Glenn Cashman & the Southland Big Band: Glenn Cashman & the Southland Big Band!

Since Glenn Cashman has spent much of his career in academia (he is an associate professor of music at Colgate University), it is no surprise that his debut album with the big band he leads in Southern California sounds, from track to track, like a history of postwar jazz. It’s possible to hear Stan Kenton, Sauter-Finegan, Miles Davis with Gil Evans, Thad Jones/Mel Lewis and even some Third Stream here. (“Satellite Twelve” is based on a tone row and dedicated to Cashman’s doctoral advisor, “new music” composer Robert Gibson.) Cashman himself cites Maynard Ferguson’s Birdland Dream Band, however, and although none of the trumpeter/flugelhorn players approaches Ferguson’s stratospheric style, that’s really a telling reference, since, despite being overtly steeped in jazz history, this is a living, breathing jazz band that swings and takes some hot solos.