Original image by There Stands the Glass.
My preparation for Joshua Redman’s return to the Folly Theater on Saturday, February 7, went awry when I realized I’d rather be listening to the saxophonist’s late father. After checking out Dewey Redman’s 1966 debut album Look for the Black Star (wild! fun!) and Redman’s contribution to Keith Jarrett’s maligned 1979 album Eyes of the Heart (messy! awkward!) for the first time, I revisited an old favorite.
Old and New Dreams’ self-titled 1979 debut for ECM Records turned my world inside-out when I first encountered it in the early 1980s. Ornette Coleman- the man to whom the quartet of saxophonist Redman, trumpeter Don Cherry, bassist Charlie Haden and drummer Ed Blackwell paid homage- was little more than a name to me then.
Consequently, Old and New Dreams’ elegiac version of Coleman’s “Lonely Woman” was my introduction to the classic composition. Forty-five years later, it still gives me chills. My taste in improvised music was formed in large part by the landmark recording.
Joshua Redman’s occasional nods to the thornier work of his father were among my favorite moments of Saturday’s concert. (My review at Plastic Sax is forthcoming.) No one should feel obliged to follow the path forged by a parent. Even so, it’s the Old and New Dreams discography rather than the work of the younger Redman I continue to binge.