(1991) Cristina Mazza/Reggie Workman/Mal Waldron - Where Are You ***

 

With: Cristina Mazza (alto saxophone), Reggie Workman (bass on #A1, A2), Mal Waldron (piano on #A3, B1, B2, B3)
Record date: probably somewhere in 1991

Another record with an Italian woman. But Cristina Mazza ain’t no singer, she plays alto saxophone. She is mainly active in the Italian scene but she sure ain’t no Candy Dulfer. Mazza plays more avant-garde oriented jazz and is not afraid to make crossovers with a genre like heavy metal, like she did once with John Tchicai on the ‘No Trespassing’ album. Definitely not a boring lady. Also joining is the great Reggie Workman, who fortunately joined Mal on so many occasions. On this record he does not play with Mal. And of course there’s Mal himself who was never afraid to play with new talent or experiment with new styles. But he does not play on all the selections, just a few of them.

The music played here is a little hard to describe. Jazz or jazz structures are pretty far away. In a way it really is free improvisation on some of the selections. But you don’t have to expect loud and angry freejazz. Mazza has a pretty warm and sweet tone. It’s more like Neo-classical music with an avant-garde twist. The less accessible kind. The first two selections are really in that style. It’s a kind of dialogue between Mazza and Workman. And though both play beautiful, after a few minutes it really starts to bore a little. It just misses a groove, a theme and some direction. But they do blend pretty good. It’s not like they are on some different planet. But I just don’t really understand the planet that they are on. On the third track Mal joins for a duet with Mazza. Again it’s mostly free improvisation and Mal mostly follow’s what Mazza is playing. It is again all pretty abstract but he loses some of that abstraction in his own soloing which is beautiful and contains some of the warm energy this record really needed. There’s some blues in there also which is pretty refreshing to hear. This is a composition by Ornette Coleman but it’s pretty hard to get that out of the music.

Side B is a little more structured. The starting duet between Mazza and Waldron is clearly written by Mal, hence the brooding and dark atmosphere in it. But again the total arbitrariness in Mazza’s playing fails to impress. I really miss some idea’s here. The solo piano part by Mal is definitely the best of the whole album. His hot driven almost panicking piano style with it’s constant repeating phrases make a true first statement of feeling and emotion on this record. Of course Lacy’s ‘Blues for Aida’ is also more structured but it really misses a key ingredient…. Lacy himself. Mazza’s playing is ok but could not compare that of the soprano master himself. The closing song is a little unnecessary.

What I mainly miss here is the deep soul that Mal’s records mostly contain. I miss the freedom that he could get out of structured music. I miss some blues All of the musicians play pretty well an Mazza is no exception. But I just miss the statement she wants to make with this kind of music. 

There is no source on the internet nor on the LP itself that says anything about a record date. Only that is was released in 1991 on the pretty obscure Il Posto records. 1990 was the year that Mazza’s career started of so it was probably recorded in that year or in 1991. For some weird reason Il Posto released most of it’s stuff on LP and did not issue it on cd. That was pretty unusual in those years. The sound quality is not so great for something that was recorded in those years. It’s still pretty easy to obtain on the internet. One has to pay around 30 euros at least for it. If you ask me, there are better ways to spend them on another Mal record.