Sherman Ferguson has honed his unique skills working with Benny Carter, Pharoah Sanders, Sun Ra and Horace Silver. His new quartet, JazzUnion, is tearing things up in Los Angeles with an unusual front line including two saxophones, Louis Van Taylor and Carl Randall, and bassist Trevor Ware. Ferguson’s new release, Welcome to My Vision (Jazz/a/sance), features intriguing arrangements of the standards “Lush Life” and “Lester Left Town” as well as Bobby Watson’s “Monk He See, Monk He Do” and Oliver Nelson’s undeservedly obscure “Black, Brown and Beautiful.” Ferguson plays here with his customary clarity, whether leading the funky parade march of “Mixed Nuts” or playing his melodic, unaccompanied drum solo “Philly Joe.” Without piano or guitar Randall and Van Taylor are free to explore more modern harmonic possibilities, as they do on the initially somber, eventually jubilant “Spirit of Higgins.”
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