(Reprinted from the January 2023 issue of Downbeat magazine)
Much has changed since Harmony, Bill Frisell’s long-awaited debut as a leader on Blue Note in 2019. Not just in the world at large, but in the celebrated guitarist/composer’s interior space. With Four, the third Blue Note release under his own name, Frisell honors several close friends who recently passed. From this place of loss springs a serene work inspired by these deep, lasting bonds.
The title refers to the band’s configuration, a spectacular quartet with Frisell, horn player Greg Tardy, pianist Gerald Clayton, and drummer Jonathan Blake. Like Frisell, Clayton and Blake—newcomers to his sphere—bring a preternatural sensitivity to their playing. Collectively, the group intuition serves Frisell’s Americana-derived themes well, unearthing levels of meaning in the simple melodic forms.
On “Dear Old Friend (For Alan Woodard),” for instance, Tardy’s homey, Foster-esque clarinet solo brushes against the passing dissonance in Clayton’s piano accompaniment. Frisell opens the whiskey-warm improvisation, “Blues From Before,” with halting licks—a teasing invitation to the band’s carefree extrapolation. Blake catalyzes the oddly whimsical “Holiday” with bold dashes of rhythmic color, and on “Dog On A Roof”—the album’s most experimental track—the ensemble emerges from the tumult to join in unison on Frisell’s ominous melody.
Against expectation, though, the album doesn’t dwell in mournfulness. For contrast, listen to “Good Dog, Happy Man,” a light-hearted ramble through harmoniousness. Or “Waltz for Hal Willner,” with its jaunty lilt and shiny edges. And “Always,” a solo vehicle for Clayton’s perspicacious understanding of beauty.
In the album bio, Frisell dedicates Four to the late trumpeter Ron Miles, his “closest, longest brother-friend.” Miles lives on in the musical wisdom that this relationship engendered, Frisell says—wisdom that he in turn passes on. In this way, he asserts, their friendship endures.
Four: Dear Old Friend (for Alan Woodard); Claude Utley; The Pioneers; Holiday; Waltz for Hal Willner; Lookout for Hope; Monroe; Wise Woman; Blues from Before; Always; Good Dog, Happy Man; Invisible; Dog on a Roof. (57:50)
Personnel: Bill Frisell, electric, acoustic, & baritone guitars; Greg Tardy, clarinet, tenor sax, bass clarinet; Gerald Clayton, piano; Johnathan Blake, drums.