Search - Frederic Hand :: Jazzantiqua

A Classic Fusion

Robert Carlberg | Seattle | 03/12/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This famous album from 1983 fuses jazz, classical and Renaissance music (the "antiqua" of the title). The result is a unique blend of sounds and styles which ought not to work, but somehow generally does.



Frederick Hand's acoustic guitar playing reminds one of John Williams, whose own "John Williams & Friends" mined a similar intersection between dissimilar styles. Added to the guitar are lute, electric piano, flute, recorder, saxes, crumhorn, drums, double bass and synthesizers. At times this disc can sound like the Paul Winter Consort, or the Roger Kellaway Cello Quartet, or Earl Klugh, or Gryphon, or one of Creed Taylor's mid-1970s productions on CTI records -- sometimes all within the same track!



It's a marvelously disorienting head-scratching experience which remains unique even today, 22 years later."