Search - Bobby Watson :: Quiet As It's Kept

A top album of contemporary jazz

10/31/1999

(5 out of 5 stars)

"A relaxed, warm, mellow session of beautiful new compositions from one of the most important and innovative composer of contemporary jazz scene. Bobby Watson work on the sound of his horn and on the melody. It's essentially a ballads album oriented that remind Coltrane's Ballads. It's different but similar for the poetry and the mastery of the music. A classic album for the new millenium. The music is fresh, full of feeling and innovative."

Superb Effort by Hugely Underappreciated Alto Master

Jan P. Dennis | Monument, CO USA | 06/25/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"It's great to hear Bobby Watson back on Red Records, the label of his greatest successes (especially Love Remains). Sadly, Quiet As It's Kept is already hard to find. I thought he'd finally put it all together after the marginal success of his group Horizon on a major label (RCA?--I don't have those CD's in front of me) and the universally panned fusion effort on the ill-fated Kokopelli label, but he still seems to be Mr. Hard Luck.It's difficult to know why this man isn't a jazz superstar. He's paid his dues, having come up with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers; he has one of the most beautiful tones on alto sax of anyone in the history of jazz, and he's no slouch on suprano sax either; he's an excellent composer, with some of his tunes in the standard category, and he shares a penchant for melonchollic composition with Tom Harrell, the great jazz trumpeter. One possibility is that he's too old to be a young lion and too young to be an old master.Quiet As It's Kept is a wonderful record. Choosing to forego the overheated virtuoso approach that characterizes much of jazz these days, Watson instead concentrates on slow-to-mid-tempo ballads. Perhaps that gives the record an aural monochromaticism that displeases some ears--not mine, however. The playing by all is top drawer, especially Ralph Peterson, whom one does not expect to hear in such surroundings. Simply some of the very best jazz currently available. Trust me, you won't be disappointed."