(Reprinted from the October 2020 issue of Downbeat magazine)
Bassist/composer Michael Feinberg tackles the concept of place on From Where We Came, his Steeplechase Records debut. The eight tracks on the album, all Feinberg originals, take their titles from the names of cities that fostered ground-breaking talents—a device that suggests more than a passing interest in the formative conditions that beget greatness.
Feinberg opens the album with an unaccompanied bass solo, a teasing set-up for his quintet’s thunderous entrance to “Louisville.” In honor of Kentucky-born boxing champ Muhammad Ali, the tune’s jouncing head gives saxophonist Dave Liebman—a heavyweight in his own right—space to scale skyward on soprano, while Liebman protégé Noah Preminger soars below on tenor. The adventuresome playing of these two reedists lends the right amount of effervescence to the group’s hefty sound; throughout the recording, the rhythm section (with pianist Gary Versace and drummer Ian Froman) bears the amplitude of the ensemble.
Most of the compositions ride on the collective propulsion of these five instrumentalists. Froman’s sophistication with a coolheaded bop groove animates “Pontiac,” for drummer Elvin Jones; Versace’s fleet, intervallic solos brighten “Cairo,” for baseball legend Jackie Robinson; and Liebman and Preminger finesse Feinberg’s spry melody on “East St. Louis,” for Missouri native Miles Davis.
Not all of the tunes are so locomotive, however. Feeling, more than energy, invigorates the open, languid “Tryon," an homage to singer Nina Simone, and a slow swing undergirds the John Coltrane tribute “Hamlet.” Most divergently, the wistful waltz “Tokyo,” Feinberg’s nod to film composer Ryuichi Sakamoto, soothes and settles at the album’s eleventh hour.
The album closes with “Nogales,” a gamboling up-tempo inspired by Charles Mingus; on its lone-bass intro, you can hear Feinberg lean keenly into each curve of the solo. Such musical prowess suggests that Atlanta, Feinberg’s hometown, is a good place to be from. DB