New York Repertory Orchestra: Le Jazz Hot

This is an unusual venture featuring the great saxophonist David Liebman with a full-blown orchestra under trumpeter Bill Warfield's direction. The band mostly operates in a Gil Evans Sketches of Spain-era mode, on four different examinations of New Orleans soprano-sax pioneer Sidney Bechet's theme Petit Fleur; there are also jazz spins on Darius Milhaud and Francis Poulenc – references to Bechet's adopted France. Liebman delivers the opening account of the principal theme, but mingles it with probing multiphonics. The band whoops and slews in a George Russell-like manner on the rocking Creataloop, sidles stealthily on John Coltrane's Blue for Bechet, simmers romantically on a brass-led version of Petit Fleur, and swings hard on its Poulenc variations, with Liebman at his most rugged and forceful on tenor sax.