Footsteps of Our Fathers

1	Giggin' 7:20
2	The Freedom Suite: Movement 1 6:03
3	The Freedom Suite: Interlude 0:59
4	The Freedom Suite: Movement 2 8:19
5	The Freedom Suite: Movement 3 7:33
6	A Love Supreme, Pt. 1: Acknowledgement 7:11
7	A Love Supreme, Pt. 2: Resolution 12:37
8	A Love Supreme, Pt. 3: Pursuance 8:10
9	A Love Supreme, Pt. 4: Psalm 4:20
10	Concorde 4:59

Barnes & Noble

For the first release on Marsalis Music (a subsidiary of Rounder Records), label founder Branford Marsalis has chosen to honor artists who have influenced and inspired his own career in jazz, taking on iconic material from Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, and the Modern Jazz Quartet. On Footsteps of Our Fathers, Marsalis' saxophone stamps the "Resolution" section of Coltrane's epic A Love Supreme anew, playing with such commitment that it is nearly as frighteningly powerful as the original. On the following "Pursuance," pianist Joey Calderazzo matches Marsalis' energy, while drummer Jeff "Tain" Watts and bassist Eric Revis also lay into the tune. The closing section, "Psalm," is not a nostalgic hymn to Coltrane but an anointing one, reminding the listener once again that few in jazz can touch the strength or the humility of the composer's music. One who is equal in some ways to Coltrane is Rollins, whose own epic, Freedom Suite, also becomes a stepping stone for Marsalis' reinterpretive skills. He salutes Rollins's Caribbean roots by imparting something of a street-dance vibe to Movement I, while Movement II of the 1958 composition, which was written as a call for racial justice and equality, is played with a fragile and heartfelt loveliness. With the saxophonist supported by bass and drums only, the jubilant Movement III declares the strength of not only the music but also of the African-American culture from which it came. The album is so well thought out that Coleman's opening blues, "Giggin'," serves as an entry into the collective mind of the Marsalis Quartet, and the closer, John Lewis's "Concorde," is the swinging party after all that challenging stuff. Branford Marsalis exemplifies the role of the contemporary jazz player, to illuminate the past without becoming enslaved to it. Roberta Penn

Downbeat

Leaping into four historic compositions, the saxophonist has found himself.