen teams up with trumpeter
Dennis Gonzalez, bassist
Malachi Favors and drummer
Alvin Fielder for the unusual "Three Monks Suite" (an 8½-minute episodic work that was completely written out and has the tenorman switching to soprano), along with four passionate originals. Intriguing and often intense music that effectively uses simple folk melodies as vehicles for improvising. ~ Scott Yanow